This week, House Republicans on the Homeland Security Committee are moving forward with their blatantly unconstitutional attempt to undermine the Biden administration by marking up articles of impeachment against the Secretary of Homeland Security, Alejandro Mayorkas. The Homeland Security Committee, formed to defend national security interests, was once an exemplar of bipartisan compromise. Now, the esteemed committee is run by extremists who have spent years working to undermine our democracy, some of whom are even threatening civil war and the rule of law by encouraging states to ignore a Supreme Court order. MAGA extremists and some of Trump’s most fervent supporters dominate the Homeland Security Committee, and they have made it clear that they are more interested in scoring points with their MAGA base than actually reforming our country’s immigration system.
There are no grounds for impeachment, and it is clear that this is nothing but a naked partisan game launched at the behest of Donald Trump – but that should come as no surprise given that Marjorie Taylor Greene and MAGA Committee Chair Mark Green have been wanting to impeach Secretary Mayorkas since Republicans took charge of the House. Trump’s MAGA allies in Congress are following the Trump playbook once again, playing partisan political games to harm the Biden administration and hurt Democrats with a baseless, immoral impeachment push.
The GOP House Homeland Security Committee Is Packed with Trump’s Most Fervent Confidants.
- Nearly 75% of the Republicans serving on the committee have endorsed Donald Trump.
- Seven of the eighteen Republican committee members – 70% of the non-freshmen serving on the committee – voted against certifying the 2020 election results.
- Nearly 75% of the Republicans serving on the committee – thirteen out of the eighteen present – are vocal election deniers, including extremists like Mark Green, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Clay Higgins, Morgan Luttrell, and Eli Crane:
- Committee Chair Mark Green Worked to Overturn the 2020 Election. Green voted against certification of the Electoral College and joined an amicus brief seeking to throw out the votes in four key states won by Joe Biden. He was also one of the members who was texting Mark Meadows about overturning the election. Green began spreading lies about the election while votes were still being counted, tweeting on November 6, 2020 that “In Tennessee, we ensure our elections are administered in a fair, open, transparent process and that every vote is counted in accordance with Tennessee law so there’s no question about election integrity. Looks like Pennsylvania could learn a lesson or two from us.”
- Marjorie Taylor Greene Is A Top January 6th Conspirator. Greene’s leadership in the events of January 6, 2021 were so pronounced that her eligibility to run for office has been challenged in court. She relentlessly spread lies about the 2020 election being “stolen” and was a key figure working in Congress to overturn the results in Donald Trump’s favor. Greene texted White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows frequently for strategic guidance on overturning the election and she went as far as to suggest declaring martial law to keep Trump in office. She also reportedly attended a December 21 White House meeting focused on efforts to pressure Mike Pence to help overturn the election.
- Rep. Clay Higgins (LA-03) Described the 2020 Election As A “Conspiracy To Dismantle America.” Rep Clay Higgins is a MAGA extremist who released a bizarre video in 2020 while votes were being counted claiming to have “inside data that this election is compromised…Our president won this election. Feel my spirit.” After the Electoral College confirmed Joe Biden’s victory, Higgins compared supposed election fraud to the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II, saying, “the Supreme Court of the United States did not stop it. Lessons of history. They were 120 thousand. We are 75 million.” At the end of December, just two weeks before the violent attack on the Capitol on January 6th, Higgins tweeted that Biden’s inauguration, “will mark the final hour of conspiracy to dismantle the American election process, and the first hour of conspiracy to dismantle America.” He also signed a brief supporting Texas’s lawsuit seeking to throw out the election results in key states, then voted to overturn the results of the 2020 election. While votes were still being counted Higgins. Higgins has continued to defend the actions of the January 6 rioters, calling their treatment by the Department of Justice “disgusting,” and he even publicly challenged a random Alaska man who called him a “traitor” for voting to overturn the election to a physical brawl. In November, he even floated a conspiracy theory that the FBI sent “ghost buses” to Washington D.C. on January 6th, filled with “FBI informants dressed as Trump supporters, deployed onto our Capitol.”
- Trump Appointee Morgan Luttrell (TX-08) Said He Would Have Voted To Overturn The Election. Rep. Luttrell, a former Trump administration appointee, said he would have voted against certifying Joe Biden’s electoral college victory if he was in Congress at the time. He has called for “forensic audits” of the 2020 election, including in Texas – a state Donald Trump won by six points. In 2022, Luttrell returned a campaign contribution from his friend, January 6 committee member Adam Kinzinger, calling Kinzinger’s service on the committee “bad for the Republican Party.”
- Eli Crane (AZ-02) Campaigned on “Decertifying” the 2020 Election. Crane is an election denier who has repeatedly called for the “decertification” of the 2020 election, and ran his campaign with “election integrity as my number one issue.” Crane has been endorsed by some of the most extreme conspiracy theorists in Arizona, including QAnon-linked extremist Mark Finchem, far-right Oath Keeper member Wendy Rogers, and the star of a conspiratorial film about the 2020 election.
House Republicans’ Baseless and Unconstitutional Impeachment Effort Is Being Spearheaded by MAGA Committee Chair Mark Green. The impeachment effort is being led by Homeland Security Committee Chair Mark Green (TN-07), a MAGA Republican and member of the far-right Freedom Caucus who has endorsed Donald Trump’s re-election bid. Green has repeatedly demonstrated that this is just another partisan stunt, telling donors at a fundraiser over nine months ago that he would produce impeachment charges of high crimes and misdemeanors against Secretary Mayorkas: “get the popcorn…it’s going to be fun.” Even as he spent months investigating Secretary Mayorkas and finding no evidence of wrongdoing or even grounds for impeachment, Green has a record of refusing to work towards reforming our broken immigration system. Green is also a top Trump ally. In 2017, Trump even nominated Green to serve as U.S. Secretary of the Army, but withdrew the nomination after intense criticism – including from Senate Republicans – over his past statements about Muslims and LGBTQI+ people. Like Trump, Green has close ties with right-wing authoritarian leaders, and met with the inner circle of far-right former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro in November 2021 to discuss “voting integrity policies.”
MAGA Republicans Are Pushing Impeachment At the Behest of Marjorie Taylor Greene. Like Chair Green, far-right Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (GA-14) has been pushing to impeach Secretary Mayorkas from the beginning, demanding his resignation for months before the 2022 midterm elections. As early as November 2022, she began pushing for investigations into Mayorkas, posting on X, “More things like this to come.” Just a few months ago, Greene forced a vote on her own baseless impeachment resolution against Secretary Mayorkas, which failed to advance after facing bipartisan opposition. Greene even started fundraising off the vote to impeach Secretary Mayorkas in November 2023, encouraging her supporters to “chip in,” alongside a statement declaring, “If you have a Republican Representative, urge them to stand with MTG and IMPEACH Mayorkas now!”
MAGA Extremists Dominate the Homeland Security Committee:
- Five of the eighteen Republicans serving on the committee (30%) are members of the far-right freedom caucus, even though the Freedom Caucus comprises under 20 percent of the House GOP. Far-right Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene is a former member of the Freedom Caucus.
- At least four of the eighteen Republicans serving on the committee are supporting Texas Governor Greg Abbott’s lawless effort to subvert the U.S. Constitution and violate a Supreme Court order related to border security:
- In response to the Supreme Court ruling, Rep. Clay Higgins (LA-03) embraced secessionist rhetoric and a violent reference to civil war, posting on X, “The feds are staging a civil war, and Texas should stand their ground.”
- Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (GA-14) has also described the situation in violent terms, telling a right-wing audience, “I’m extremely concerned about that Supreme Court ruling…we literally saw a ruling that’s going to put the federal government at war with the state of Texas.” She called the ruling, “the most radical, devastating thing that we have seen happen in a Supreme Court ruling,” and said, “I think Texas needs to stand their ground and we should join Texas in their fight against the federal government to defend their state, defend their border, defend their people.”
- Reps. Anthony D’Esposito (NY–04) and Morgan Luttrell (TX-08) have co-sponsored a MAGA resolution seeking to undermine the rule of law by subverting the Supreme Court ruling entirely.
Homeland Security Republicans Care More About Political Stunts Than Immigration Reform.
- All but one Republican serving on the committee voted to advance Marjorie Taylor Greene’s MAGA impeachment resolution against Secretary Mayorkas in November 2023.
- All of the non-freshman Republican committee members voted against billions of dollars in border security funding as part of the FY 2023 spending package, which included a nearly $4.9 billion supplemental request for the border and provided the Border Patrol with $7.153 billion — a 17 percent increase from the year before.
- Nine of the ten non-freshman Republican committee members voted against immigration reform legislation adopted by a bipartisan majority that would have provided a pathway to citizenship for DACA recipients, expanded eligibility requirements for DACA, and expanded protections for Temporary Protected Status recipients
- Eight of the ten non-freshman Republican committee members voted against bipartisan immigration reform legislation that would have provided a pathway for certain undocumented agricultural workers to earn legal status, reformed the temporary agricultural worker program, and established an E-Verify employment eligibility verification system for agricultural labor.
- Seven of the ten non-freshman committee members voted against billions of dollars in border security funding as part of the FY 2022 spending package.