Heritage Action opposes any motion to dismiss or table the trial of Secretary Mayorkas and will include it as a Key Vote on our legislative scorecard.
The evidence of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas’ role in creating and facilitating the border crisis is undeniable. As a result, the U.S. House of Representatives impeached him on Feb. 13, 2024 on two counts:
Article I: Willful and Systemic Refusal to Comply with the Law; for releasing hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants every month into the United States and abusing his authority by improperly designating all people crossing the border as “refugees” to game the system by letting people in who legally should not be allowed to enter.
Article II: Breach of Public Trust; for lying to Congress, by withholding information and misleading the public to cover up the fallout of his terrible policies.
It is now the constitutional duty of the U.S. Senate to fulfill their responsibility to try impeachments, assigned under Article I, Section 3, Clause 6 of the Constitution. As The Heritage Foundation’s Thomas Jipping and Hans von Spakovsky write, the Senate has never refused to hold a trial when the impeached public official remained in office. To dismiss or table would be contrary to the Senate’s own impeachment trial rules and would be a serious dereliction of the Senate’s duty to hear and consider the evidence. The American people deserve the opportunity to have all the facts laid before them, especially when Mayorkas has been so deceitful about his open border operations, which have directly resulted in avoidable American deaths.
Our government cannot function if those sworn to uphold the law are not held accountable when they act in direct contravention of the law. As Steve Bradbury, distinguished fellow at The Heritage Foundation, points out: “What’s at issue in this impeachment is not a policy dispute over how best to enforce the nation’s immigration laws. Mayorkas is intentionally and actively nullifying and undermining those laws.”
The framers of the Constitution designed a system of checks and balances. A recent Supreme Court decision affirmed Congress’s power and appropriateness to respond to a cabinet member’s defiance of the law through impeachment. In holding that Texas lacked standing to challenge Mayorkas’ refusal to enforce immigration laws, removing him from office is the last tool available to Congress to hold his lawlessness to account.
Due to his willful and systemic refusal to comply with the law, and for his breach of the public’s trust, the Senate must also convict and remove Secretary Mayorkas from office. Removing Secretary Mayorkas will limit President Biden’s ability to continue his lawless immigration agenda by subjecting intense scrutiny for his replacement by Congress and the public.
If Senate Majority Leader Schumer wants to hide evidence and rob Americans of their chance to see Mayorkas evidence—his party will have to answer to the people at the ballot box. Any senator who votes to dismiss or table the trial will be complicit in the coverup and the on-going border crisis itself.
The Senate must fulfill its duty to hold a trial to convict and remove Secretary Mayorkas from office. The Senate must take seriously their constitutional role in exerting checks and balances and discouraging such lawlessness by future cabinet members.
Heritage Action opposes any motion to dismiss or table the trial of Secretary Mayorkas and will include it as a Key Vote on our legislative scorecard.