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Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas on Tuesday took intention at what he referred to as “baseless” and “false” allegations leveled towards him by House Republicans ahead of a key vote on impeachment articles within the House Homeland Security Committee.
“I assure you that your false accusations do not rattle me and do not divert me from the law enforcement and broader public service mission to which I have devoted most of my career and to which I remain devoted,” Mayorkas stated in a prolonged letter to House Homeland Security Committee Chair Mark Green.
The committee is assembly to advance two articles of impeachment towards Mayorkas, accusing him of refusing to comply with immigration regulation and of breaching public belief. A vote is predicted later within the day, possible alongside occasion traces, shifting the articles to a House vote at a future date.
Mayorkas’ letter comes after Republicans have traded barbs with Democrats and the administration over the impeachment push towards the Biden cupboard secretary, who Republicans have accused of a “dereliction of duty” in his dealing with of the continuing and historic disaster on the southern border. Migrant numbers formally hit 302,000 in December, a brand new report, after 2.4 million encounters in FY23. Republicans have stated that enormous releases into the inside and a rolling again of Trump-era insurance policies have fueled the disaster.
Representative Mark Green, a Republican from Tennessee and chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, throughout a House Homeland Security Committee listening to in Washington, DC, US, on Wednesday, Jan. 10, 2024. (Photographer: Graeme Sloan/Bloomberg through Getty Images)
Green’s majority started investigating Mayorkas’ dealing with of the border disaster final 12 months and this month have held hearings on the impeachment articles that have been despatched by the House final 12 months. Those articles accuse Mayorkas of having “repeatedly violated laws enacted by Congress regarding immigration and border security” and of having “made false statements to Congress” that the border is safe, and closed and that DHS is in operational management of the border.
“These articles lay out a clear, compelling, and irrefutable case for Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas’ impeachment,” Green stated this week. “He has willfully and systemically refused to comply with immigration laws enacted by Congress. He has breached the public trust by knowingly making false statements to Congress and the American people, and obstructing congressional oversight of his department. These facts are beyond dispute, and the results of his lawless behavior have been disastrous for our country.”
Green accused Mayorkas of having “completely disregarded the separation of powers, a bedrock of our constitutional republic.”
“Congress has a duty to see that the executive branch implements and enforces the laws we have passed. Yet Secretary Mayorkas has repeatedly refused to do so. His lawless behavior was exactly what the Framers gave us the impeachment power to remedy. It is time we take this affront to a coequal branch of government, to the Constitution, and to the American people seriously,” he stated in a press release this week.
The administration and House Democrats have as a substitute blamed the disaster on a “broken” system in want of reform and funding from Congress, which they accuse Republicans of having failed to offer, amid a Hemisphere-wide disaster.
In his letter, Mayorkas declared that “problems with our broken and outdated immigration system are not new”
“Our immigration laws last received an overhaul in 1996. Our immigration laws were simply not built for 21st century migration patterns,” Mayorkas stated.
He pointed to statistics together with half 1,000,000 removals since May, and each day removals practically double what they have been in comparison with from 2014-2019. He additionally says that the apprehension charge has been 78%, the identical because the prior administration, and there have been a big improve in elimination flights inside the Western Hemisphere.
He additionally factors to elevated Border Patrol hiring, an anti-smuggling marketing campaign, and an intensified anti-fentanyl effort that has seen extra seizures of the lethal drug which kills tens of 1000’s of Americans annually.
“Instead you declare that now we have didn’t implement our immigration legal guidelines. That is fake,” he stated.
He additionally pushed again on the criticism his division has confronted over an alleged lack of responsiveness to oversight queries from Congress, claiming as a substitute that he has been conscious of Congress with testimony, witnesses and paperwork.
“The allegations are baseless and inaccurate,” he says.
MIGRANT CRISIS BROKE NEW RECORD IN DECEMBER WITH 302K ENCOUNTERS, OFFICIALS CONFIRM
Immigrants wait to be processed at a U.S. Border Patrol transit heart after they crossed the border from Mexico on December 20, 2023 in Eagle Pass, Texas. A late-year surge of migrants crossing the ussouthern border has overwhelmed U.S. immigration officers. (Photo by John Moore/Getty Images) (John Moore/Getty Images)
House Democrats have additionally backed Mayorkas on the matter. On Monday, they launched a prolonged report accusing the Republican majority of abusing the impeachment course of and operating a “sham” course of, whereas sabotaging Mayorkas’ efforts to deal with the border disaster.
“What is glaringly missing from these articles is any real charge or even a shred of evidence of high crimes or misdemeanors – the Constitutional standard for impeachment. That should come as no surprise because Republicans’ so-called ‘investigation’ of Secretary Mayorkas has been a remarkably fact-free affair. They are abusing Congress’ impeachment power to appease their MAGA members, score political points, and deflect Americans’ attention from their do-nothing Congress,” Ranking Member Bennie Thompson stated in a press release.
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“Republicans don’t actually want to work towards bipartisan solutions to fix the border – in fact, they have repeatedly sabotaged the Secretary’s efforts to secure the border and denied DHS’ funding requests. Secretary Mayorkas is upholding the law and honoring the public trust as he has throughout his more than 30 years of service to our Nation. The House must reject this sham resolution.”
Fox News’ Chad Pergram, Elizabeth Elkind and Tyler Olson contributed to this report.
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