Providing for Consideration of H. Res. Impeaching Alejandro Nicholas Mayorkas, Secretary of Homeland Security, for High Crimes and Misdemeanors; Providing for Consideration of H.R. Protecting Health Care for All Patients Act of 2023

Floor Speech

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Mr. ROY. Mr. Speaker, I get no great joy being on the floor of the House of Representatives and talking about something as important and solemn as the removal of a Secretary of one of our Departments, particularly one as important as the Department that is in charge of homeland security. This is an individual who was appointed and then confirmed by the United States Senate. Impeachment is one of the highest charges we have as Members of the United States House of Representatives.

The charge by my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, particularly the ranking member on the Rules Committee, that this is a political exercise or that there are individuals taking ``orders'' from former President Trump, I think indicates the extent to which my colleagues on the other side of the aisle desperately want to make this political.

My colleagues on the other side of the aisle desperately want to take the abject and total failure of Democrat leadership on the southern border, resulting in death and destruction of the American people, the undermining of economic activity, the death of our children, fentanyl pouring into schools, ranchers who are getting absolutely decimated, the empowerment of cartels, and the empowerment of China.

This has all happened at record levels, record numbers, and my colleagues on the other side of the aisle know this. Therefore, they are desperately trying to deflect, deflect to legislation that was political and never had a chance to move from the Senate to the House, never had a chance to move, but they want to be able to deflect. They want to deflect an entire conversation about the failures of President Biden and the failures of Secretary Mayorkas to secure the border by not having a serious conversation about why we would be bringing Articles of Impeachment against a sitting Secretary.

The reason is simple: The Secretary of Homeland Security has blatantly ignored the laws of the United States he is charged to faithfully execute.

He has done so with reckless abandon. He has done so in a way that has led directly to the death of American citizens and to the death of the very migrants that the Secretary suggests they want to try to help.

A thousand migrants along the southwest border are dead, and 53 migrants died in a tractor-trailer in San Antonio last year in the district I represent. Mr. Speaker, 75,000 Americans died from fentanyl poisoning last year.

These numbers are off the charts, at levels we have never seen before, and they are the direct result of the policies enacted by the Biden administration but very specifically by the Secretary of Homeland Security. It is his leadership of that Department that has led to an abject failure of the Department to secure the border.

It is not the line men and women of the Border Patrol or ICE who are out there trying to do their jobs. They are being denied the ability to do their jobs because the Secretary won't let them. The Secretary has turned them into processing machines. He has done so intentionally to flood the zone, and they basically acknowledge that.

He has turned the law upside down. The basic law requiring that they have operational control of the border, that we stop the flow, that you have to have papers to come to the United States has been turned upside down.

In its place, the administration, and specifically Secretary Mayorkas, has used exceptions to swallow the rule: exceptions for asylum, exceptions under parole that are supposed to be on a case-by- case basis, based on our benevolence as human beings to try to help people, a bipartisan desire to do so. We have been made to swallow the rule of actual border security. As a result, the numbers have been astounding.

The key considerations, of course, are the types of individuals that are coming into the United States. We are not talking about some workers who want to go from Nuevo Laredo to Laredo or Juarez to El Paso. We are talking about dangerous individuals from all over the globe, including 331 that have been encountered that are associated with terrorist organizations under this administration, under Mayorkas' watch, which compares to 11 under President Trump.

They say: Well, aren't they doing their job? They encountered them. No. Those numbers indicate who we are finding, not the 50,000 a month or so got-aways that are pouring into the United States.

Now we see cops being beaten in the streets of New York by people who are here illegally walking out of the court with no bail and flicking off the American people.

We have a woman being dragged out of a parking garage in New York by migrant gangs, dragged through the streets of New York.

We have all sorts of danger to the American people, people like a cheerleader getting killed in Texas by somebody here illegally and an illegal who posed as an unaccompanied child who lived with a family in Florida and then killed the family.

That is what we have happening in the United States of America, and it is directly a consequence of a Secretary of Homeland Security who is failing to secure the homeland as he is charged to do when he takes an oath to fulfill his duty to carry out the laws of the United States.

If the Attorney General just went out and ordered all the United States attorneys and prosecutors and assistant U.S. attorneys to stop enforcing the law, allow reckless abandon, he should be impeached. That is, in fact, a high crime and misdemeanor.

This is where I disagree with my colleagues on the other side of the aisle and a few, I think, on my side of the aisle, this notion of high crimes and misdemeanors and what it includes or does not include. It most certainly includes officials in the administration, in the executive branch, who are completely refusing to carry out their duty. Literally, his job is to secure the homeland, and he is refusing to do it.

The fact of the matter is, some of my colleagues have concerns about issues of maladministration and so forth. If you believe this is maladministration--and I do not. I think it goes beyond maladministration. It is the purposeful, willing ignoring of the law to endanger the American people. It goes beyond maladministration.

Even if you accept the notion that it is maladministration, I keep hearing people say: Well, the Founders rejected maladministration.

The fact of the matter is Colonel Mason put it forward. Mr. Gerry put it forward, seconded it. Mr. Madison raised a concern. He said the term would be equivalent to a tenure during pleasure of the Senate.

There was some debate. Gouverneur Morris, Colonel Mason withdrew maladministration. There was no vote. There was no affirmative rejection of it. There was a debate. They withdrew. Instead, in its place, he substituted--the language was not there at the time--other high crimes and misdemeanors.

Now, you go back and say: Well, what does that mean? Well, I wasn't there. You can go back and look. There are debates about what it meant.

One thing is, British common law had developed a definition of high crimes and misdemeanors that included but was not limited to maladministration.

Now, this is a debate worthy of academic debate, but the fact is, it is up to us. There are no elements of the crime in the Constitution. There is no specific requirement that there be a violation of statute. There is no mens rea in the Constitution. It is for us and us alone to determine.

When the Secretary violates his duty to the Constitution, violates his oath to defend the people of the United States and secure the homeland, then it is incumbent upon this body to call out and reject that Secretary--in this case, that Secretary being Secretary Mayorkas.

There are other tools at our disposal, but there are not many. We have the power of the purse. We should use it. That is a speech for another time.

One last point on this notion that somehow by rejecting the bill that the Senate was debating and that, by the way, has not been sent to us-- the Senate is merely debating it. They are not even debating it yet. They haven't even proceeded to it yet. They haven't even gotten past cloture on proceeding to it yet.

Why? Because it is fundamentally flawed. The bill does not do what my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are suggesting it does.

I am sorry. You are getting punched in the head 10 times. My colleagues on the other side of the aisle want to say: Well, sorry. We will just start punching you in the head five times. Why won't you take that half a loaf?

I am sorry. That is not how this works. That is not what we are here to do. We are actually here to stop the flow.

That bill was flawed. It would have set essentially in permanent stone, effectively, mass migration. It has 250,000 visas and 250,000 work permits.

It ensconces alternatives to detention as part of how the releases would work for asylum claims. It would spend $4 billion to hire up new asylum officers by this administration, by this Secretary, who has the power right now to stop this flow but refuses to use it.

The President of the United States could use 212(f) right now and stop the flow. The Secretary could apply the laws the way they are supposed to be applied with respect to asylum and parole. He could stop it right now but refuses to do so.

We are here to defend the people of the United States who don't have a voice. We are here to stand up for the forgotten men and women of this country who are tired of getting rolled over.

That is why we are here, and the Secretary of Homeland Security deserves to be held accountable. I rise in support.

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