Four Republicans file to impeach Biden over Afghanistan, border security, moratorium on deportations

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Updated 10:50 am Friday with commentary from DCCC.

WASHINGTON – Four House Republicans, including two Texans, have filed articles of impeachment against President Joe Biden, accusing him of failures in Afghanistan and at the border and abusing his power by extending the freeze on linked evictions to the pandemic.

Representatives Brian Babin of Woodville and Randy Weber of Friendswood joined the effort, led by Representative Bob Gibbs of Ohio.

Their resolution closely mirrors impeachment resolutions pushed by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Green, the Republican from Georgia whose trafficking in QAnon and other conspiracy theories prompted the GOP caucus to avoid.

“Since January 20, 2021, Joe Biden has only plunged our nation into a state of backward and heightened vulnerability while thwarting the rule of law at every moment,” Babin said Thursday, announcing his support for impeachment. “He failed miserably in his duties as Commander-in-Chief and violated his oath to defend the US Constitution. “

Democrats control the House, but by a slim majority. Only a handful of Republicans have expressed support for Biden’s impeachment.

There is therefore no chance that the effort will result in a vote on the ground, let alone a trial in the Senate.

Like all but 10 House Republicans, those pushing for Biden’s impeachment voted against Donald Trump’s impeachment for inciting the Jan.6 riot on Capitol Hill.

This is the sixth resolution calling for Biden’s impeachment filed since taking office. All were referred to the Judicial Commission and have not been heard since.

At this point in Donald Trump’s presidency, only one impeachment resolution had been tabled, attracting the support of only two lawmakers, both Democrats: Representatives Al Green of Houston and Brad Sherman of California. This concerned Trump’s sacking of FBI Director James Comey, who was investigating whether Trump’s 2016 campaign colluded with Russia.

“While Texas Republicans waste time and taxpayer money playing political games, House Democrats are busy doing the hard work of governing,” Monica Robinson, spokeswoman for the government said Friday. Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. “Stunts like this, from the party that inspired the murderous insurgency on our Capitol, are an unnecessary distraction from the real work Democrats are doing to support middle-class families and rebuild our country’s infrastructure. “

Representative Randy Weber, R-Friendswood, speaks at an infrastructure press conference with other members of the Conservative House Freedom Caucus outside the Capitol on August 23, 2021.(Kevin Dietsch / Getty Images)
Rep. Brian Babin R-Woodville, a member of the Conservative House Freedom Caucus, leaves a closed-door strategy session with then-President Paul Ryan, R-Wis., March 28, 2017, shortly after the Conservative bloc has derailed a GOP health care bill.
Rep. Brian Babin R-Woodville, a member of the Conservative House Freedom Caucus, leaves a closed-door strategy session with then-President Paul Ryan, R-Wis., March 28, 2017, shortly after the Conservative bloc has derailed a GOP health care bill.(AP Photo / J. Scott Applewhite)

The impeachment resolution filed this week includes three articles alleging that Biden:

  • failed in its duty to protect against invasion “by stopping the construction of a barrier along the US-Mexico border, leaving border patrol agents to fend for themselves in their efforts to secure our borders,” and because that he “knowingly released migrants who tested positive for COVID-19 from border patrol custody and in the United States.”
  • overstepped his authority when he extended a moratorium on evictions recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention by 60 days.
  • “Abandoned thousands of Americans” in Afghanistan and even “aided and abetted the enemy by failing to secure or destroy military equipment donated by the United States as Taliban forces invaded Afghan territory, leaving billions of dollars of military equipment in the hands of enemy soldiers.

“I couldn’t stand idly by while Biden commits gross and willful violations of his oath of office,” Gibbs tweeted.

September 10, Weber tabled his own resolution impeachment claiming that Biden, “by perpetuating a false perception that Afghan security forces were winning the war against the Taliban,” manipulated public opinion prior to the US withdrawal and “demonstrated he was a threat for national security “.

Two Republicans from Georgia and Maryland signed.

“While in the past I had shied away from invoking impeachment in the absence of a clear demonstration of ‘serious felony’, the standard set in the US Constitution, I considered this act to have gone beyond that line. The Democratic majority in the previous Congress removed President Trump on much less substantive grounds, ”Weber said.

Green, the Georgia conspiracy theorist, filed the first impeachment resolution against Biden on Jan.21 – the day after his inauguration.

The resolution did not attract any co-sponsors and, like the others, did. He accused Biden of “blatant nepotism” and corruption related to his son Hunter Biden’s service on the board of Burisma, a Ukrainian energy company.

Green tried again on August 23, with three separate resolutions on the same topics in this week’s resolution tabled by the Texans and their allies.

A green resolution, which attracted five co-sponsors, claims that Biden “endangered the people of the United States by allowing illegal aliens who had tested positive for COVID-19 to enter the country and infect American citizens” and “willfully refused to maintain operational control of the border ”, and that

He also touches on Afghanistan, with allegations closely followed by those this week: “Carelessly withdrawing the US military from Afghanistan and leaving billions of dollars in military assets in the hands of terrorists to be used against we… President Biden authorized the Taliban, ISIS, Al Qaeda, and the Muslim Brotherhood, among others, to threaten America, American citizens and its security interests. “

A second Green August 23 resolution focuses only on those allegations regarding Afghanistan; which attracted seven co-sponsors.

The third green resolution of August 23 attracted two Republican co-sponsors. He focused on the Biden administration’s order extending the moratorium on evictions during the COVID-19 pandemic until October 3.

The resolution incorrectly claimed that the United States Supreme Court had already ruled on June 29 that only Congress can extend the moratorium. In fact, that was not part of the decision, only part of a concurring opinion from a judge, Brett Kavanaugh.

The new impeachment resolution is based on the same claim, namely that Biden “violated the separation of powers by extending the moratorium despite the clear warning from the US Supreme Court.”

Gibbs wrote to his GOP colleagues in early August to try to mobilize support for impeachment based on Biden’s “blatant breach” of border security and for extending the moratorium on deportations. The American withdrawal from Afghanistan had not yet succeeded.

He differentiated efforts to remove Biden from Trump’s two impeachment trials, calling them baseless and “politically motivated.”

“As Tories and Republicans, I think we understand that impeachment is a serious constitutional mechanism, intended to be used only in the rarest and most serious circumstances,” Gibbs wrote to his colleagues. “Sadly, we have seen our fellow Democrats debase it and use it as a talking point for electoral purposes.”

Weber, explaining his vote against Trump’s impeachment in January, said it “would upset half of the electorate and recklessly embolden the other half.”

Babin called Trump’s impeachment “Reckless and futile” when he voted against. He accused Democrats of peddling a “categorical lie” that Trump instigated the Jan.6 attack, while claiming that Trump’s victory was stolen by “flagrant election irregularities.”

“I have never seen our Constitution so trampled on for the sole purpose of maintaining political power,” he said.


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