Kevin McCarthy’s Pledge To Impeach Mayorkas Is A Gift To Democrats

Article Two accuses Mayorkas of not using Trump’s “Title 42” program to bar a sufficient number of immigrants from entry on the basis of possible exposure to Covid. This, too, is a policy disagreement, and in any case a federal judge earlier this month ordered an end to Title 42, effective December 21.

“Impeach Mayorkas!” is a gift to Democrats in two ways. As noted, deranged Republican impeachment drives have helped Democrats raise campaign funds in the past. But also, “Impeach Mayorkas!” gets Democrats (including Mayorkas) off the hook on an issue—immigration—where they might otherwise be vulnerable.

Migrant apprehensions at the southern border are a rough index for how many people cross the border illegally: The more arrests, the more undocumented migrants likely make it across. During the past fiscal year, which ended last month, apprehensions rose 37 percent over the previous year, from 1.7 million arrests to 2.3 million. That represents, at the very least, a failure on the part of Vice President Kamala Harris to persuade El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala to improve conditions sufficiently to reduce out-migration. A 20-page policy document to address root causes, reported by The Los Angeles Times last year, contained no timelines or measurements for success. Meanwhile, as James North argued here last week, the United States has quite cruelly been turning away refugees from Venezuela, a country on whose undemocratic regime we’ve imposed economic sanctions. If we aren’t willing to admit Venezuelan refugees, why maintain Venezuelan sanctions that drive them to our doorstep?