August 09, 2023 11:07 AM UTC

Full Buckpedal on Impeaching DHS Secretary Mayorkas

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• by: Colorado Pols

Politico’s Jordain Carney reports on what appears to be a significant flip-flop on the part of Rep. Ken Buck that, while we consider it welcome on balance, we can’t fully explain based on Buck’s own prior statements:

House Republicans once regarded Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas as their easiest impeachment target. Yet even that seems increasingly out of reach…

Rep. Ken Buck (R-Colo.), a member of the Judiciary Committee and the Freedom Caucus, said that a recent hearing with Mayorkas didn’t sway him toward supporting impeachment. He remains unconvinced that booting Mayorkas is a necessary step, and summed up the impeachment chatter within the conference as a “new shiny object every week.”

“Think about it — you replace Mayorkas with another Biden appointee,” Buck said, adding that impeachment is “a rare occurrence. It’s supposed to be.”

Although Rep. Buck has been in the news recently over objections to the tit-for-tat campaign by MAGA House Republicans to impeach President Joe Biden, Buck throwing cold water on impeaching Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas represents a 180-degree reversal from Buck’s own stated position. In April of 2022, the same Ken Buck accused Secretary Mayorkas of “intentionally” sabotaging border security, and told Mayorkas to his face that he should be impeached as a traitor:

U.S. Rep. Ken Buck, R-Windsor, said during a heated exchange Thursday with Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas that those in Colorado’s 4th Congressional District find his actions along the nation’s southern border to be traitorous and deserving of impeachment…

“Many of my constituents have asked me whether you will be impeached when Republicans gain control next year,” Buck said during Thursday’s House Judiciary Committee hearing. “They don’t believe that you’ve committed a high crime and they don’t believe that you’ve committed a misdemeanor. My constituents want you impeached because they believe that you’ve committed treason. They believe you are a traitor and compare you to Benedict Arnold.”

“…There’s anger people feel for a lot of reasons with the Biden Administration, but those other areas [energy crisis, treatment of military personnel] are not impeachable,” Buck said. “I believe this is.” [Pols emphasis]

First of all, we’ve always questioned the idea that Buck’s “constituents” were the ones clamoring for the impeachment of Secretary Mayorkas, who is way down the list in terms of name recognition among the Biden administration’s Cabinet members. But either way, there’s no question Buck’s position on impeaching Mayorkas has undergone a major revision.

So, what changed? We’re sorry to say it’s not an act of altruistic statesmanship on Buck’s part. There’s an ulterior motive at work in Buck flip-flopping from calling Mayorkas a traitor to his face to shrugging off the idea of actually impeaching Mayorkas that has yet to be determined. This move once again puts Buck on the wrong side of his hard-right counterpart in the delegation Rep. Lauren Boebert, who has called for Mayorkas to be impeached along with most of the rest of the Biden administration.

What we can say is that for some years, Buck’s disenchantment with his own party’s corruption and double-dealing, health concerns after a battle with cancer, and a divorce from fellow Weld County Republican politico Perry Buck have been evident factors that might influence Buck’s decision to retire from office–which has led to speculation ahead of several election cycles that Buck had to overcome. Buck seems more interested in complaining about “both sides” on CNN these days than actually trying to change the agenda of the House GOP majority–which makes it look like Buck may be looking to a future of cable news talking headery.

And though his record makes it hard to swallow, maybe Buck doesn’t want to be known as a radical MAGA “impeach ’em all” cable news talking head.