November 14, 2023 11:28 AM UTC

MTG Big Mad At Ken Buck For Killing Mayorkas Impeachment

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• by: Colorado Pols

As NPR reports, yet another long-sought goal of the hardliner Freedom Caucus, the impeachment of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, died yesterday after a deja vu-inducing eight Republicans joined with Democrats to circular file the measure into committee oblivion:

The House voted Monday to push off a Republican effort to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, ending for now a threat against the Cabinet secretary that has been brewing ever since Republicans took the House majority in January.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a hard-right Republican from Georgia, forced a vote on impeaching Mayorkas to the floor through a rule that allows any single member to force a snap vote on resolutions, including constitutional matters such as impeachment. Eight Republicans joined with Democrats to vote 209-201 to send her resolution to committees for possible consideration, like any other bill. They are under no obligation to do anything. [Pols emphasis]

The eight Republicans who voted against impeachment of Secretary Mayorkas today enjoy a similar degree of infamy within their caucus to the “Gaetz Eight” who voted to remove former Speaker Kevin McCarthy in early October, having helped scuttle a key GOP priority with an overwhelming majority of the Republican majority opposed to them. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, who forced the failed snap vote yesterday on Mayorkas’ impeachment, is circulating their names on a photographed handwritten revenge list, which is what you do in the digital age to convey you’re really pissed off:

Out of all 435 members of the U.S. House, only one has the distinction of being a member both of the “Gaetz Eight” who voted to remove Speaker Kevin McCarthy and the “Mayorkas Eight” who voted against impeaching Secretary Mayorkas, and that’s Rep. “KenSNBC” Buck of Colorado. The very different goals of these two votes make it difficult to rationalize one person making them, but Buck has somehow managed to bridge the cognitive gap.

Along with Buck’s slide toward long-anticipated retirement finally announced last month, Buck’s view of Secretary Mayorkas in particular has shifted since April of 2022–when Buck went so far as to call Mayorkas a “traitor” for his allegedly “deliberate” mishandling of migration at the U.S. Southern border, compared Mayorkas to Benedict Arnold, and flat-out stated “my constituents want [Mayorkas] impeached.”

“Many of my constituents have asked me whether you will be impeached when Republicans gain control next year. 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,” said Rep. Buck following Mayorkas’s testimony. “They believe you are a traitor and compare you to Benedict Arnold.”

No mincing words there, right? But explaining his vote on CNN yesterday, Ken Buck apparently decided between then and now that Mayorkas is not a “traitor” after all:

“Secretary Mayorkas has not committed an impeachable offense,” Rep. Buck told CNN on Monday night. “I disagree strongly with how he’s handling the border, I think the border is porous, I think it’s a threat to this country, but it’s not a high crime or misdemeanor, it’s not treason, [Pols emphasis] it’s not bribery, it’s not the crimes or issues our founders set forth in the Constitution.”

So, not treason then! That’s good to hear, since calling people “traitors” is just one small step away from calling them “vermin” and vowing to “crush” them. The best thing for Ken Buck would probably have been not to level these incendiary and now admittedly false allegations in the first place, but this was April of 2022–months before Buck decided it was time to re-invent his public image to better suit future career plans.

The lesson is not that Buck belatedly voted the right way, but that he did so only after being on the wrong side from the beginning, helping to sow the unfounded animosity he felt necessary to undo by blocking Mayorkas’ impeachment. The solution is not for more Republicans to make performative (not to mention unapologetic) splashes on their way out–but to just do the right thing from the beginning.