With impeachment dud, House Republicans fail to produce political stunt Trump needs

Today the Republicans in the House of Representatives showed a great show of unity. You will remember that in February the House voted along partisan lines to remove the Secretary of Homeland Security, Alejandra Maoris, and this afternoon that process moved forward. Republican House

impeachment

managers including Marger Taylor Green and Andy Bigs Walk. shoulder to shoulder through the halls of Congress to deliver the articles of

impeachment

to the US Senate. The last time the chamber delivered the articles of impeachment to oust a Cabinet member was back in 1876, when the Secretary of War He was accused of exchanging military positions for profits now in the year 2024.

What has the Secretary of Homeland Security, Alejandra Mayorcas, done to deserve impeachment? Republicans say she hasn't done enough to stop illegal border crossings. Now keep in mind that's not grounds for impeachment, in reality, Republicans are the ones who sabotaged a border protection bill just a couple of months ago a fact that New York Rep. Dan Goldman pointed out earlier today unfortunately the Republic and has put politics above our border security they want chaos to win an election instead of solving the problems there was a policy bill there was a policy change that would have significantly addressed the problems at the border and, in Instead, all of you on the other side of the aisle sabotaged it, baselessly accusing the secretary who is trying to solve our S problem on the southern border because they want to win.

If you want to win in November, you want to solve the problem, so a baseless and

political

ly motivated impeachment vote in Basel Impe congratulates Republicans in Congress for doing so, but don't be fooled by today's show of unity in the hallways of Congress because this is pretty much the only thing Republicans have managed to accomplish in this 118th Congress: funding the government for a full year took half the fiscal year to get the bipartisan border deal shot down. Aid to Israel, Taiwan and Ukraine have been stalled for months, in fact, the fight over the Ukraine aid bill has become so contentious among Republicans that Congresswoman Green has been threatening to unseat President Mike Johnson over it. issue for weeks and until today, Green stood alone and pushed for Johnson's removal, apparently no other Republican had the desire to expel another speaker in less than six months until today.

When Kentucky Congressman Tom Massie decided to join forces with the Greens today, he pledged to cosponsor their motion to impeach President Johnson after Johnson announced a plan to advance those foreign aid bills this week to recap legislation stalled in the fight against disputes over leadership and incapacity. to fund our government or our allies, that certainly doesn't sound like Unity to me. I'm joined now by Congressman Jamie Raskin of Maryland. He is the ranking member of the House oversight committee and former lead manager of Trump's second impeachment trial. Congressman Raskin. It's so good to see you that I was thinking about the fact that two weeks ago you and I were talking about the fact that the impeachment seemed to be reaching a dead end and then I realized that you and I had been talking about each other . a

political

ly motivated sham impeachment, the Biden impeachment, so the fact that we have to choose between them says something about the Republicans' agenda here.

Well, impeachment for my work was the big consolation prize for the ultra magga wing of the party that didn't get Joe Biden impeached. They wanted it and that's why they did this in a clear place. The mayorca impeachment lacks the central thing that an impeachment

needs

constitutionally, which is treason, bribery or a high crime in another high crime in a minor crime. um, and they don't have it. They have political differences with the secretary of my work where, at best, they have a claim of mismanagement, which is precisely what the writer said. You can't accuse someone.

Look at him, look at him go, although he seems very committed. You have to give it to him this morning. You had Secretary my orcus testifying before the House Appropriations Committee as they held their annual hearing on the dhs budget request earlier this year. He worked on a bipartisan bill in the Senate, as you all know, House Republicans say they now have him facing this impeachment trial and and Secretary Myor, he seems pretty unfazed by this process earlier this month, he said that when I say I'm not focused on the impeachment process, I actually mean it.

I will say this, I hope they don't take time away from my job clearly. a disconnect between the amount of things that are on my secretary's plate, the portfolio that he has, whether it's the US-Mexico border, whether it's international threats and what Republicans want him to focus on well, if you think about it. , given that this is just a policy conflict and at least a dozen Republican senators have acknowledged that in recent days the public is dramatically siding with my work and the bipartisan Senate deal that was ruined at the last minute by the mega-

republicans

and Donald Trump. because Trump doesn't want a border solution he wants to face a border crisis he has nothing else in the tank that is empty because he can't talk about abortion anymore because the entire country has turned so decisively against him yes' We're talking about Kansas, Ohio, Pennsylvania or Florida, so they can't talk about that, so it's just immigration.

He also has Vladimir Putin breathing down his neck because Putin doesn't want 6.1 billion to go to the people of Ukraine. what he is pursuing now is simply an autocratic agenda and it is surprising to see Republicans in the House simply following him like Lemmings. Well, let me ask you about that today, Republican Congressman Mike McCall said this before criticizing the Biden administration for his words. not projecting force amidst the ongoing conflicts in Ukraine and Israel listen, the world is on fire and um, history will judge us by our actions, were you Chamberlain or Churchill? I mean, how seriously can you take them, when, when, that's their positions and yet their own caucus can't calm down over a foreign aid bill, well, I think it was actually aimed at Mike Johnson, it was not directed at Joe Biden, who has been doing everything in his power to try to dislodge the foreign aid package he sent. us several months ago, but it is Mike Johnson who is captive of the pro-Putin mega wing of the party, which might be dominant in the Republican caucus now, but seems to be trying to free itself from it with this succession of unique issues. bills so that we would get a vote for or against Ukraine and, of course, the vast majority in the House, virtually all Democrats and maybe even 50% of Republicans, but certainly 30 or 40% of the Republicans, but we would definitely have a supermajority to do it, that's what's so bothering Marjorie Taylor Green and Matt Gates and, um, the far right of the party and, as far as we know, it's Donald Trump who, you know, makes the decisions on that, well, Congress let me ask.

You talk about that because that was the other development today, Congressman Massie joining Marger Taylor Green's efforts to impeach President Johnson. Do you think you're hearing that more Republicans will join them? Well, I've heard there are a couple more in the wings that they have ready to show their push, but of course, under the mega rules that Chairman McCarthy had endorsed and almost the entire caucus was behind, any member of your caucus can make a motion. to vacate the chair with the aim of knocking him down. speaker and therefore gives the extremist elements of the party who report directly to Donald Trump the power to dictate the course of events, it may be that Mike Johnson is simply fed up with it and says: you know, see if you want to evict The president goes ahead and does it, but I have to move on at this point.

You've got several committee chairmen who seem determined to get us to vote on Ukraine and they're starting to call out how Putin's propaganda has started to overwhelm the Republican caucus and you've got members like Marjorie Taylor Green um and like Gates basically repeating the talking points. of Putin. I mean, Marger Taylor Green just a couple of days ago said it was anti-Semitic to delay aid to Israel to get aid. to the Nazis in Ukraine or the Ukrainian Nazis something like that and this is just a classic Putin smear and disinformation tactic against the democratic nation of Ukraine, the only nation on Earth that has a Jewish president other than Israel itself.

Without effect, it's a feature, not a bug. Congressman Jamie Raskin, thank you very much for taking the time to be with us tonight. Hello everyone, MSNBC has a new and improved app. You will receive alerts and analysis in real time. Live blogging. In-depth essays. Featured videos and the best election coverage of 2024. Download the new one. MSNBC app, here's how to do it. Tap the App Store on your phone. Press search in the bottom right corner. Type MSNBC. Click on the MSNBC app. Click Get or the cloud icon and enjoy.