Senate dismisses impeachment articles against Mayorkas

AMNA NAWAZ: Welcome to the "NewsHour."

Ukraine is reeling tonight from the deadliest Russian strike in weeks.

It comes at a critical point in this more-than-2-year-old war.

But, first, a congressional aid package for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan took a key step forward today, potentially putting the House speaker's job in greater jeopardy.

GEOFF BENNETT: Meantime, the Senate began and quickly ended the first ever impeachment trial of a sitting Cabinet official for Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.

Our Lisa Desjardins was there for it all and joins us now.

So, Lisa, lots to unpack, lots to discuss.

Take us through what happened in the Senate chamber today.

LISA DESJARDINS: It was never going to be a surprise how this ended.

Mayorkas was not going to be convicted.

That wasn't the question here.

But it was a question of how.

And here the Senate decided on a party-line vote that the articles themselves were unconstitutional.

Let me take you through this.

Senator Schumer offered at the beginning to have some debate time.

That's what Republicans wanted, at the very least, and some votes on some procedural ideas.

But Republicans, including Senator Mike Lee of Utah and others, objected to that.

They wanted a full trial or nothing.

Schumer outgamed them and said, OK, you reject my offer, we're going to move straight to votes on whether these articles of impeachment are constitutional.

He knew he had the votes to declare them so.

Reminding people, I want to look at those articles.

So, when you're talking about them being unconstitutional, what are they?

Those are the two articles we have talked about on this program first, refusal to comply with the law.

Republicans say Mayorkas allowed the border to be unsecured, second, breach of trust, largely the idea that he lied to Congress about that.

Now, that lie to Congress was the idea that the border itself was secure or not.

All of that was declared unconstitutional because the vote was, those are not high crimes or misdemeanors.

So this ended on the Senate floor with back and forth over whether or not a trial should happen.

SEN. CHUCK SCHUMER (D-NY): It is beneath the dignity of the Senate to entertain this nakedly partisan exercise, one that both conservative and liberal legal scholars agree fails to meet the high standard demanded by impeachment.

So I will say it again.

Impeachment should never, never be used to settle policy disagreements.

SEN. ERIC SCHMITT (R-MO): As Senator Schumer said in 2020 -- quote -- "A fair trial has witnesses.

A fair trial has relevant documents as part of the record.

A fair trial seeks the truth, nothing more, nothing less.

I will not assist Senator Schumer in setting our Constitution ablaze."

LISA DESJARDINS: We spoke about game theory.

Today, Senator Schumer played chess and he basically put Republicans in a position where they really -- they couldn't get to do what they wanted to do.

GEOFF BENNETT: Has this ever happened before, a Senate impeachment trial dismissed on constitutional grounds?

LISA DESJARDINS: That's the right question.

I had the same question.

I asked the Senate historian's office.

And they told me they couldn't answer it yet, because what happened today was so complicated that they were still getting their hands around it.

Now, Senate Democrats said they don't know of any time this has ever happened before.

I will also say the reason this whole thing is unprecedented is because of a man named William Belknap.

He was the secretary of war in 1876.

He was the first Cabinet secretary impeached, but he resigned before he was impeached and before he ultimately was forced to leave office.

He resigned.

GEOFF BENNETT: So what precedent does this set for future Congresses then, Lisa?

LISA DESJARDINS: This is why we're talking about this at length.

The Senate in a process really determines policy.

And we have seen that with the Supreme Court.

We have seen that in the future potentially with what happens in the next Senate.

And in this case, when you talk to conservative and liberal experts, they're concerned, both of them, for different reasons about the way things went, or they're happy how they went.

You talk to conservatives, they say that Mayorkas is someone who was accused of a serious crime, lying to Congress.

We talked about why liberals say that's wrong, but they say that that absolutely is something that should have been tried and heard in the Senate.

SIMON HANKINSON, The Heritage Foundation: If they lie to Congress, as Mayorkas has done, arguably, on several occasions, when he says that the border is secure or when he says that people who are found to be -- have no right to remain are going to be removed, and when they have mismanaged the portfolio to such an extreme extent that they're causing significant harm to the people, that's the only mechanism that Congress has to remove them from office.

LISA DESJARDINS: But on the left, when you talk to folks who've experienced impeachment before, they say that's nonsense and that they say these articles themselves were what was dangerous.

JOSHUA MATZ, Former Counsel, House Judiciary Committee Democrats: Rather than alleging any kind of misconduct or malfeasance by Secretary Mayorkas, they really just amount to an incredibly wide-ranging policy disagreement over how this administration has handled immigration.

And for centuries, it's been understood by scholars of every political persuasion that you simply can't impeach on that basis.

LISA DESJARDINS: The question is, how much of a political weapon will impeachment be?

Secretary Mayorkas sent out a statement today saying this proves essentially now that there was no evidence.

GEOFF BENNETT: All right, let's talk about the other chamber, the House chamber.

Has the House speaker, Mike Johnson, has he made more decisions about how he's going to bring this foreign aid package to the floor?

LISA DESJARDINS: We were waiting for the bill text, and he did in fact put out text today.

Let me catch everyone back up to speed with where we are with these important foreign aid bills.

So we have separate bills for Ukraine, Israel and the Indo-Pacific.

The text of those bills is out.

There is a fourth bill about TikTok and also potentially there should be means to pay for some of that foreign aid in that bill.

I have not seen that text yet.

It could come any time.

Here is the new today.

The speaker announced there will be a fifth bill on border security.

There is no question this is to appease conservatives who said, why can we vote on aid for other countries, but not our own?

Speaker Johnson trying to work his conference to get those votes.

All of this is going to come to a head probably Saturday, Jeff.

That is when the speaker says to his conference they should expect votes on this.

GEOFF BENNETT: Does he have the votes for these bills and does he have the votes, Lisa, to keep his job?

LISA DESJARDINS: It is a nail-biter.

It's not clear on either one.

And some surprising voices have been moving toward the fence, like Chip Roy of Texas, someone who really did not want to talk about motion to vacate, today indicated he may be open to it.

He's very unhappy with the speaker and the way he's going about this.

The first big test could come as soon as tomorrow or Friday, when they vote on that first procedural motion for all of this.

Will Democrats help the speaker?

We're having this conversation over and over again.

GEOFF BENNETT: Yes.

LISA DESJARDINS: But so much about the ability of our own government to function and Ukraine to survive hinges on all of this.

GEOFF BENNETT: Lisa Desjardins, our thanks to you and our congressional team, as always.

We appreciate it.

LISA DESJARDINS: You're welcome.