The House Republican majority has spent the last several months trying to uncover incriminating evidence against President Joe Biden. To date, GOP lawmakers have failed spectacularly, generating no shortage of frustration — as well as a healthy dose of embarrassment for partisan crusaders and conspiracy theorists.
But as it turns out, just because Republicans can’t find evidence of presidential wrongdoing doesn’t mean the party is prepared to abandon their impeachment plans. On the contrary, as Politico reported, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy took a big step in a radical direction on Monday:
Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) said Monday night that Republicans’ investigations into the business deals of President Joe Biden’s family members are “rising to the level of impeachment inquiry.” McCarthy’s comments to Fox News’ Sean Hannity mark the furthest he’s gone on a potential impeachment inquiry.
It’s important to emphasize that the California Republican didn’t explicitly say he intends to formally launch an impeachment process, but McCarthy was no doubt aware of the circumstances: When a House speaker tells a national television audience a partisan inquiry is “rising to the level of impeachment inquiry,” it’s intended as a provocative and unsubtle shot across the bow.
All of this, of course, comes less than a month after McCarthy repeatedly and publicly raised the prospect of impeaching Attorney General Merrick Garland.
For good measure, let’s not forget that the House speaker has also talked openly about a possible impeachment push targeting Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.
Time will tell whether Congress’ top Republican follows through on such talk, but it’s worth remembering that this was a path McCarthy had every intention of avoiding.
Revisiting our earlier coverage, a couple of weeks before the 2022 midterm elections, then-House Minority Leader McCarthy was asked about the prospects of impeachment crusades if House Republicans retook the majority in the chamber. The future House speaker downplayed the possibility.
“I think the country doesn’t like impeachment used for political purposes at all,” the GOP leader told Punchbowl News in late October. Asked if anyone in the Biden administration had done anything that warranted impeachment proceedings, McCarthy added, “I don’t see it before me right now.”
I wrote a prediction of sorts soon after, suggesting the decision might not be entirely his to make: McCarthy was positioned to become speaker, but if his members were determined to impeach someone, and if a certain former Republican president started barking orders from Mar-a-Lago, McCarthy would likely lack the political strength to throw cold water on the intra-party fire. That was nine months ago. Now, McCarthy not only can’t seem to stop talking about his willingness to consider impeachment inquiries against administration officials, the top GOP lawmaker is also prepared to try to “expunge” Donald Trump’s impeachments. Every time the House speaker takes these steps, we’re reminded of the fact that he’s simply too weak to stop the process he recognizes as misguided. McCarthy’s comments on Fox News last night weren’t outrageous, they were pitiful. This post updates our related earlier coverage.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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