Senate Republicans Host Press Conference on Homeland Secretary Mayorkas Impeachment Trial

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112 Video Views·Apr 9, 2024
The Senate Republicans including Roger Marshall, M.D. (R-Kan.), Mike Lee (R-Utah), Ted Cruz (R-Texas), John Kennedy (R-La.), Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) and Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), Eric Schmitt (R-Mo.) host a press conference at 3:30 p.m. ET on April 9 to discuss the importance of holding Homeland Security Department Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas accountable and conducting a full impeachment trial in the Senate.
This week, the House of Representatives is set to deliver its Articles of Impeachment for Alejandro Mayorkas to the Senate.
Senate, violent against the institution of the Senate and its time-honored traditions,
since November of 2013, when Harry Reid nuked, deployed the nuclear option on the executive
calendar filibuster. In a sense, this is even more serious. On the one hand, we deal more
frequently on a day-to-day basis with the filibuster. But on the other hand, in this
respect, this effort to nuke our traditions is even more serious here. Because unlike
the filibuster, which is rooted in tradition, in our rules, this one's rooted in the Constitution.
Article One gives the House the sole power to impeach and gives the Senate the power
and the duty to conduct trials of impeached officials. There have been 21 sets of articles
of impeachment passed by the House of Representatives in the history of our republic. And I believe
it's 17 out of those 21 cases where the Senate conducted a trial and those proceedings culminated
in a verdict of guilty or not guilty. In the remaining four cases, the Senate didn't conduct
a trial and didn't reach a verdict of guilty or not guilty, but only because between the
time when the House adopted the articles and it reached or not reached the Senate, the
person holding the office had either died or left office, thus mooting the case and
obviating the need for a trial. There's no plausible justification for invoking any of
those historical antecedents here, as Secretary Mayorkas is very much alive and very much
still the Secretary of Homeland Security. So in that material respect, what they're
nuking here is not just a Senate precedent or a Senate rule, but a provision of the Constitution
and a time-honored duty in the United States Senate to do this. They're nuking a provision
of the Constitution. So separate and apart from how you feel about Secretary Mayorkas
and his performance of his duties, anyone who fancies him or herself an institutionalist,
someone concerned about the Senate as an institution, should for that reason alone be willing to
stand up to this form of legislative tyranny and say that we've got an obligation to do
this. Now on the merits of the thing, I would ask a series of questions, questions that
one way or another, regardless of where you stand on Secretary Mayorkas, need to be answered.
So for example, if you think that Secretary Mayorkas has not willfully, defiantly refused
to enforce our laws, then let's hold a trial. If you disagree that he's allowed over 430,000
unaccompanied minor children in recent months into the United States, then let's hold a
trial. If you think that he hasn't dangerously loosened the restrictions and efforts to vet
people entering our country from China, including a whole lot of military-aged men crossing
our border, then let's hold a trial. If you believe that we haven't seen a dramatic increase
in known terror suspects entering our southern border unlawfully, then let's hold a trial.
Because a trial, after all, can either acquit or it can convict, which begs the question,
why don't they want to hold a trial, given that we have a sworn duty, consistent with
our oath to uphold the Constitution, as we're all required to take under the Constitution,
to conduct this trial? We've got nearly two and a half centuries of precedent backing
up that constitutional duty. Why depart from this now? Why depart from this now, even if,
especially if, you think he's innocent of the impeachable offenses of which he's been
accused? What does an innocent administration that has nothing to hide do? It's not this.
I'm very grateful to Speaker Johnson for his bold willingness to delay this. We don't want
this to come over on the eve of the moment when members might be operating under the
influence of jet-fume intoxication. That was precisely the plan, and it's much better for
us to do this at the beginning of a legislative week, rather than toward the end of one. And
I thank him for doing that.
Senator Cruz?
We are witnessing a profound threat to our nation at the southern border. Joe Biden,
Kamala Harris, and this entire administration has deliberately and willfully facilitated
the criminal invasion of this country. It is a humanitarian crisis. It is a public safety
crisis. It is a national security crisis. When Alejandro Mayorkas last testified before
the Senate Judiciary Committee, I asked him how many migrants died last year crossing into this
country. He said, I don't know. Of course he didn't. The number is 853. But this administration
doesn't care about the body bags that their open borders are producing. When Joe Biden
stood before Congress and gave the State of the Union address, he had planned in his remarks not
to say a word about Lakin Riley, the beautiful 22-year-old woman, the nursing student in
Georgia murdered by an illegal alien Joe Biden and Alejandro Mayorkas released into this
country. When Biden gave his State of the Union address, he didn't mention the name
Jeremy Caceres, the two-year-old little boy murdered just miles away from here in Prince
George's County, again by an illegal alien that Joe Biden and Alejandro Mayorkas released
into this country. He also didn't mention the Haitian illegal immigrant that Joe Biden
and Alejandro Mayorkas flew from Haiti to America, released, who then violently raped
a 15-year-old girl in Boston, Massachusetts, who was severely disabled. What we are witnessing
is evil. It is wrong. That is why the House of Representatives impeached Alejandro Mayorkas,
because he has aided and abetted the criminal invasion of this United States. And yet Chuck
Schumer and the Democrats don't want to talk about it. Even worse, Chuck Schumer and the
Democrats want to defy their constitutional responsibility. Twenty-one times in our
nation's history, the House of Representatives has sent articles of impeachment over to the
Senate, 21 times. Alejandro Mayorkas is only the second cabinet member ever to be impeached.
The last time a cabinet member was impeached was 1876, 148 years ago. What Mayorkas has done
is extraordinary, and its consequences are profound. Under the Constitution, the responsibilities of
the Senate are simple and straightforward. They are to try this impeachment. Chuck Schumer doesn't
want to do that. Instead, he wants to move the table, the entire thing, and there are three
reasons Chuck Schumer wants to move the table, the articles of impeachment. Reason number one,
he does not want to allow the House managers to present the evidence of Alejandro Mayorkas and
this administration's willful decision to aid and abet this criminal invasion of this country. The
second reason Schumer wants to table the articles of impeachment is he does not want a trial. He
does not want the American people to see the facts. When each of us lay out the facts of what's
going on, no Democrat argues there's not another side. They don't defend it and say, no, no, no,
it's great. Don't worry about the people who are dying. Don't worry about the children being raped.
Don't worry about the Mexican drug cartels making billions of dollars. The Democrats have no
response. Their response is they count on the media not to report it. That's their entire strategy.
And the third reason Schumer wants to table these articles of impeachment is he does not
want Senate Democrats, particularly those on the ballot in November, to vote guilty or not guilty
because it is indisputable Alejandro Mayorkas is guilty and he's not just guilty of aiding and
abetting the invasion that has happened for the last three and a half years and every dead body
that has resulted, but he's guilty tomorrow and the next day and the next day he intends to continue
facilitating and accelerating this criminal invasion. Of the 21 times the House has voted
out articles of impeachment and sent them to the Senate. In four of them, the Senate either lacked
jurisdiction because the individual was a senator and not an executive branch officer or judicial
officer or the person impeached was out of office and the case was mooted. In every single case
where the individual impeached was still in office and all 17, the Senate conducted a trial
and adjudicated and came to a decision guilty or not guilty. In 2013, Harry Reid nuked the
filibuster that did enormous damage to the institution of the United States Senate. In
2024 Chuck Schumer intends to nuke the impeachment clause of the United States Constitution and make
no mistake if this precedent is set it will not be the last time it is used. If and when
Donald Trump wins in November, if God forbid Democrats have the House, they'll impeach him
again and probably again and again and again and what Chuck Schumer is deciding is the Senate no
longer has to try impeachments but instead can hide behind procedural games. Anyone who cares
about the security of this country should oppose what Schumer is doing and vote to convict Alejandro
Mayorkas and anyone that cares about the United States Senate and about the United States
Constitution should demand that a trial be conducted. The American people deserve a trial
and I would encourage everyone in the media ask yourself why is Chuck Schumer so terrified to
have a trial on what's happening on our southern border and the answer is he cannot defend it and
he desperately wants to keep it hidden and secret from the American people. Well first of all thank
you Senator Marshall for sponsoring this press conference. Thanks all of you for coming here and
I want to thank the legal minds of our conference for kind of laying out the case of why we must
hold a trial. I'm gonna make the practical case. The reason Chuck Schumer wants to table it is this
chart. I was with President Trump last week traveling with him of course we talked about
the border and I showed him this chart that I've been developing since I was chairman Homeland
Security probably in 2014 and beyond just updating it monthly. The disaster that was deferred action
on childhood arrivals which sparked this massive under a Biden invasion of our country. President
Trump liked the chart and he adapted it. He modified it for his own use. It's gotten more
publicity as a result. I'm shocked but one of the commentators one political commentators retweeted
that chart and said this will itself decide the election. That's why Senator Schumer does not want
to hold this trial. I've made one additional modification by the way what I like about this
chart and what I've tried to describe here is the cause and effect. You know starting with DACA, the
reinterpretation of the Flores decision, the fact that President Trump was faced with his own border
crisis but he fixed it. You'll notice his peak a little under 5,000 people a day on average being
encountered the southern border and within 12 months he had reduced that down to about 500 a
day. Now that was before title 42 what I've added to the chart now is expulsions under title 42. So
even though single adults started increasing in about May of 2020 during the election year because
Democrat presidents or candidates were vowing they would end deportation, they provide free
health care. That was an incentive. That's the problem. The Biden administration, Democrats, they are
incentivizing the invasion of this country. So more people started coming but because of COVID
President Trump invoked title 42 and he started expelling people. So you can see the incredibly
small numbers of people under the Trump administration that President Trump allowed in
this country. We had pretty well secured our border. Setting up the next step of passing a
functioning legal immigration system. I was working with Senator Lee and the Trump administration on
it. We would have fixed these problems but unfortunately America made the wrong choice. The
elected President Biden and Democrats control the houses of Congress and this is an important point
to understand. Democrats, President Biden want an open border. They caused this problem. We didn't
need a law passed to have President Biden have the authority to close the border. President Trump
using existing law closed the border. President Biden used that exact same authority opened it up.
So you can see the explosion from the end of the Trump administration where virtually we had the
border closed and then the explosion and the widening gap as President Biden allowed title 42
to expire. But even without that, even using title 42, they welcomed, they incentivized families,
unaccompanied children and subjected them to the depredations. Their open border policy
facilitates the multi-billion dollar business model of some of the most evil people on the
planet. The human traffickers, the sex traffickers, the drug traffickers poisoning our cities. That's
what Biden and the Democrats and this is important to note too. It's not just President Biden.
This is Democrat policies. That's what must be defeated. But Senator Schumer wants to nip
this impeachment trial in the bud because he doesn't want the house managers to make the case
to explore exactly what happened, how their actions, how their policies are causing this
invasion. They don't want to be held accountable. That's why a trial is imperative in the United
States Senate and why I so appreciate what Speaker Johnson apparently just announced
that he's going to delay delivery of these things so that Senator Schumer doesn't have
Thursday at one o'clock to just snuff this thing out. So again, thank you,
Senator Marshall. Thank you all. And Senator Schmidt.
Politically speaking, if there were a Mount Rushmore of worst cabinet members in the history
of our country, Secretary Mayorkas would be on that Mount Rushmore. He'd be one of the faces.
Legally speaking, he subverted the laws of the United States and that's what this is all about.
But before we get to that, we have to have a trial. The constitution calls for it. In the
history of this country, as you've heard here today, what Chuck Schumer is about to do has
never happened. In a town that says things are unprecedented all the time, this actually is
unprecedented. The idea that you would dismiss or table something that is part of our duties,
when we raise our right hand, when we take this office, something that we're supposed to do.
Chuck Schumer is willing to throw all of that away because he's afraid of a couple of news cycles.
And we hear a lot about threats to democracy. Ladies and gentlemen, there's only one party
in this country trying to throw a political rival off the ballot,
throw him in jail for the rest of his life, end the filibuster, destroy the Senate,
and end impeachment forever. That is what their game plan is. And so I would just simply ask,
even my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, this is our job. This is our job,
regardless of how you're going to vote. Because 200 years from now, people will look back,
senators who we don't know their names and sitting in seats in that chamber,
will look back to what happened in the next seven days. And it will set a course for the
rest of American history, because there's no going back. Once you break the seal here,
there will be no impeachment trials ever again. And Chuck Schumer likes to say history is watching.
And I would remind him, history is indeed watching Chuck Schumer. Do the right thing,
hold the trial, let the chips fall where they may.
Thanks, Eric. I want to make one point, we'll open it up for questions.
Several of us have pointed out that Senator Schumer is unleashing another nuclear weapon
here. But can you imagine what the retaliation might be? Could you imagine a day in time
where we have a Republican president, a Democrat-controlled house,
they impeach the Republican president, they send it to a Republican-controlled
Senate. And that Senate said, we're going to table it. I just think that Americans and the
national media would lose their minds over it. But we're letting Chuck Schumer get by with it
for whatever reason now. So let's do questions. I should go ahead.
I'm sorry, Eric. A couple of you have already started delaying this. You weren't directly
from the speaker because you tweeted two hours ago that they were sending them to speak. Okay,
so he's delayed this. If this is delayed to Monday, what then? How do you get a trial?
How do you try to obstruct Schumer from dismissing this?
Come up to the microphone, Mike, so they can record it better. Remember,
once they deliver articles of impeachment, it triggers a whole different set of rules.
The Senate has exactly three states of being, legislative calendar, executive calendar,
and impeachment court calendar. The minute we receive the articles, we are convened,
they read the articles, we get sworn in, and then we go about a process to negotiate the
precise procedural meets and bounds of this particular impeachment proceeding.
And in those, we make arguments. We're allowed to make, in theory, unlimited motions subject to
being ruled dilatory by the presiding officer, Patty Murray, in this instance, because the
president's not on trial. And so we'll be making arguments and points of order in the unfortunate
event that they decide to proceed with this disastrous approach to nuke impeachment,
at least nuke impeachment in all cases where the party in control of the majority of the Senate
finds itself in opposition to the impeachment. Remember, it has not been very long
since we've conducted, well, we conducted two impeachment trials involving the 45th president
of the United States, the first of which came over to us at a time when we Republicans were
in control of the United States Senate. Think about it this way. Over time, you've seen the
Senate gradually whittling away its own authority and with it its own obligations. On the legislative
calendar, we've seen the Senate and the House sadly transferring a disproportionate share of
our lawmaking power over to unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats in the executive branch of government.
On the executive calendar side, we've seen ourselves whittle down the number and the
percentage, the portion of federal appointees, presidential appointees subject to Senate
confirmation. We'll now have a trifecta, a trifecta if we undertake this task where we will have yet
again narrowed down our constitutional duties. And that's shameful. But getting back to your
question, this will be all about making those arguments and we'll have more time to do them.
Members will be less inclined to operate under jet fume intoxication on a Monday
than they would on a Thursday.
Short answer is we're going to file points of order, but Senator Schumer can block those.
We'll have a lot of points of order because this is blatantly unconstitutional. But Senator Murray,
the pro tem will be in the chair and she doesn't have to recognize us. That's entirely possible
that Senator Schumer would tell her only to recognize him and we wouldn't even have a chance
to make a pull on the border. So much democracy. I mean, the Senate runs on unanimous consent
and moving forward, we may not be providing that consent. Well, and let me say also,
y'all can influence this. Why is Chuck Schumer trying desperately to defy the Constitution and
not have a trial? Because he doesn't want the American people to hear the facts about what
this administration has done and how many Americans have died as a result.
And he believes with the motion to table, he believes the press will be compliant.
How many of you are going to write a story tomorrow that says Chuck Schumer and the
Democrats defy 200 years of history and for the first time refuse to hold a trial
on impeachment? I suspect they're not going to be many stories.
Why is Schumer wanting to do this? Because the press, he believes, will let him get away with
it. And every Democrat. How many of you have asked John Tester in Montana, why are you refusing to
comply with your constitutional duty? How many of you have asked Sherrod Brown or Jackie Rosen or
Tammy Baldwin? They're all on the ballot. That's who Chuck Schumer is trying to protect from having
to hear the evidence and fulfill a constitutional responsibility. He believes the press won't
report on what he's doing. You mentioned the vulnerable Democrats that they've kind of gone
back and forth, but there's even some Republicans that are a question on what they vote in the
motion to table. Talking to reporters today, Senator Romney said that he wasn't sure what
he would do. I mean, what's the reaction to that? How do you project a unified GOP conference
when you have someone that size saying they don't know what they're doing?
Look, I think that every senator is going to vote their conscience. Obviously, Senator Romney's not
up for re-election. Maybe there's a reason he's not going up for re-election. I would just tell
you that the supermajority of Republicans that I know back home are demanding some sort of
accountability. And I'm not sure what town halls he's going to and listening to, but it's not the
same town halls I'm listening to. Mark? I have two questions. I want to follow up, Senator
Lee, on what you were just saying about the demolition of the congressional board. The
founders purposely made Congress, the creation of Congress, article one. Are you suggesting that
effectively Congress is no longer the branch? Yes. And look, it was surprising to no one. It
was secret to no one at the time that the most dangerous branch of the federal government was
then, is now, has always been, was always intended to be the article one branch. The
legislative branch, Congress, where we work. Always. Why? Well, because we have one branch
that makes the law. We have one branch that enforces the law or is supposed to. The same
law is passed by the legislative branch. A third branch that interprets the law. Those are
subservient to the dominant role of making the law. We set the policy. We decide what should be.
The executive branch enforces that. And then in the rear view mirror, the courts look at things
and say, this is what it means. This is what it, this is what was enacted. This is what the law
actually says. So we are by far the most dangerous branch. And that's why the founding fathers
entrusted only to the branch of government, most accountable to the people at the most regular
intervals. Voters have the chance to fire every representative in the house, all 435 every two
years. Voters have the chance to fire a third of us every two years. There is a reason for this.
And that makes it that much more dangerous. When we impart, we relinquish, we shun, we run from
our own obligations just for the sake of ease, for the sake of avoidance of criticism. That's
the road to tyranny folks. Whether you're a Democrat or Republican, a liberal or conservative,
that ought to scare you to death.
Well, look, I don't know that it's going to take an entire week to go through the initial
round of arguing. I mean, I would love to make it not easy for them to do it. I don't know that
it will stretch it into an entire week. What I'm saying is if we don't start it until the end of
the week, that leaves us no adequate opportunity to debate it. You don't want members trying to
get out of town so quickly that they're influenced by the jet fumes.
And let me jump in on this because there are two ways this
canon should proceed constitutionally and consistent with precedent.
One is next week, if we receive the articles of impeachment on Monday night,
the Senate, under the rules, immediately moves into a court of impeachment.
And typically the beginning of that is negotiating the resolution that lays out how the impeachment
will proceed. There are two ways to do it. One, the trial can be on the floor of the Senate.
That's what happened with both of the impeachments of Donald Trump is the impeachment was on the
floor of the Senate. The other way they can do it is the Senate can appoint a committee to try
the impeachment. So not the entire Senate, not on the Senate floor. That is the way it has
typically been done for impeachments below the level of president. So Senator Lee filed an
organizing resolution for the full Senate to convene and conduct a trial the way we did twice
for President Trump. He and I both believe that would be the best way to do it, but it's not the
only way to do it. The other way to do it would be next week when the articles of impeachment are
received to appoint an impeachment committee that would then conduct the trial in the committee.
And that would enable if there are other legislative matters that need to proceed,
they could proceed. They would proceed on parallel tracks. So any Democrat who tells you, no, no,
no, we've got other things to turn to. We've got FISA. We've got this. We got that.
Every one of those arguments is baloney because under the existing rules, the Senate could appoint
an impeachment committee to conduct a trial that would be public and in front of the American
people. And the Senate could simultaneously proceed and consider legislation while that
trial was ongoing. You said this place functions by unanimous consent. Is it,
I just want to make sure I understand, is it that if you don't get a trial,
that's the promise you'll, you guys will thumb this up then going forward?
Well, of course we would need the majority of the Republican conference to
basically agree with that strategy. But we believe this is important enough that
that ought to be on the table. If, if Senator Schumer is so disrespects the traditions and
presence of the Senate, he's willing to do this nuclear option on the impeachment power.
I think we should certainly challenge him and let him realize that it may not be real easy
going from here on in. Let me just add, I will also say, this is not like some
amendment on an approach bill, right? This is the United States constitution in 240 plus years
of precedent. And so my, my personal view is the consequences ought to be commiserate
with the action. And this is again, short of ending the filibuster, there's, there's nothing
more you could do in the United States Senate to diminish this institution from its constitutional
responsibilities. This is it. Impeachment is actually something we're supposed to do that
trial. So my personal view is that there ought to be a real cost for Chuck Schumer. So we'll see.
You guys haven't spoken to anyone who's voting differently on tabling or not tabling based on
if this happens on a Thursday or Monday, right? Wait, what? By pushing this to Monday, as opposed
to doing this on Thursday, you haven't spoken to anyone within the Republican or Democratic
I'm going to vote to not table because this is happening.
What kind of question is that? How do you know that we don't have the votes?
I'm asking if you do, and I'm asking what the point, what the benefit of the delay is.
Well, we, the benefit of the delay is duh, that we have a chance to talk about the issue.
I mean, if you guys want to go back and write an article about whether your LinkedIn page is
holding you back, you can do that, or you can write about this issue. And short of getting
rid of the filibuster, this goes to the heart of the United States Senate. I happen to think,
and I think my colleagues agree with me, that maybe talking about it for a few days might,
before we take the Constitution and turn it upside down, just might be a wise thing to do.
Now I can't tell you that every Republican is going to vote for this. I can't tell you that.
You know, as well as I do, that we have some free range chickens, and they wander off,
and sometimes we can't catch them. And they had the right to be free range chickens.
I'm just telling you all these questions that are being asked,
you're falling into Senator Schumer's trap, because he's going to try
to muddy up this water to make it look deep. There's nothing complicated about this. You
either believe in the Constitution, or you don't. I will say there was strong consensus
in the Senate lunch today to delay this delivery of impeachment, so we can have this discussion,
because we feel this is an important discussion to have. So again, that was almost unanimous
consensus. Nobody, people ask, anybody dissent? Nobody did. Yeah, and by the way,
Chuck, Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema bucked Chuck Schumer on the filibuster just a couple
years ago. So I don't know, there might be Democrats who actually care about the Constitution
too. But if they're allowed to get away with this tabling or dismissal, that would be-
And let's be clear, the question, what difference does it make doing it on a Thursday afternoon?
Every one of you covers Capitol Hill. You're aware on Thursday afternoon, Senators rush to
the airport and fly to get out of here. Schumer wants it on a Thursday afternoon because he wants
no coverage. He wants it to go away quickly. The advantage of starting the week with it is it
enables the Senate to focus on it. We ought to do our job. And I will say the question a minute
ago that was asked, well, you don't have the votes. Understand what you say when you say that
we don't have the votes. You're saying that you know that every single Democrat Senator does not
give a damn about what evidence might be presented. Wouldn't listen to the evidence,
wouldn't be open to any evidence, doesn't care about the people being killed, doesn't care
about the 100,000 Americans who died of drug overdoses last year, doesn't care about the
little boys and girls being violently sexually assaulted. They don't come to the border.
They don't look them in the eyes. I do. Every one of us here has been to the border. We've
seen children. We've seen women who have been brutalized by the cartels. And your question
assumes no Democrat cares. They're all okay with the open border. By the way, remember that
when you write the stories about each of the Democrats saying I'm very concerned about border
security because they're going to say that in their election ads, they're going to claim they're
very concerned about it. Well, if they are, we ought to have a trial. And the reason Schumer
doesn't want a trial, he doesn't want the evidence in front of them. And you know,
the Democrat senators don't care about the people that are getting hurt by these open borders
because their only priority is political power. I want to make one point too, is that
public sentiment, public opinion does drive an impeachment trial.
1974, I'm a young, young boy watching Watergate hearings. And those hearings with all the American
eyes on those as boring as those hearings are where they drove an impeachment trial to the
point that caused Richard Nixon to resign. And just like the press then had a responsibility,
the press has a responsibility now, I hope, to talk about the significance of this nuclear option.
Yeah, go ahead.
Is there a success that you were able to usher in that pressure to make
America's resign even if you don't necessarily vote to convict or remove?
America isn't going to resign. You know that and I know that.
You mentioned points of order, sir. Could you detail the kinds of points of order you're
thinking of offering? I know you said it's up to them in terms of whether they recognize you,
but what are your ideas in terms of...
Well, I'm not going to tell you. Stay tuned.
You should actually watch the proceedings.
But I will tell you this, you'll be impressed.
But we will have lots of points of order and we will have lots of motions.
Let me say it again, I don't know...
And maybe some free range chickens.
And maybe some free range chickens, but I don't know if we'll even get to make them.
Right, or...
Because if Senator Schumer walks in there and gives a high sign to the Speaker Pro Tem,
and she won't recognize anybody but Senator Schumer, they can even get rid of our
responsibility to raise points of order because this thing is unconstitutional.
I mean, you know it's unclearly unconstitutional.
Good, go ahead.
What's the fair minimum you need to see from the trial to say that you're satisfied with
how the process went before the...
I want a trial.
A trial.
Conduct a trial, allow the House managers to present their evidence.
That's how a trial occurs.
So the House drives it, it's not the Senate that says,
we know what evidence we want to hear.
The Senate sits and receives the evidence, considers the evidence,
and makes a determination.
Have a real trial, the House will have that responsibility.
And by the way, we've all seen that happen.
That happened twice in recent years when the Democrats impeached Donald Trump.
And to stick with John Kennedy's poultry analogies,
remember what's good for the goose is good for the gander.
When House Democrats impeached Donald Trump the first time, Republicans had a majority.
We could have done this, we didn't.
Because we actually took our constitutional responsibility seriously,
and the Senate conducted the trial.
The question is, is there even one Senate Democrat, one,
who takes the Senate's constitutional responsibility seriously now?
And if the answer is no, I can promise you,
the next time we see an impeachment,
if the Senate is in the same party as the President, you're not going to see a trial.
You're seeing the Democrats erase the impeachment clause from the Constitution.
And that is a serious, serious threat to the rule of law.
Let's go clear to the back.
So Alex, so is the ask to go straight into a trial or to have a committee assess the evidence?
I'm proposing that we go straight into a trial with my organizing resolution.
Senator Cruz has a different one that would propose that we
have it handled by a select committee.
I think most of us, maybe all of us, would probably prefer the former,
but we'll take either one as either one would satisfy our constitutional duty.
Okay, last question.
Mark.
Yeah, when a federal official like Lucas takes the Oval Office,
I think one of the counts coming over from the House
cites several specific instances where Secretary Mayorkas instructed DHS employees not to divorce.
Is that a policy disagreement?
No, that's called a violation of the law.
That's a violation of the law.
And understand.
That's why he's not going to resign.
Mayorkas is not impeached for being incompetent.
He's not impeached for being negligent.
This invasion is not an accident.
It's not that they're bad at the job.
Sadly, it's that Alejandro Mayorkas is very good at the job he's trying to do.
And the job he is trying to do is maximize the number of illegal immigrants in America.
This is absolutely deliberate.
And and this is flouting the law.
Look, I've said several times Joe Biden has done something I thought was impossible.
He made me miss Barack Obama.
Listen, Barack Obama, there are lots of things I disagreed with.
There are lots of things I disagreed with about Barack Obama.
But when it came to immigration, Obama, by and large, followed the law.
And in particular, Obama deported millions of people.
Remember, the left got mad at Obama.
They called him the deporter in chief.
We have never seen a president of the United States do what Joe Biden is doing,
which is utterly flouting the law.
Not only is Mayorkas not trying to secure the border,
he's trying to accelerate illegal immigration.
He wants the 10.4 million illegal immigrants to become 20 million, 30 million, 40 million,
because he views them all as future Democrat votes.
And so this is different from saying he's not very good at his job.
This is openly defying the law.
And this is aiding and abetting Mexican criminal cartels, human and drug traffickers
that have become deca-billionaires because of these open border policies.
So one final comment, because I want to disagree with Senator Cruz.
It was President Obama that sparked this invasion with the
Deferred Action on Childhood Arrivals memorandum.
That was a lawless act that caused all of this.
And by the way, I do have that new chart for all of you if you want it.
We've probably got a couple of those in copies.
But thank you, everybody.
And by the way, Ron's got a tattoo of the chart, too.
It's really, it's impressive.
Stop.
Thanks, everybody.
It's right there if you want it.
Do you have copies right here?
Different color codes to match your outfit?
I can take art.
