2023-06-28 12:45:00
IMPEACHMENT* – Will Joe Biden be impeached? Republicans, very conservative, seem determined to succeed. Congress on Thursday, June 22, dismissed a “privileged” resolution aimed at forcing a vote of impeachment. 219 votes were in favor of referring this resolution to two committees of the House of Representatives, against 208 votes against. The President of the United States, candidate for his own succession for the 2024 elections, is now the target of an impeachment inquiry, led by the Committee on Homeland Security and that of Justice in the House of Representatives.
Described as a far-right Republican, Lauren Boebert (1)who introduced this resolution, criticizes Joe Biden for having “raped” his oath, by not enforcing immigration laws and not securing the border with Mexico to prevent a synthetic drug, fentanyl (2)to be introduced on American soil.
According to House rules, a “privileged” resolution must be voted on within two legislative days. This is a resolution that makes it possible to circumvent procedural obstacles and can be dealt with more quickly than traditional resolutions, by being placed directly on the agenda.
A vote “inevitable in the months to come”
If Democrats hoped outright to defeat the measure, Republicans redirected Lauren Boebert’s attempt to force an impeachment vote against President Joe Biden to the two aforementioned committees.
Republican Kevin McCarthy, Speaker of the House of Representatives, has said he is opposed to these initiatives, preferring to wait for the conclusions of the investigations into Biden, his family and his administration, currently carried out by the Chairman of the Oversight Committee James Comer and the President of the Jim Jordan Judiciary Committee. “I think tackling prematurely [une destitution] without having experience in it, it undermines what we do”, did he declare.
The Republican opposition does not wish to venture into this terrain so as not to transform the procedure into a purely partisan exercise, since some of its members wish to indict the President of the United States as a form of revenge. To recall, his predecessor, Republican Donald Trump, was twice impeached by the then Democrat-controlled Congress over Ukraine. (3) and the assault on the Capitol.
U.S. media say sending case to Homeland Security and Justice Committees allowed Republicans to prevent a vote “rushed”, “doomed” and the division within their party, already weakened by internal tensions, especially with the most conservative. Last Thursday’s vote only delays, observers believe, an inevitable impeachment vote in the coming months. Party lawmakers have already filed articles of impeachment for Biden but the use of such resolutions raises concerns.
Moreover, another Republican representative, Marjorie Taylor Greene, also considered to be very conservative, announced her intention to soon introduce other privileged resolutions to dismiss the resident of the White House but also two members of his cabinet, FBI Director Christopher Wray and US Attorney Merrick Garland, in charge of the prosecution of participants in the January 2021 Capitol assault.
Her colleague Boebert reacted to last Thursday’s vote by threatening to file a “preferred resolution every day for the rest of my time here in Congress”. Her actions, she said, enabled her to force her party to launch an impeachment inquiry. “Nothing happens without strength. And sometimes you have to shake things up to actually change them.”a added Boebert.
Do these resolutions have a chance of succeeding? Homeland Security Committee Chairman Mark Green, who said his team “will put Biden at the center of his southern border investigation”declined to say whether he considered the president’s actions to be a felony or misdemeanor serious enough to warrant impeachment, as provided for in the US Constitution.
Impeaching Biden or the Attorney General ‘isn’t America’s priority’
The White House reacted Monday, June 26, 2023 to the launch of this impeachment investigation. The Biden administration has criticized its opponents for being “hopelessly diverted” of their economic program. “President McCarthy and the Republicans [d’extrême droite] of the House prove that they have no positive agenda to actually help the American people on the issues most important to them and their families”a declared Ian Sams, White House spokesman for surveillance and investigations.
The Attorney General is also accused by Republicans, led by Kevin McCarthy, of “bias” in the case of Hunter Biden, son of the president, and to have “militarized” the Department of Justice.
“Maybe Republicans are desperate to distract from their own plan to deliver even more tax cuts to the rich and big business and add more than $3 trillion to the deficit… Instead of pushing more partisan stunts meant only to draw attention to the far right, they should work with the president to prioritize America’s middle class and working people (…) to cut costs , create jobs, boost American manufacturing and small business, and make prescription drugs more affordable,” he added the White House.
Further, the Biden administration calls proposed impeachments of the president or attorney general as “non-priority cases for American families”. “It’s unfortunate that Congressional Republicans want to continue to focus on an issue that Americans don’t prioritize.”said this time Karine Jean-Pierre.
If he were to be impeached, Joe Biden, whose candidacy for a second term cringes because of his age, will be the first president in American history to undergo such a procedure. Three have already been indicted. They are Andrew Johnson in 1868, Bill Clinton in 1998 and Donald Trump in 2019 and 2021. All were acquitted.
*procedures for the impeachment of the president, in the United States.
Notes :
(1) Lauren Boebert is regularly ranked on the far right by the media because of her participation in the program “SteelTruth”, broadcast on the web and hosted by Ann Vandersteel, a close friend of the QAnon movement, himself presented as sectarian and d ‘far right.
(2) Opiate presented as a painkiller, particularly addictive, which has been the cause of severe mortality in the United States in recent years.
(3) In connection with a case started in September 2019, after the revelations of the content of a telephone conversation between Trump and Zelensky about Hunter Biden (the former president of the United States wanted the opening of an investigation against him) . Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the House of Representatives, then launched impeachment proceedings against Trump. In February 2020, he was acquitted by the Senate.
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