Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas testified before the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday, where he ran into a very irate and eloquent congresswoman opposed to the illegal and unethical manner he has run the department.
Mayorkas has faced significant criticism from the GOP, with some even calling for his impeachment, due to the high numbers of migrants attempting to enter the U.S. since President Biden took office.
After a tense hearing that featured Republicans making charged accusations of dereliction of duty, and the DHS Secretary making staunch denials, Congresswoman Harriet Hageman lit into Mayorkas in epic fashion. Watch:
“Mr. Mayorkas, I actually really want to thank you as well for coming here today for your performance,” she began. “I have watched with absolute fascination as you have danced and dodged and lied. Yes, lied.”
“We know you’ve lied. You know you’ve lied. But more importantly, the American public knows that you lied throughout your testimony today,” she continued. “And yet you believe that you and your fellow architects of the Censorship Industrial Complex think that you should be able to determine what is and isn’t true and what is and isn’t untrue.”
“You are the walking, talking epitome of the very tyrant that our forefathers recognized would gravitate towards government service, and it is because of people like you that they drafted the First Amendment,” she added. “I thank them for their foresight. I thank them for recognizing that you and people like you would do everything in your power to control speech, to control freedom, to take away our rights, and they’ve written a document that isn’t going to allow you to do that.”
“And fortunately, we still have courts and judges who recognize that you don’t have the power that you are attempting to take, that you do not have the right to limit our freedom of speech, our freedom of association, our right to communicate,” she concluded. “Thank God we have the First Amendment, so that we can stop you from doing what you’ve been doing.”
This may be one of the most succinct and memorable public humiliations of a government official in recent memory. At another point in the hearing, Congressman Mike Johnson (R-LA) excoriated Mayorkas for being “the most dishonest witness that has ever appeared before the Judiciary Committee.”
The only thing left now is to take action against DHS Secretary Mayorkas for failing to secure the border and enforce immigration law.