House Speaker Mike Johnson has postponed sending articles of impeachment against Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas to the Senate until next week, according to his spokesman.
The delay comes as Senate Republicans explore strategies to exert political pressure on Democrats, which includes the possibility of disrupting Senate proceedings. Johnson, a Republican from Louisiana, originally planned to send the articles to the Senate on Wednesday.
However, Taylor Haulsee, a spokesman for Johnson, said the House will transmit the articles of impeachment to the Senate next week "to ensure the Senate has adequate time to perform its constitutional duty."
Senate Republicans had urged Johnson to delay sending the articles in order to provide senators with additional time for debate. The aim is to address the matter at the start of the week rather than toward the end when lawmakers typically prepare to return to their home states.
The Republican-controlled House passed two articles of impeachment against Mayorkas on Feb. 13 by a narrow margin of one vote.
The impeachment charges allege that Mayorkas mishandled the situation at the U.S.-Mexico border. The House accuses him of "willfully and systematically" failing to enforce existing immigration laws and of breaching the public trust by allegedly lying to Congress about the security of the border.
The House's impeachment vote of 214-213 in February, which narrowly passed on the second attempt after the initial effort was rejected a week earlier, marked the first instance in nearly 150 years that a Cabinet secretary had been impeached.
However, while the Senate is obliged to consider the charges, a two-thirds majority of the chamber would be required to convict him.
Unlike the two impeachment trials of former President Donald Trump in 2020 and 2021, the Senate is not expected to spend significant time on charges against Mayorkas. Democrats, who hold the majority in the Senate, seem to have sufficient votes to quickly dismiss the trial. Not a single Democrat has indicated support for the impeachment initiative.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said that Democrats are maintaining their strategy to address the impeachment "as expeditiously as possible."
"We are ready to go whenever they are. We are sticking with our plan. We're going to move this as expeditiously as possible," he said.
Democrats argue that the charges against Mayorkas constitute a policy disagreement rather than meeting the threshold of "high crimes and misdemeanors" outlined in the Constitution as grounds for impeachment.
Johnson and Senate Republicans are urging Schumer to proceed with a full trial.
