Alejandro Mayorkas

“You don’t have to go home, but you can’t stay here.” So goes the bartenders’ refrain to customers at closing time. The Trump administration is issuing that same call to millions of illegal immigrants, beginning with the most violent (and those caught staying with them). You can’t stay here. It’s a wildly popular stance, but it is running into predictable problems. The first is that rounding up the millions here illegally is costly, time-consuming and sometimes dangerous. That problem was vastly increased by Joe Biden’s deliberate decision to open the southern border, allow millions of people to cross it illegally and then lie to the public and Congress about what his administration was doing.

Donald Trump is making strides in all the right places, it seems. Polls indicate he’s making moves among black and Jewish voters in New York State as well as with female voters, while also gaining support in crucial battleground states.According to the New York Post:Surveys from Emerson College and the Hill show the 45th president edging out Biden in Arizona (47 percent — 43 percent), Georgia (45 — 41 percent), Michigan (46 — 45 percent), Nevada (46 — 43 percent), Pennsylvania (47 — 45 percent) and Wisconsin (47 — 44 percent).In all six states, Trump’s lead has either remained the same or grown from the outlet’s polls taken last month, before he was convicted by a Manhattan jury on thirty-four business fraud charges.

The Biden White House had a difficult weekend as pro-Palestinian protesters continue to be a thorn in the side of the administration and the Democratic Party. Thousands arrived outside of the White House on Saturday to call for an immediate and permanent ceasefire and for Biden to stop sending weapons to Israel. Police erected additional fencing around the White House in anticipation of the protests and deployed pepper spray against at least one demonstrator, but no arrests were made. Instead, the pro-Palestinian activists left graffiti on statues in Lafayette Square and trash strewn around the perimeter of the White House complex.

After offering explanations for why TikTok presents a danger to US security, Homeland Security secretary Alejandro Mayorkas admitted Friday that his college-aged daughter uses the controversial app.At a “signature event” held by the Economic Club at the capital’s Marriott Marquis Hotel, the club’s president, David Rubenstein, sat for a lengthy conversation with the secretary. On immigration, Rubenstein pressed him, asking about asylum policy, increasing encounters and whether having a physical barrier would have helped curb illegal crossings. This reporter asked Mayorkas if the administration was preparing for any policy changes given they recently hired two new senior-level officials.

The Senate kicked off its impeachment trial for Department of Homeland Security secretary Alejandro Mayorkas on Wednesday as Democrats quickly dismissed the charges.House Republicans voted to impeach Mayorkas in February for failing to enforce federal immigration law and lying to Congress when he said the border was secure. The two articles of impeachment were finally delivered to the Senate yesterday, and although Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell argued that the body has a duty to hold a full trial, senators voted along party lines just a few hours after the start of the trial to dismiss Mayorkas’s alleged “willful and systemic refusal to comply with the law.” They dismissed the second charge — “breach of public trust” — in short order, as well.

“If there’s anyone who deserves impeachment, it's Alejandro Mayorkas. Not only has he failed to enforce the law, he’s violated his oath of office with impunity.” Greg Abbott is not mincing words. The Republican governor of Texas is at the center of the biggest issue on the minds of many 2024 voters — the border, where his policy clashes with Joe Biden’s White House and administration have become a focal point for Republican candidates nationwide and will be a major part of the 2024 Trump campaign. Multiple polls show the border/migrant issue to be top of mind for voters, especially for Republican-leaning independent voters — more on that below.

House Republicans successfully impeached Department of Homeland Security secretary Alejandro Mayorkas by a 214-213 vote on Tuesday after an initial failed attempt last week. Mayorkas is the first cabinet official to be impeached since 1876. Speaker Mike Johnson said Mayorkas “deserves to be impeached,” arguing that Mayorkas lied to Congress, refused to comply with federal immigration law and violated his oath of office. Impeachment articles accused Mayorkas of a “willful and systemic refusal to comply with the law.”To say it is extremely unlikely that Mayorkas would be convicted by the Democrat-controlled Senate is an understatement. This serves as more of a symbolic measure for Republicans.

Republican National Committee chairwoman Ronna McDaniel is reportedly preparing to step down from her post after seven years on the job. Multiple sources told the New York Times that McDaniel intends to resign after the South Carolina GOP primary at the end of the month; she had been facing years of pressure as the longest-reigning RNC chair with seemingly few tangible successes. The RNC expressed plans at its Winter Meeting last week to take out a credit line amid disappointing fundraising and cash-on-hand numbers, and McDaniel took sharp criticism for her failure to produce a “red wave” in the 2022 midterms and her unwillingness to get financially involved in Virginia’s state elections in 2023.

A former Trump official is reportedly in critical condition after being shot during an attempted carjacking in Washington on Monday evening. Mike Gill was waiting to pick up his wife when a man shot him and then fled on foot. The carjacker allegedly went on a rampage, killing Alberto Vasquez Jr. after taking his car keys, stealing two more cars and then firing a gun at a police officer before he was finally shot and killed.Carjackings have become a serious problem around the country, but especially in the nation’s capital. Last year, carjackings doubled, reaching a shocking 959 reported incidents. Public officials have said that most of the carjackings in DC are committed by repeat teenage offenders.

Given just how unpopular illegal immigration is, it is stunning to see both the likely nominees for president fumbling the issue. That’s political malpractice.  For Biden, the malpractice consists not only in keeping the border open, which is already killing him in the polls, but in resisting the strongest Republican proposals to close it. Every time Republican congressional leaders visit the White House to negotiate, they come away empty handed.   In stiff-arming the Republican proposals, the White House has put itself in the awkward position of saying it will grudgingly accept their efforts but only if Republicans make concessions on other issues.

Some details of the latest congressional border deal, negotiated by Republican senator James Lankford and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, dropped Saturday. Conservatives didn’t have high hopes for negotiations, but the reported deal is worse than imagined. The Senate has been tight-lipped about discussions, but Rosemary Jenks, government relations director at the Immigration Accountability Project, says sources familiar with the negotiations have leaked details to her. The current framework of the deal reportedly involves expanding legal immigration and providing greater incentives to illegal immigrants in exchange for slight changes to border policy.

White House officials confirmed Tuesday that defense secretary Lloyd Austin kept his prostate cancer diagnosis to himself for a month before informing the White House, adding further scrutiny to Austin’s recent failure to inform Biden or the National Security Council that he was in the ICU for several days. Austin, who oversees a department tasked with deterring conflict, received his diagnosis in December, according to a statement from Walter Reed National Military Medical Center officials.

The pandemic-era immigration policy known as Title 42 came to end alongside the nation's public health emergency Friday. Its expiry is expected to throw the southern border into further chaos. Title 42 refers to a portion of US code that gives the federal government the authority to curb migration during public health crises. The Trump administration implemented the policy to quickly eject illegal border crossers, including those who claimed asylum, amid the Covid-19 pandemic. Administration officials at the time warned that border crossers could both spread the virus to American citizens, as well as to each other if held in close quarters in detention facilities, at a time when the US was mostly prohibiting travel from other countries.

Republicans need to start questioning their political instincts. For the sake of accountability, I’ll start with myself. I want nothing more than to see the GOP investigate the artist currently known as Hunter Biden and the Big Guy right out of the gates. Which is why, and it pains me to say this... they probably shouldn’t. First, let me explain my eagerness to watch House Republicans "pounce" and seize on this probe into the corrupt First Family. After years of the president’s bogus “that has been debunked!” denials and the media’s suppression of the legitimate laptop from hell, it is high time we got some answers from the Biden family.

In front of the whole world, Homeland Security secretary Alejandro Mayorkas threw the Border Patrol agents he oversees — and our country's reputation — under the bus. Now, two leading border chiefs are ushering the DHS secretary toward the exit. Mark Morgan, head of the US Border Patrol under Barack Obama, has dubbed Mayorkas "the most dangerous man in the Biden administration" and is calling for his impeachment. Morgan also slammed the DHS head for choosing "to withhold the truth." Former ICE director Tom Homan is equally blunt: "He should resign.