Congress Limps Into the New Year as Impeachment, Foreign Aid, and Government Funding Fights Loom

In early January, members of Congress will return to the nation’s capital with just days to go before the government runs out of money, threatening the credibility of House Republicans as capable of governance even as they push to impeach President Biden, hold Hunter Biden in contempt, and extract border security concessions from Senate Democrats. The most pressing items on the agenda include two government funding packages that must be passed by January 19 and February 2 in order to avoid a government shutdown. Speaker Johnson previously battled with conservatives over topline funding levels, and given that the GOP now has only a two-seat majority following the expulsion of Congressman George Santos and the resignation of a former speaker, Congressman Kevin McCarthy, the math is going to get a lot harder for Mr. Johnson. Top of mind for many Republicans, though, is impeaching Mr. Biden over allegations of corruption and venality involving his family. The White House has pushed back and refused to cooperate for months with congressional investigations. Yet now that the House has passed a resolution formally authorizing the impeachment inquiry, it is clear that more subpoenas will be issued, more depositions will be taken, and the possibility of criminal penalties for noncompliance has increased dramatically. Hunter Biden is by far the most likely to face repercussions, for his defiance of a congressional subpoena. In November, the chairman of the House Oversight Committee, Congressman James Comer, issued a subpoena for Mr. Biden to appear for a sworn deposition in private, which Mr. Biden refuses to do. “I’m here today to make sure that the House committees’ illegitimate investigations of my family do not proceed on distortions, manipulated evidence, and lies,” Mr. Biden said in a dramatic appearance at Capitol Hill the day he was due to appear before Mr. Comer’s lawyers. “For six years, I have been the target of the unrelenting Trump attack machine, shouting: ‘Where’s Hunter?’” he added. “Here’s my answer: I am here.”Mr. Comer and his Republican colleagues say they will hold Mr. Biden in contempt of Congress early in the new year, hoping that the United States attorney for the District of Columbia will prosecute the same way he did with a former White House strategist, Steve Bannon, and a former White House trade advisor, Peter Navarro, after they resisted compliance with the select January 6 committee.On top of their government funding deal and potential impeachment of the president, House Republicans are looking to play hardball with the Senate on border security and immigration reform. Border crossings have surged to historic highs in recent weeks, and the GOP is aiming to capitalize on Democrats’ desperation for a Ukraine aid package by insisting that any new aid to Ukraine must be accompanied by an agreement on border enforcement. The rapid increase in border crossings, according to Fox News, has overwhelmed law enforcement and the asylum processing system. On December 18 alone, Reuters reports, more than 14,000 individuals crossed the southern border from Mexico, comprising migrants from South America, Asia, and Africa. The backlog of migrants awaiting appearances in front of immigration judges has also swelled. In just the last 12 months, the number of those with court dates ballooned to 3 million from 2 million, meaning each immigration judge now has an average of 4,500 pending cases.The key group of Senate negotiators decided to sit down around Thanksgiving to begin the process of hammering out a deal that would provide billions of dollars for Ukraine while also reintroducing some Trump-era policies that allow law enforcement to more easily expel migrants and force them to remain in a third country before being released into America. House Republicans have made it clear that the final product from the more cordial, deal-making Senate may not go far enough. One House Freedom Caucus member, Congressman Chip Roy, previously told the Sun that he wants to see nothing less than the House-passed immigration reform bill known as HR 2, which provides billions of dollars for border security enforcement and restricts migrants’ ability to enter America on the basis that they are seeking asylum. “Our position is clear: It’s HR 2,” Mr. Roy told the Sun shortly after the Senate negotiations began. “Here’s the bottom line — they’re either going to stiff us on the ability to move any kind of border security because they refuse to move HR 2, or they’re never getting Ukraine. If they ever want to have a thought of having Ukraine, then you better sit down and do the border. That’s it. That’s the end of the conservation.”“We don’t need a carving off of HR 2. Otherwise, just call [President] Zelensky and say, ‘I’m sorry,’” the congressman said.

Congress Limps Into the New Year as Impeachment, Foreign Aid, and Government Funding Fights Loom

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