A Republican-led House committee plans to begin impeachment proceedings against Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas next week, the panel’s chair said Wednesday.

Republicans have repeatedly accused Mayorkas of violating his oath of office by failing to stem the flow of migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border.

Rep. Mark Green, R-Tenn., chair of the Homeland Security Committee, said the panel will hold its first impeachment hearing Jan. 10.

“For almost three years, the American people have demanded an end to the unprecedented crisis at the Southwest border, and they have also rightly called for Congress to hold accountable those responsible,” Green said in a statement. “That’s why the House Committee on Homeland Security led a comprehensive investigation into the causes, costs, and consequences of this crisis.

“Our investigation made clear that this crisis finds its foundation in Secretary Mayorkas’ decision-making and refusal to enforce the laws passed by Congress, and that his failure to fulfill his oath of office demands accountability.

In November, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., forced a vote in the full House to impeach Mayorkas. Eight Republicans and 201 Democrats voted to refer Greene’s article of impeachment back to the Homeland Security Committee, which had already been conducting its own investigation into Mayorkas. The Georgia congresswoman said she was “outraged” by the vote.

Green, the committee chair, said Wednesday the referral “served to highlight the importance of our taking up the impeachment process.”

A majority vote in the House is needed to impeach Mayorkas over alleged “high crimes and misdemeanors.” Two-thirds of the Democratic-led Senate would need to convict him in order to remove him from office.

A Department of Homeland Security spokesperson said Wednesday that House Republicans are “wasting valuable time and taxpayer dollars pursuing a baseless political exercise that has been rejected by members of both parties and already failed on a bipartisan vote.”

“There is no valid basis to impeach Secretary Mayorkas, as senior members of the House majority have attested, and this extreme impeachment push is a harmful distraction from our critical national security priorities,” the spokesperson said in a statement emailed to Spectrum News. “Secretary Mayorkas and the Department of Homeland Security will continue working every day to keep Americans safe.” 

Rep. Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, the top Democrat on the Homeland Security Committee, called the impeachment push against Mayorkas “baseless.”

“No matter how many reports Republicans release, hearings they hold, or Fox news interviews they make, nothing Chairman Green has done this past year has changed the fact that the extreme MAGA Republican effort to impeach Secretary Mayorkas is completely baseless,” Thompson said in a written statement. “They’ve only shown the American people it is nothing more than a political stunt without any foundation in the Constitution. It was never meant to be a legitimate investigation – only a MAGA spectacle.”

Encounters between law enforcement and migrants at the border briefly fell after a pandemic-era policy expelling migrants expired in May and the Biden administration implemented new measures aimed at deterring migrants from attempting to travel to the U.S. without appointments to make their cases for entry. But the numbers have since risen again, with at least 232,000 encounters being reported monthly from September to November, the latest month for which data is available.

Nationwide, Customs and Border Protection recorded 308,728 encounters in November, the worst November on record, according to the Homeland Security Committee.

News of the scheduled impeachment hearing comes on the same day House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., is leading a delegation of more than 60 House Republicans to the border to pressure President Joe Biden and Democrats to agree to stricter immigration measures.

“This situation requires significant policy changes and House Republicans will continue advocating for real solutions that actually secure our border,” Johnson wrote on X, formerly Twitter, on Tuesday.

The White House has pushed back by blaming House Republicans for voting against funding to hire thousands of new Border Patrol agents, asylum officers and immigration judge, help communities host migrants, and invest in technology to help stop the smuggling of fentanyl into the country.

Biden’s $106 billion supplemental spending request, which is languishing in Congress, includes $13.6 billion that would be dedicated to border and migration issues. Republicans have said the president’s proposal does not go far enough and have balked over funding that would provide services for migrants inside the U.S.