The US Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas, de facto in charge of immigration, emerged unscathed from the trial to which the Republicans referred him, accusing him of causing a crisis on the US-Mexico border.

It only took a few hours for the Senate, where the Democrats have a marginal majority, to decide that the process initiated against the official was non-existent.

As the country enters an election year, immigration has become one of the dominant issues of the campaign ahead of the showdown between Democratic President Joe Biden and his Republican predecessor Donald Trump.

The American right accused Minister Alejandro Mayorkas of turning the southern border of the USA into a strainer.

For this reason, proceedings were initiated to refer him to trial and suspend him.

In mid-February, the 64-year-old minister was thus referred to trial by the House of Representatives, in which the conservative faction has a marginal majority.

1876

As required by the Constitution, the Senate, the other body of the US Congress, began his trial yesterday.

The process began in earnest in the early afternoon, but ended very quickly after Democrats voted en masse against Mr. Mayorkas’ impeachment.

Mr. Biden’s faction has commented that the opposition has tried to scapegoat the Cuban-born minister for partisan purposes, with the Nov. 5 election less than seven months away.

The most recent impeachment of a minister to a Senate trial by the House of Representatives dates back to… 1876. Then-Secretary of War William Belknap, accused of corruption, resigned before the proceedings were completed.

The US Constitution states that Congress can impeach the president, his cabinet, or even a federal judge, if he is found to have committed “treason”, is involved in “corruption”, or “crimes or serious offences”.

“Wasting valuable time”

The person concerned, Alejandro Mayorkas, repeatedly rejected the accusations of the Republicans, accusing them of “wasting precious time and taxpayers’ money” with this process, which he called a “political maneuver” and a “farce”.

Still, immigration continues to be a painful headache for Joe Biden.

Republicans, especially loyalists of former President Trump, with highly anti-immigration rhetoric, are accusing the Democratic president of standing idly by while the country is under what they say is an “invasion,” pointing to record numbers of arrests of undocumented immigrants at the border — they reached 302,000 in December.

Donald Trump often refers to shocking, particularly heinous murders, which he emphasizes are committed by people who entered the US illegally, seeking to create the impression that the country is being swept by a crime wave caused by illegal immigrants.

But neither the available police statistics in American cities, nor the studies prepared by experts document that such a phenomenon actually occurs.