On Tuesday, the first working day for the U.S. House of Representatives after its most recent vacation, Speaker Kevin McCarthy announced he had ordered House committees to open a formal impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden’s actions. Exactly what actions prompted the inquiry were left unsaid, as nine months of investigations by multiple House committees and subcommittees have failed to produce any evidence of wrongdoing by the president.
“We will go wherever the evidence takes us,” McCarthy said.
In all previous presidential impeachments, the House developed an evidentiary record before launching an impeachment inquiry, but McCarthy has opted to skip that.
A lack of evidence has never troubled the most rightwing members of the Republican House caucus. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia first filed articles of impeachment against Biden on Jan. 21, 2021, the day after Biden was sworn in as president. Greene based her articles on a discredited conspiracy theory alleging Biden was involved in corrupt dealing in Ukraine.
Nine months before Biden won the November 2020 election, Sen. Joni Ernst had embraced the same Ukraine conspiracy theory as possible grounds for impeaching Biden if he became president.
“I think this door of impeachable whatever has been opened,” Ernst said in a February 2020 interview with Bloomberg News.
“The House is really leading on this charge and I do actually have concerns about what’s been uncovered so far about President Biden,” Ernst said in a conference call with Iowa reporters on Wednesday. The senator did not say what had been uncovered that caused her concern.
“It’s being led by the House and we’ll see where it goes,” Ernst, who voted to acquit Trump following both his impeachments, said.
All four of the Republicans who represent Iowa in the U.S. House have said they support the impeachment inquiry.
“I think this is the starting point for having a real conversation on what evidence may exist, and then holding folks accountable if there’s been a violation,” Rep. Zach Nunn, who represents Des Moines and other parts of central Iowa, said on Tuesday.
Rep. Randy Feenstra, whose district covers western Iowa, issued a statement of support for the inquiry on Tuesday.
After beginning with a few false statements about the results of House committee investigations, Feenstra concluded, “It is evident that a further and more thorough investigation is warranted to protect the integrity of our institutions, defend the rule of law in our country, and hold President Biden accountable for his corruption. I support a formal impeachment inquiry into President Biden.”
Rep. Ashley Hinson already came out in favor of an impeachment inquiry earlier this month, and Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks said in a statement she supported the inquiry because it would give House Republicans additional subpoena power, which would be “instrumental in further connecting the dots regarding alleged improper payments and influence peddling involving President Biden and the Biden family.”
“The President hasn’t done anything wrong, and the House Republicans’ investigations for the past 9 months have proved that,” a White House spokesperson said in a statement on Tuesday. “They have no evidence, so they’re launching the next phase of their evidence-free goose chase simply to throw red meat to the right wing so they can continue baselessly attacking the president to play extreme politics.”
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