House Republicans line up behind McCarthy on the Biden impeachment seesaw

House Republicans are caught between two forces when it comes to impeaching Joe Biden: conservative eagerness to target the president and the protection of their members in pro-Biden districts.

Speaker Kevin McCarthy raised impeachment during a closed-door GOP meeting on Wednesday, cautioning his members that Republicans would launch a probe only when — and if — they secured the evidence to justify one, according to three lawmakers in the room who spoke on condition of anonymity.

At the moment, McCarthy said, Republicans have not amassed enough evidence to start an impeachment inquiry, those three lawmakers said. The speaker further warned members not to overstate what they’ve uncovered so far against the president.

It was the second straight day that McCarthy contained himself on impeachment after suggesting on Fox News that the House GOP’s work was nearing the threshold for a formal impeachment effort. The California Republican’s two-step on the topic underscores how combustible impeachment is for his five-seat majority, which runs through a dozen-plus Biden-friendly seats.

McCarthy must placate his hard-right critics — whose support he’ll need in this week’s high-stakes spending votes — without alienating his most skittish members who face reelection on turf that Biden won. Some House Republicans are left to privately wonder how long the speaker can keep up that balancing act, though he seems to have mollified both sides for now.

“It’s meaningful that he has broached the impeachment subject, and he has acknowledged that the evidence is mounting against the president,” said Rep. Bob Good (R-Va.), a vocal McCarthy detractor who appeared satisfied by the speaker’s gestures this week.

During Wednesday’s GOP meeting, McCarthy carefully outlined the difference between an initial impeachment inquiry and the official impeachment vote that might follow. One senior House Republican, also speaking on condition of anonymity, said the conference is refining its message this way: The GOP is in an "investigation" of whether there’s enough evidence to launch such an inquiry, with no timeline or deadline.

To explain the GOP's potential case for opening a historic impeachment inquiry into Biden, McCarthy has pointed broadly to various threads of sweeping GOP investigations. Those include IRS whistleblower allegations that the Justice Department hampered the federal Hunter Biden probe, questions about Biden family business deals and an uncorroborated FBI document that links the president to an unverified bribery claim.

But Republicans have not yet found a smoking gun linking the president to his son’s business arrangements or that Joe Biden accepted a bribe, while both Attorney General Merrick Garland and U.S. Attorney David Weiss have denied the whistleblower allegations.

The conundrum for GOP leaders, then, may be holding back Good and other conservatives who have long champed at the bit to impeach Biden, an appetite that's grown as hunger to impeach a Cabinet member looks to be on the wane in the party. Some battleground-seat and centrist Republicans, meanwhile, have chafed at the idea.

“There are some people that aren't going to be happy until everybody in Washington gets impeached. And it just looks like that's the road we're going down,” said Rep. Tony Gonzales (R-Texas), who’s criticized some of his conservative colleagues' impeachment calls.

“Impeachment is going to suck all the oxygen out of this place … The people back at home in my district are worried about inflation, worried about the border, their kids being safe in school — you know, real issues,” Gonzales added.

Some in the conference are pressing party leaders about the effect that a public flirtation with impeachment would have on more vulnerable members. That question got raised during a private GOP leadership meeting on Tuesday, according to a GOP member familiar with the sitdown.

Importantly, some of those swing-district Republicans aren’t outright rejecting the idea of impeachment. Many have said that Republicans should continue to investigate, but that they aren’t yet sold on a formal inquiry.

“Not yet. Let’s put the facts — the committees are doing their work — let’s put a spotlight on all this, and we’ll go from there,” said Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.).

Rep. Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.), one of the GOP’s most endangered incumbents, asked: “Are the [investigations] producing enough facts and evidence that warrant taking it to the next step? I don't think it's there at the moment.”

And not every conservative is drawing a red line for GOP leaders on impeachment timeline or strategy. Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas), who has tangled with McCarthy, said he supports an impeachment inquiry but is deferring on the specifics to McCarthy and Judiciary Committee Chair Jim Jordan (R-Ohio).

“We’re talking about the president of the United States,” Roy said. “All of the stuff that we’re getting on Biden and the Biden family ... more than troubling. But we’ve got to go lay it all out and make the case.”

The pressure that swing-district Republicans must navigate over a potential impeachment inquiry into Biden also extends to two of his Cabinet members: Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, who testified on Wednesday before the House Judiciary Committee, and Garland.

Republicans used the hearing to grill Mayorkas, who defended the administration's handling of the border. Rep. Ken Buck (R-Colo.), who has been an impeachment skeptic, told Mayorkas that his constituents consider the Homeland Security chief a "traitor."

Rep. Jeff Van Drew (R-N.J.) asked Mayorkas if he would resign. When the secretary said he would not, Van Drew responded: "If you will not resign, that leaves us with no other option, you should be impeached."

While the hearing is likely a preview of the legal and political arguments Republicans would make if they move to impeach Mayorkas, they've also acknowledged the obvious: They don't currently have the votes on the committee or within the conference to move that forward.

The intra-GOP tension comes as Democrats vow to hammer Republicans for being overzealous in targeting Biden as the 2024 campaign ramps up. At the heart of Democrats' pushback is a charge that impeaching Biden on thin grounds would amount to political retribution after the two impeachments of former President Donald Trump — which many Republicans view as unfair.

McCarthy, for his part, has batted down suggestions that he is flirting with impeachment to appease the right flank of his conference over purple-district Republicans whose reelections next year will prove crucial to holding the House.

So far, the GOP’s biggest pro-impeachment voices are echoing McCarthy’s more cautious language, declining to demand a specific timetable.

“An impeachment inquiry is looking very good. It's looking promising. And I think it's something that our conference is moving towards,” said Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), who called for Biden to face impeachment proceedings on her first day in office.

She echoed McCarthy in stressing that the party was talking only about an inquiry, which “could possibly lead towards" a full impeachment. Asked about her timeline, she said only: “Soon.”