Failed DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas may have dodged an impeachment hearing in the Senate in the short term, but GOP lawmakers didn’t miss a chance to rip him to shreds when he appeared on the Hill to defend his fiscal 2025 budget requests.

Mayorkas appeared before the House Homeland Security Appropriations Subcommittee and the Senate Homeland Security Appropriations Subcommittee this week.

“This request is not serious,” said Subcommittee Chairman Rep. David Joyce (R-OH) referencing Mayorkas’ proposal to cut 7,500 beds in detention facilities.

“This budget is not only full of gimmicks that mask the true cost of protecting the homeland, but it also fails to address the policy-driven crisis that continues at the border,” Joyce added.

Despite President Biden dismantling his predecessor’s secure border with executive orders, Mayorkas insisted that only Congress could fix the border crisis.

“Only Congress can fix our broken and outdated system,” Mayorkas said. “And only Congress can address our need for more border patrol agents, asylum officers and immigration judges, facilities and technologies.”

Mayorkas didn’t find any friendlies in the Senate committee hearing, either.

“It gives me no joy to say this but most Republicans don’t trust you and the vast majority of the American people don’t trust you. That’s why you’ve been impeached,” Sen. John Kenned (R-LA) told Mayorkas.

“The only people I know who are better off in this country today than they were four years ago are illegal immigrants. And that’s a result of your policies,” Mr. Kennedy said, though he repeatedly added that his feelings weren’t personal. “I don’t hate anybody. I look for grace wherever I can find it. And I certainly don’t hate you.”

A majority of the American people think that, as a result of Sec. Mayorkas and Pres. Biden’s behavior, our southern border is an open bleeding wound.

And they believe that this chaos is by design. pic.twitter.com/DerI7wR9kB

— John Kennedy (@SenJohnKennedy) April 10, 2024

Mayorkas seemed shocked that Kennedy would even suggest that it’s the policies of the Biden Administration that are causing the crisis at the southern border.

“The notion, senator, that we intend to allow illegal immigration is nothing short of preposterous,” he said. “It is disrespectful to the extraordinarily hard work that we perform and far more importantly that the personnel in the Department of Homeland Security and across this administration perform to stem illegal immigration.”

Mayorkas is the first Cabinet secretary to be impeached in more than a century.