BREAKING: The House kills the Hegseth impeachment by seven votes, and eleven Democrats didn’t vote
Pete Hegseth survived Tuesday, and the margin was smaller than the number of Democrats who skipped the vote.
The Republican-led House voted 211-204 to send Rep. Thomas Massie’s impeachment resolution to committee, which effectively shelves it. The motion blocked a vote on the actual articles, which accuse Hegseth of waging war on Iran without authorization, ignoring laws meant to protect civilians and carrying out extrajudicial killings.
Every Democrat who voted opposed the motion. Massie was the only Republican to join them.
But eleven Democrats didn’t vote at all. CNN’s Jake Tapper posted the names: Brownley, Correa, Hollen, Hosford, Jackson of Illinois, Pelosi, Pettersen, Stansbury, Stevens, Strickland and Wilson of Florida.
Here’s the math. The motion passed by seven. If those eleven Democrats had voted no, it fails, and the House has to debate and vote on the articles of impeachment.
Hegseth had a very good evening. Trump called the result an “EXONERATION of a Great American Patriot.”
There’s still no explanation from the eleven members for why they missed the vote, so the reasons are unknown. Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries supported the impeachment effort and has said Democrats will “run Pete Hegseth out of town” when they take control of Congress in January.
Massie got his vote. The Senate wouldn’t have removed Hegseth anyway, since that takes two-thirds. But Republicans had to go on the record, and Democrats had a chance to put more of them there.
The vote was seven votes short, and eleven members weren’t in the room to cast it.