Despite Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas’s image being on “the Mount Rushmore of worst Cabinet members of all time,” Missouri Sen. Eric Schmitt expects Democrats will try to block his impeachment trial in the Senate next week.

Schmitt made the remark in an exclusive interview with The Heartlander Wednesday in which he also dished on Bidenomics, the president’s “cynical” vote-buying student loan cancellations, and Elon Musk’s fight to preserve free speech in the Western Hemisphere.

Schmitt said he hopes there will be a legitimate trial soon to remove Mayorkas for his abject failure to secure U.S. borders, but he expects differently.

“[Senate Majority Leader] Chuck Schumer, I think, plans to try to table this or dismiss it. That’d be unprecedented – and again, another norm, another rule, another obligation, another job that he’s willing to just totally bulldoze that affects our constitutional order.

“There are three ‘states of being’ in the Senate. We have an executive calendar, a legislative calendar and an impeachment calendar. Those are the three things we do. And it’s a very important role we have, by way of the Constitution, to be sort of the jury, the judge. We’re sworn in as judges when the articles of impeachment come over, presumably next week.”

Would his Democrat colleagues vote to convict Mayorkas if the evidence calls for his removal?

“I don’t know,” Schmitt admits. “That’s what the whole point of a trial is, to hear the evidence and make a decision. I would hope that there would be some Democrats who would see that not only does Secretary Mayorkas belong on the Mount Rushmore of worst Cabinet members of all time, but that he’s subverted the law. 

“There are memos to that effect, that he’s written to DHS personnel, to ignore the law. For the history of our country, Republican, Democrat, the law of the United States essentially was, if you came here illegally you were detained and deported unless you fit into some narrow categories like amnesty. That’s not how they’re running the country right now. And that’s why we have 9 million people here illegally. 

“It’s why we have crime in our communities from illegal immigrants. It’s why we have seen all the overdoses – over 100 a day – and unprecedented human trafficking and the national security ticking time bomb. 

“In the history of our country, there’s never been an instance, in 240-plus years, where articles of impeachment have come over to the Senate and there’s not been a trial for someone who’s still in office or alive. And so, to just flippantly dismiss that, in a way that’s never been done before in the history of the country, I think is offensive. And the American people deserve better than that.”

Americans deserve better economically as well, Schmitt argues, citing the continued ravages of chronic inflation under Biden.

“It’s been a disaster for American families,” Schmitt says. “There’s no other way you can spin it. And I know they’ve tried to, with trying to brand things as ‘Bidenomics.’ People feel it every time they go to the grocery store. Everything is more expensive, at least 20%. Energy is 30% more expensive. And inflation is cumulative, right? So, each time you get a report like we’ve seen [Wednesday], it just adds on. It’s a pile-on for American workers and American families. 

“This is the result of disastrous Democrat policies. I think voters are getting a glimpse now of what they’re all about, which is open borders and high inflation. And I think that’s being reflected in the polling, too.”

Meanwhile, Biden is rolling out millions in new college student loan cancellations, despite a U.S. Supreme Court ruling last year striking down his prior plan to shift $430 billion in college loan obligations to taxpayers.

Federal law allows the temporary suspension of student loan repayments during national emergencies, such as during the COVID-19 pandemic, but not the cancellation of them. The court said only Congress could agree to that, and hasn’t.

Is Biden’s current student loan cancellation plan suddenly legal?

“No, it’s not,” Schmitt says simply. “It’s another cynical election year ploy by Joe Biden to try to get votes. He knows he’s losing younger voters now; they’re fleeing the Democrat Party to be Republicans because they see what a disaster the economy has been for them. It’s twice as expensive to get into a home now. Every time they go to the grocery store, everything’s 20%, 30% more expensive than it was just a few years ago.

“He’s shedding voters, shedding younger voters. And this is his attempt to try to woo them back. But it won’t work. They see right through it. And it’s also a huge middle finger to everybody that worked their way through college or paid back their student loans or just chose a different course in life. All the Democrats have left now is to try to buy votes, and it’s sickening.”

The Heartlander asked Schmitt – who, as state attorney general, filed the landmark Missouri v. Biden lawsuit to halt the administration’s collusion with Big Tech companies to censor conservatives online – what he thinks of X/Twitter owner Elon Musk’s companion fight against government censorship of social media in Brazil.

“I think you’re seeing a rise of left-wing authoritarianism around the world, and their calling card is censorship. They’re afraid of debate. They want to control language. This is the way of tyrants, and we see it in other places in the world.  

“And by the way, we’ve seen it with this administration, with their vast censorship enterprise, trying to suppress the voices of dissent in this country. And I think we need to stand up and push back against that at every turn.”