The Homeland Security secretary may have escaped an impeachment trial this week, but he couldn’t dodge the trial by fire of facing a furious Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri.

Alejandro Mayorkas could only look on sheepishly and respond meekly to Hawley’s fusillade Thursday over innocent Americans’ deaths at the hands of suspected criminals who came here illegally with the Biden administration’s blessings and assistance.

In particular, Hawley grilled the wide-eyed Mayorkas on Georgia jogger Laken Riley’s alleged killer, José Antonio Ibarra, and the illegal alien driver who killed 12-year-old Missourian Travis Wolfe in a wrong-way head-on crash in December, allegedly at over 70 miles an hour in a 40-mph zone.

Ibarra, Hawley noted, was “paroled” into the country – illegally, as it turns out – when the Biden administration didn’t have room for him at an El Paso detention center. He made his way to New York, where biometrics showed he had a criminal record in Venezuela – but still managed to get a work permit here, and even had an arrest for injuring a child in New York expunged before allegedly killing Riley in Athens, Georgia.

The only thing Mayorkas would say about the tragic chain of events is he’s confident justice will be done in the case.

“Well, hopefully he’ll get more of a trial than you got,” Hawley shot back. “Otherwise there’ll be no justice for anyone at all.”

As for young Travis Wolfe, though he didn’t even recognize the boy’s name, Mayorkas said “all of our hearts break for the family of this young boy who died in that accident.”

‘Doesn’t show it in his actions’

The Heartlander asked Hawley in an interview whether he thinks Mayorkas’ heart really does break for the Missouri boy.

“Well, he sure doesn’t show it in his actions,” Hawley said. “I mean, words are cheap. Talk is cheap. He hasn’t called these families. He hasn’t followed up with them. He didn’t even know who Travis Wolfe was.  

“I don’t think he cares. If he cared, he’d do something about it. He would close the border. He’d bring these criminals to justice. He’s not doing any of that. He’s getting exactly what he wants. He wants the open border. If Americans are collateral damage, if our schools are overrun with drugs because of it, he’s fine with it.”

If Mayorkas’ heart really does break for young Wolfe, Riley and others killed by illegal immigrants, why doesn’t he change U.S. policy at the border?

“Oh, because this is the policy outcome he wants,” Hawley says. “He wants there to be 9 million, 10 million illegals flooding across our border, as there have been in the last three years. That’s his record. He has said that he’s proud of their record on immigration. He’s wanted this.

“He’s wanted it because he wants illegal voters. He’s wanted it because he wants the border to be overrun. He wants to collapse our immigration system, which he has called systemically oppressive and racist, and all the rest. Those are all lies, by the way. But that’s what he said. 

“So, this is what he wants. And again, if Americans, Missourians, are harmed or hurt or even killed in the process, he just keeps right on going.”

During his blistering interrogation by Hawley at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing Thursday, Mayorkas repeatedly refused to answer even factual questions about Riley’s alleged murderer, citing an open investigation. For some reason, Mayorkas wouldn’t even say whether he’d read Ibarra’s parole file.

‘Oh, he’s a liar’

At one point, Mayorkas timidly claimed Hawley had misstated some facts about Ibarra’s record and actions. Hawley responded that he was merely reading from Ibarra’s file verbatim. Mayorkas had no answer for that.

“Oh, he’s a liar,” Hawley told The Heartlander. “I mean, listen, the guy lied. We caught him red-handed. He lied under oath. Two days ago he said with regard to Laken Riley’s killer he just didn’t know much about that case, and he didn’t know why the guy was in the country. Five days before that, he’d sung a different tune: He’d said, ‘Well, yeah, he was in the country, it was fine to parole him.’ 

“I have the file now. I’ve got the parole file. I’ve seen it. And as I said today when I read it into the record, what it clearly shows is he was paroled into this country by Mayorkas illegally. And Mayorkas knows that. He has known it for all of these months, and he’s lied about it.  

“The truth is, Laken Riley would be alive today were it not for Mayorkas and Joe Biden. And sadly, the same is almost certainly true of Travis Wolfe [and] the people who were stabbed in O’Fallon, Missouri by the illegal migrant there, and thousands of more people around the country.”

With all this tragedy unfolding as a result of the open southern border, Senate Democrats nonetheless voted in unison Wednesday to summarily dismiss the two articles of impeachment against Mayorkas and not hold a trial.

“Not one Democrat was willing to have a trial. Not one Democrat was willing to even debate the articles of impeachment. It’s a cover up,” a still-animated Hawley said.

“Total travesty. It’s a cover-up of the Democrats’ crime of the open border. They don’t want to hear any evidence presented about Laken Riley’s killer, about the killer of Travis Wolfe right here in Missouri, about the guy in O’Fallon, Jose Barrera, who stabbed folks who just came to a laundromat to wash their clothes.  

“All of these people [are] in the country illegally because of Joe Biden. [Senate Democrats] don’t want to talk about the drugs pouring into our community. 

“They did something that’s never been done in American history. They killed an impeachment proceeding without even having a trial, without having a vote on the articles [of impeachment]. It’s a 100% cover-up.”