Ted Cruz: Congress Should Impeach Eric Holder If He Takes No Action on IRS Targeting Scandal

On the day the House Oversight Committee held Lois Lerner in contempt, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) said Congress should impeach Attorney General Eric Holder if he does not indict those like Lerner for their roles in the IRS’s targeting of conservative groups.

In a Thursday appearance on Sean Hannity’s radio program, Cruz said Holder should be impeached for “defying Congress and the rule of law.” He said Holder’s actions were not in the spirit of the Department of Justice, which Cruz said has “a bipartisan tradition of resisting partisan pressure and upholding the rule of law.” Cruz cited examples of Holder’s predecessors (Janet Reno and Elliot Richardson, respectively) from Bill Clinton’s and Richard Nixon’s administrations. 

Cruz said he was “very pleased” that Lerner was held in contempt by the House Committee but noted that the Justice Department has not indicted one person eight months after the inspector general concluded that the IRS had wrongfully targeted conservative groups. He blistered the Obama administration for appointing a Democrat who was a bundler for Obama’s campaign to head the IRS investigation, and he said that would be akin to John Mitchell investigating Richard Nixon. 

Cruz called Holder “the most partisan attorney general the country has ever had.” 

Cruz also blasted Obama for a “pattern of lawlessness” that “is breathtaking” and “dangerous” for liberty. 

“We have never seen a president consistently ignores the law and brazenly defies the law,” Cruz said, noting that Obama has ignored immigration, marriage, drug, and welfare laws. 

Cruz mentioned that Obama has unilaterally changed Obamacare nearly 30 times even though there is “no basis for him to change the law” in the Constitution.