As a Democrat on the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, Rep. Jasmine Crockett of Texas has repeated a simple question to her colleagues clamoring to impeach President Joe Biden.
“Where’s the crime?”
After months of fruitless investigation, Chairman James Comer (R-KY) tried to gin up the illusion of a case by subpoenaing the president’s son to be deposed behind closed doors. Hunter Biden said, with good cause, that he did not trust his father’s enemies not to disseminate falsehoods disguised as leaks and would only testify in a public session.
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Despite more than a year of investigative efforts, Comer and his crew still can not answer Crockett’s question. But they nonetheless moved Wednesday to officially launch an impeachment inquiry.
She spoke to The Daily Beast by phone while sitting in the Democratic cloakroom, just off the House floor, as the vote neared on Wednesday evening.
Crockett had an immediate answer when asked what she would have rather been doing in Congress that day.
“I have tried to push for a hearing about one of my constituents who was a postal worker who died on the job as a result of heat conditions,” she said. “I definitely know that his wife wanted a hearing to make sure that we can [have] better working conditions for those that are doing the hard work of the federal government every single day.”
Letter Carrier Eugene Gates was 66 and loved the job he had been doing for 36 years, the last 15 on the same route in Dallas. He delivered to 400 homes along an eight-mile route in a vehicle without air conditioning.
The heat index stood at 114 on June 20 when he collapsed crossing a lawn. A homeowner administered CPR, but Gates was beyond saving. An autopsy determined that he had died from heat exhaustion.
In the aftermath, Crockett enlisted 14 fellow members of the Oversight Committee to co-sign a letter regarding Gates to U.S. Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, who had been a big-time Trump donor before his appointment in 2020.
“We write to express our deep concerns over the working conditions and labor policies of the U.S. Postal Service, specifically with respect to letter carriers,” the letter began, going on to say of Gates, “His unnecessary and untimely death was likely preventable and a stark reminder of the costs of the global climate emergency and the effect of more frequent and damaging extreme weather events.”
The letter cited other instances in which postal workers died as a result of extreme heat. They included California letter carrier Peggy Frank, who was found dead in 2019 “in her non-air-conditioned mail truck” when the temperature had reached 115 degrees.
“Following Ms. Frank’s death, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) cited the Postal Service for failing to provide and maintain a work environment free from recognizable hazards, such as extreme heat, that are likely to cause death or serious harm.” the letter noted.
The letter further reported, “A 2020 analysis of OSHA records showed that OSHA issued more than $1.3 million in initial fines against the Postal Service for heat hazards in eight years. Despite these numerous and continued violations, it appears the Postal Service has yet to comprehensively address this issue and adopt nationwide work conditions policies that prevent these avoidable, tragic deaths.”
The issue was all the more of concern to Crockett as a member of the Government Operations subcommittee. But she was still a Democrat in a committee controlled by Republicans who are themselves ruled by their party leader.
Crockett blamed “the puppeteering of Trump” for the House’s inability to complete even the simplest of tasks.
“It is tough when people are motivated by outside forces instead of some moral compass, or some moral obligation to preserve the institution itself,” she said.
And the twice-impeached Trump wants President Joe Biden to get a taste of the same shame he felt, whether or not it is deserved. Instead of holding hearings on the plight of postal workers and maybe comforting Gates’ widow, Carla, with the knowledge her husband did not die in vain, the Comer crew busied themselves with a hunt for evidence that does not seem to exist. The only hearing the committee held concerning federal workers took them to task for teleworking.
“It’s absolutely insane that this is more important than really delving into the death of someone who has given more to the federal government than most of us that sit in Congress,” Crockett said.
On Wednesday morning she arrived at the Oversight Committee room to see that somebody had set a nameplate reading “HUNTER BIDEN” in front of an empty chair. The president's son had been ordered to appear for a deposition behind closed doors or face contempt of Congress charges.
“Someone from the Republican side said, ‘He’s on TV right now, instead of being here, he is on TV!’” she recalled. “And then, a little later, it became clear that he was not only on TV, but he was actually at the Capitol.”
Crockett saw that Hunter Biden was holding a press conference at the Senate Swamp Site, an outdoor space at the other end of the Capitol. He repeated his willingness to comply only in public.
As she sat in the cloakroom prior to the vote on a bogus impeachment inquiry where there was no crime, Crockett spoke of the empty chair as symbolic of something bigger than Hunter Biden’s absence.
“I can’t think of a better way to sum up this year,” she said. “Because honestly, that’s what the Republicans have done for us all year long; they’ve given us a lot of emptiness. And they are leaving the American people with a lot of emptiness as well, in a time in which we really need to be doing our best work.”
She has come to believe that Trump and his acolytes only believe in winning.
“By any means necessary,” she added.
She had arrived at the Capitol on Wednesday morning wishing she could do right by a fallen letter carrier and others who comprise America’s actual greatness.
“We could really be working on some things of value,” she said.
The day ended with the House voting 221-212—along party lines—to authorize an impeachment inquiry.
“It feels like we are continuing to just sink into the sunken space and constantly go the wrong way,” Crockett said.
