The House voted on Wednesday to formally open an impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden, pushing forward with a yearlong Republican investigation that has failed to produce evidence of anything approaching high crimes or misdemeanors.

Republicans said the vote was needed to give them full authority to continue carrying out their investigation amid anticipated legal challenges from the White House. Democrats have denounced the inquiry as a fishing expedition and a political stunt.

Republican leaders refrained for months from calling a vote to open an impeachment inquiry, given the reservations of mainstream Republicans, many of them from politically competitive districts, about moving forward without proof that Biden had done anything wrong.

Instead, Kevin McCarthy, the speaker at the time, unilaterally announced one in September as he was facing pressure from the far Right to deliver on its priorities, including impeaching the President.

But the vote underscored how the political ground has shifted, with House Republicans willing to endorse an inquiry even as some emphasised that they were not yet ready to charge the President. The 221-212 vote was along party lines, with all Republicans voting to approve the inquiry and all Democrats opposed.

“Instead of doing anything to help make Americans’ lives better, they are focused on attacking me with lies,” Biden said of Republicans in a statement not long after.

New York Times News Service