Hegseth Impeachment Dies as 11 Democrats Skip the Vote

The House voted 211-204 on Tuesday evening to send articles of impeachment against Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to committee, which essentially kills the push. Eleven House Democrats didn't show up. The charges on the table: waging war in Iran without congressional approval, ignoring laws about minimizing civilian casualties, and directing the Defense Department to carry out extrajudicial killings.

The margin was seven votes. Eleven Democrats and seven Republicans missed it. House Republican leaders did the one thing their side had to do. They convinced enough members of their party to show up.

Who Has the Power

Rep. Thomas Massie, the outgoing Kentucky Republican, introduced eight articles of impeachment that week. After the vote, he said he wouldn't pursue the effort during his remaining time in Congress. He still plans to needle the administration with another resolution to limit President Donald Trump's war powers in Iran. Trump celebrated the failed effort and again called Massie a "major loser."

The absentees, by name: Reps. Julia Brownley, Lou Correa, Laura Gillen, Steven Horsford, Jonathan Jackson, Nancy Pelosi, Brittany Pettersen, Melanie Stansbury, Haley Stevens, Marilyn Strickland and Frederica Wilson. The Republicans who missed it were Monica De La Cruz, Neal Dunn, Russell Fry, Julia Letlow, Tom Tiffany, Derrick Van Orden and Rudy Yakym.

The excuses came fast. Stansbury, Jackson, Gillen and Strickland cited traffic problems outside the Capitol. A spokesperson for Pelosi said she was attending a Veterans Day event, and CNN reported she was in San Francisco for one. Horsford's office cited a personal emergency. Correa said he was undergoing a medical procedure.

What They're Calling Accountability

Their own colleagues weren't buying it. Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove told MeidasTouch's Pablo Manríquez: "We knew that this vote was coming, so people should have gotten their raggedy selves up these steps to vote. There is no reason why we should have lost this vote because of attendance issues." She added: "So, shame on folks who are not here. Because these people [Republicans] lost. They lost, and they still found a way to show up to table this bill. Shameful."

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez put it in terms any worker would recognize. "The people send us here to do a job," she told CNN's Manu Raju. "And the same way I had to clock in when I worked at a restaurant, we got to clock in and do our work here." She also said: "Obviously, having a vote like that on attendance is hard. That hurts."

Rep.-elect Richard Ojeda told CNN's Laura Coates: "I say shame on them for not showing up. I mean, this is important. They had an opportunity to finally get rid of this buffoonery that we have, and they failed." Sen.-elect Abdul El-Sayed was blunter: "You should show up and do your job."

The Promise of Next Year

Now comes the familiar promise. Rep. Pettersen said in a statement that Democrats would "impeach Hegseth" next year "and neither (Mike) Johnson nor (Donald) Trump will be able to stop us." House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, set to become House speaker next year, told reporters "this is not the end." Ocasio-Cortez said "there are so many criminals in this administration," and that it would be hard to figure out "the order of operations." Rep. Pramila Jayapal, asked about impeaching Hegseth, said: "Yeah, but maybe not Day 1."

Democrats have focused on a narrower set of alleged offenses, some not included in Massie's articles. Those charges, the ones about waging war in Iran without congressional approval, civilian casualties and extrajudicial killings, are the ones that sat before the House on Tuesday. They now wait, like the rest of it, for January.

Former Pentagon spokesman John Ullyot told CNN's Erin Burnett that Hegseth is "going to get impeached," despite House Republicans blocking an immediate vote. Ullyot described Hegseth as a "Fox News fire breather" who focuses on himself rather than the troops.

Separately, House Republicans picked Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio to lead the party in the minority next year, by a vote of 106 to 73. Jordan has chaired the House Judiciary committee since 2023.

The pattern is the story. An institution built around procedure, attendance sheets and calendars could not muster seven votes on an alleged war waged without its approval, and its members now say the answer is to wait for a new Congress.