Johnson said in a Fox News interview that with the resolution, “we’ll be in the best position to do our constitutional responsibility”.

With alleged corruption related to activities of the president’s son Hunter at the centre of the inquiry, the younger Biden’s dealings with Chinese and Ukrainian entities may come under renewed scrutiny.

But with extensive investigations into these activities having failed to turn up any offence with which to charge the president, the likelihood of the House voting for impeachment is unclear, particularly given the Republicans’ thin majority in the chamber.

Supreme Court asked to decide if Trump immune from prosecution

The White House issued a statement from the president shortly after the vote, criticising Republicans for focusing on impeachment instead of working with Biden on providing support for Ukraine’s defences against Russia and other issues he is trying to prioritise.

“Instead of doing anything to help make Americans’ lives better, they are focused on attacking me with lies,” Biden said. “Instead of doing their job on the urgent work that needs to be done, they are choosing to waste time on this baseless political stunt that even Republicans in Congress admit is not supported by facts.”

Congressman Jamie Raskin, a Maryland Democrat, likened the impeachment inquiry drive to an MC Escher print because of the Republicans’ inability to cite a specific violation to serve as a point of origin.

“The reason that mysteries are called ‘whodunits’ is because they start with the crime and then you have to try to figure out who did it,” Raskin said on Wednesday. “But the Biden impeachment investigation is not a whodunnit. It’s a ‘what is it?’

“Nobody can tell you what Joe Biden’s alleged crime is, where it happened when it happened, what the motive was or who the victims are,” he said.

While two impeachment inquiries in recent history – that of Bill Clinton in 1998 and of Trump in 2019 – have led to impeachments, none has ever forced a president from office.

Only the Senate has the ability to convict and remove someone from the White House, and only with a two-thirds majority.

The House impeached Trump a second time in 2021, soon after the January 6 attack on the Capitol and days before his term ended. He was indicted by a federal grand jury for his role in the insurrection.

Republicans open Joe Biden impeachment inquiry with focus on son Hunter

The extensive report on these ties highlighted what Republicans called “a vast web of corporate connections and financial transactions between and among the Biden family and Chinese nationals”.

Republicans allege that Biden pressured Ukraine to fire its top prosecutor in order to stop an investigation into Burisma.

Democrats have pointed out that the Justice Department investigated the claim when Trump was president and closed the matter after eight months, finding “insufficient evidence”.

Republicans had subpoenaed Hunter Biden to appear for a closed-door deposition before the House Oversight and Judiciary committees, which, along with the House Ways and Means Committee, are spearheading the impeachment effort.

Instead of appearing for the deposition, scheduled to take place before the House vote, Hunter Biden held a news conference outside of the Capitol, where he reiterated his offer to testify in a public hearing.

He rejected Republican claims that his father was involved in his business activities – “it did not happen,” he said – and called the investigation politically motivated.

“In the depths of my addiction, I was extremely irresponsible with my finances,” he said. “But to suggest that is grounds for an impeachment inquiry is beyond the absurd. It’s shameless.”

Hunter Biden is currently facing criminal charges in two states from the special counsel investigation.

He’s charged with firearm counts in Delaware, alleging he broke laws against drug users having guns in 2018, a period when he has acknowledged struggling with addiction

Additional reporting by Associated Press