Trey Gowdy said his party can't impeach the president over his threatened immigration overhaul – but only because Biden would become president

The folksy Biden wants the top job for himself but Republicans see him as a potentially embarrassing one-man gaffe factory

One senior House GOP aide said Biden is 'two floppy shoes short of a complete clown outfit' and Obama's 'insurance policy'

Gowdy hinted that impeachment is being dangled by the White House as bait in the hope that the GOP will destroy its own credibility by trying it

A Republican congressman known as a pit bull in Washington said Thursday that he doesn't support the idea of impeachment proceedings against President Obama because winning that fight would elevate the vice president to the Oval Office.

'Have you met Joe Biden?' South Carolina Rep. Trey Gowdy asked during a Fox News Channel interview.

Impeachment talk has swirled around Washington since the president announced that an executive order overhauling America's immigration system is imminent.

But some in the GOP see Biden as Obama's hedge against removal from office, since much of his public exposure has come in conjunction with a series of embarrassing gaffes.

A senior aide to a House Republican told MailOnline on Friday that 'Avoiding the "I" word' is a case of 'better the devil you know than the devil you don't.'

'Only in this case, we're pretty sure we know both devils. And Biden – he's two floppy shoes short of a complete clown outfit. Let's be honest: He's Obama's insurance policy.'

In a speech this year, Biden told a gathering of African leaders that Africa was a country, not a continent.

It brought back memories of a 2008 photo-op outside Biden's home where he told journalists that he had just returned from 'a successful dump,' which turned out to be a trip to a nearby landfill.

In 2010 he had a diplomatic face-palm moment by consoling Irish Prime Minister Brian Cowen on the loss of his mother – who was very much alive.

In 2012 he made the sign of the cross while on stage to address a group of more than 1,600 Jewish rabbis.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2835048/He-s-two-floppy-shoes-short-complete-clown-outfit-Republican-congressman-says-GOP-shouldn-t-impeach-Barack-Obama-met-Joe-Biden.html