Report: GOP Adding a ‘Kill Switch’ Option to Prevent Democrats From Turning Impeachment Into Circus

GOP senators are seeking to add a ‘kill switch’ option to impeachment trial rules, allowing President Trump’s team to move to dismiss should Democrats needlessly drag out the process.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is reportedly close to finalizing the rule.

“I am familiar with the resolution as it stood a day or two ago,” Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO) told Axios.

“My understanding is that the resolution will give the president’s team the option to either move to judgment or to move to dismiss at a meaningful time,” he added.

The ‘meaningful time’ description indicates the rule would allow the President’s team to request dismissal, not at the onset – which would be a losing proposition since the GOP senators have already reported they don’t have enough votes to dismiss without trial – but later on, should Democrats turn this into a circus.

Considering the circus that was operated in the House, it stands to reason they’d try the same antics in the Senate.

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Preventing a Lengthy Trial

Donald Trump Jr. voiced his support for the resolution calling it a “great move to counter Pelosi’s sham.”

The move comes as Senator Ted Cruz warned Americans that the trial could be dragged out “six to eight weeks or even longer” should lawmakers start tacking on additional witnesses.

Democrats have already been ginning up additional ‘evidence‘ in the time House Speaker Nancy Pelosi spent withholding the article of impeachment from the Senate.

Presidential candidates Joe Biden and Pete Buttigieg have expressed interest in the trial being lengthy, as it benefits their campaigns.

RELATED: Biden and Buttigieg Hope for Lengthy Senate Trial

Two Steps Ahead of Democrats

Mitch McConnell’s move shows he has been – and remains – two steps ahead of Democrats at every turn.

Hawley took to social media explaining the President “deserves the right during Senate trial to ask for a verdict or move to dismiss – otherwise trial will become endless circus run by Adam Schiff.”

Trump himself has alternated views on whether or not the trial should be dismissed out of hand, often tempted by the proposition of calling witnesses such as Schiff, Biden, or Pelosi.

“Many believe that by the Senate giving credence to a trial based on the no evidence, no crime, read the transcripts, ‘no pressure’ impeachment Hoax, rather than an outright dismissal, it gives the partisan Democrat witch hunt credibility that it otherwise does not have,” he tweeted. “I agree!”

A final version of the impeachment trial rules may be presented Tuesday. Top Republican lawmakers have said they support giving Trump the opportunity to cut the trial short.

Rusty Weiss has been covering politics for over 15 years. His writings have appeared in the Daily Caller, Fox... More about Rusty Weiss

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