Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell have engaged in a standoff throughout the week--Leader McConnell always had the upper hand.
Leader McConnell, along with ten other GOP senators, now support a resolution introduced by Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) that would allow the GOP-majority to dismiss articles of impeachment if Speaker Pelosi fails to deliver them within 25 days.
“Whensoever the Senate shall receive notice from the House of Representatives that managers are appointed on their part to conduct an impeachment against any person and are directed to carry articles of impeachment to the Senate, the Secretary of the Senate shall immediately inform the House of Representatives that the Senate is ready to receive the managers for the purpose of exhibiting such articles of impeachment, agreeably to such notice. If, following adoption of such articles, the House of Representatives does not so notify the Senate or otherwise provide for such articles to be exhibited to the Senate within 25 calendar days from the date of adoption of such articles, as recorded in the Journal of the House of Representatives, such articles shall be deemed exhibited before the Senate and it shall be in order for any Senator to offer a motion to dismiss such articles with prejudice for failure by the House of Representatives to prosecute such articles,” the resolution says.
The resolution is a direct rebuke to Speaker Pelosi’s attempt to blackmail the Republican majority in the upper chamber, in hopes of her gaining leverage over her legislative counterpart. Pelosi has drug out this process, hoping that Leader McConnell will blink first, but as anyone on the Hill knows, Pelosi’s strategy was dead-on-arrival.
Sen. Josh Hawley (@HawleyMO @senhawleypress): "I am introducing a resolution to update the Senate's rules to account for this unprecedented attempt by the Speaker of the House to delay, to deny, to obstruct a trial in the United States Senate." pic.twitter.com/3KdJC6xVcy
— CSPAN (@cspan) January 6, 2020
Following the introduction of this resolution, Speaker Pelosi said that she is nearly ready to send the articles, signaling that she will, indeed, cave to Leader McConnell.
QUESTION: "Are you prepared to hold the articles indefinitely?"
— Ryan Struyk (@ryanstruyk) January 9, 2020
PELOSI: "No, I'm not delaying indefinitely. I'll send them over when I'm ready. And that will probably be soon."
The timeline on a Senate impeachment trial is still unknown, but could begin as early as next week.