“I think our members, generally are not interested in the motion to dismiss. They think both sides need to be heard,” said Sen. Roy Blunt, R-Mo., who is part of GOP leadership.

It will be only the third presidential impeachment trial in American history, a serious and dramatic endeavor coming amid the backdrop of a politically divided nation and the start of an election year.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi has not set the timing for the House vote that will launch the Senate action. Trump was impeached by the Democratic-led House last month on charges of abuse of power over pushing Ukraine to investigate Democratic rival Joe Biden and obstruction of Congress in the probe. Democrats said the vote could be Wednesday.

With the impeachment trial starting in a matter of days, senators are still debating the rules of the proceedings. GOP senators are conferring privately about whether to allow a motion to dismiss the charges against the president or to call additional witnesses for testimony.

Trump suggested over the weekend he might prefer simply dismissing the charges rather than giving legitimacy to charges from the House, which he considers a “hoax.”

It was an extraordinary suggestion, but one being proposed by Trump allies with support from some GOP senators, including Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.

But it is clear McConnell does not have the votes needed from his GOP majority to do that.

One key Republican, Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, said she too would oppose a motion to dismiss the charges.

Collins is leading an effort among some Republicans, including Sens. Mitt Romney of Utah and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, to ensure the ground rules include plans to eventually consider voting to call witnesses.

“My position is that there should be a vote on whether or not witnesses should be called,” Collins said.

Romney said he wants to hear from John Bolton, the former national security adviser at the White House, who others have said raised alarms about the alternative foreign policy toward Ukraine being run led by Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani.

“I’ve said I’d like to hear from John Bolton,” Romney told reporters Monday. “I expect that barring some kind of surprise, I’ll be voting in favor of hearing from witnesses after those opening arguments.”

Democrats have been pushing Republicans, who have the majority in the Senate, to consider new testimony, arguing that fresh information has emerged during Pelosi’s monthlong delay in transmitting the charges.

McConnell is drafting an organizing resolution that will outline the steps ahead. Approving it will be among the first votes senators take after they are sworn as jurors by Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts for the Court of Impeachment.

Republicans control the chamber, 53-47, and are all but certain to acquit Trump. McConnell is hesitant to call new witnesses who would prolong the trial. He prefers to model Trump’s trial partly on the process used for then-President Bill Clinton’s trial in 1999.

It takes just 51 votes during the impeachment trial to approve rules or call witnesses. Just four GOP senators could form a majority with Democrats to insist on new testimony. It also would take only 51 senators to vote to dismiss the charges against Trump.

Most Republicans appear willing to go along with McConnell’s plan to start the trial first then consider witnesses later, rather than upfront, as Democrats want.

Collins is pushing to have at least the promise of witness votes included in the organizing resolution. She and the others appear to be gathering support.

“I’ve been working to make sure that we will have a process that we can take a vote on whether or not we need additional information, and yes, that would include witnesses,” Murkowski told reporters.

McConnell is expected to huddle privately with senators at their weekly lunch Tuesday.

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer told reporters the House vote might come Wednesday. “Could be,” he said.

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Associated Press writers Matthew Daly, Andrew Taylor, and Padmananda Rama contributed to this report.

Source: https://apnews.com/6e5c0f64eadfd10e6850d59a0085d49c

The post GOP senators reject plans to dismiss Trump impeachment first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

The resolution specifically would update Senate rules to allow the chamber to bring a motion dismissing the articles.

JOHN BOLTON: I WILL TESTIFY IN IMPEACHMENT TRIAL IF SUBPOENAED 

“In the real world, when a prosecutor brings a case but refuses to try it, the court has the ability and the defendant has the right – the constitutional right, I might add — to have those articles, those indictments, those charges dismissed,” Hawley said in a speech on the Senate floor. “That is precisely the action that I am proposing today.”

Hawley joined with co-sponsors Sens. Rick Scott of Florida; Mike Braun of Indiana; Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee; Ted Cruz of Texas; Steve Daines of Montana; John Barrasso of Wyoming; Tom Cotton of Arkansas; Joni Ernst of Iowa; David Perdue of Georgia; and Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma.

“Speaker Pelosi started this bogus impeachment by claiming President Trump was an urgent ‘threat to democracy’ who had to be removed now,” Hawley said in a statement Monday. “But after a bipartisan vote against the articles in the House, and with the public opposed to the Democrats’ partisan games, Pelosi has changed her tune. Now she wants to prevent a Senate trial, perhaps indefinitely. But the Constitution gives the Senate sole power to adjudicate articles of impeachment, not the House.”

He added: “If Speaker Pelosi is afraid to try her case, the articles should be dismissed for failure to prosecute and Congress should get back to doing the people’s business.”

The Senate currently has a set of 26 rules that govern all impeachment proceedings, which presume a “prompt delivery of the articles of impeachment to the Senate following their adoption by the House.”

But last month, the House voted to adopt two articles of impeachment against the president—abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. Pelosi, after the vote, said she wanted reassurances that the Senate would hold a fair trial, involving certain Democrat-sought witnesses, before sending over the articles of the Senate to begin proceedings. Pelosi, who has been sitting on the articles of impeachment since before Christmas, has yet to transmit them to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.

Hawley’s resolution would allow the Senate to dismiss the articles of impeachment for lack of prosecution, once the House has withheld articles for 25 calendar days or more. Under the proposed rule, any senator would be able to move to dismiss the articles once the time period has elapsed. That motion would then be voted upon by the full Senate.

IMPEACHMENT IMPASSE DEEPENS AS MCCONNELL REJECTS PELOSI’S BID TO SHAPE TRIAL: ‘THEIR TURN IS OVER’ 

At this point, Pelosi has held the articles of impeachment for 19 days. The House voted to adopt the articles on Dec. 18, 2019.

“After three years of searching for a reason to impeach this president, Democrats in the House cannot seem to find the time to send over the articles of impeachment,” Blackburn said in a statement Monday. “If House Democrats are so confident in their findings, they ought to have no problem sending the articles over within a 25-day deadline.”

On Friday, McConnell spoke from the Senate floor, rejecting Pelosi’s efforts to shape a pending impeachment trial, calling it a “fantasy.”

“Their turn is over. They’ve done enough damage. It’s the Senate’s turn now to render sober judgment,” he said while stressing that the Senate cannot hold a trial unless and until Pelosi transmits the two articles.

At the center of the inquiry is Trump’s efforts to press Ukraine to launch politically related investigations — regarding former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter’s dealings in Ukraine, as well as issues related to the 2016 presidential election.

The president’s request came after millions of dollars in U.S. military aid to Ukraine had been frozen, which Democrats argue shows a “quid pro quo” arrangement. Trump has denied any wrongdoing.

McConnell indicated that the Senate process is at a standstill for now, and accused the House of getting “cold feet.”

“The same people who spent weeks screaming that impeachment was so urgent … now decided it could wait indefinitely while they check the political winds and look for some new talking points,” he said.

The post GOP senators move to dismiss articles of impeachment amid battle with Pelosi first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.