Sen. Paul Threatens Other Republicans With A Vicious Ultimatum If They Side With Dems On Witness
Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) is done playing games with Democrats and Rhinos in the senate and has a vicious plan for any Republican that joins Democrats to allow witnesses to testify in President Donald Trump’s impeachment trial.
At times Senator Paul has had his disagreements with President Trump but, when it comes to impeachment Senator Paul is in his corner.
Senator Paul said that if four more GOP senators join the Democrats to have new witnesses testify he will force the Senate to vote on subpoenaing the entire list the President has requested to testify, the list includes Hunter Biden, Joe Biden, the whistleblower Eric Ciaramella, and possibly the Democrats lead prosecuting manager, Rep. Adam Schiff.
The plan is that Paul wants to get them all on record.
If you vote against Hunter Biden, you’re voting to lose your election, basically. Seriously. That’s what it is,” Paul said during an interview with Politico. “If you don’t want to vote and you think you’re going to have to vote against Hunter Biden, you should just vote against witnesses, period.”
“My first preference would be to be done with it as soon as possible and not to have any witnesses,” Paul said. “If they insist on having people like Bolton coming forward, my insistence will be not just one witness. But that the president should be able to call any witnesses that he deems necessary to his defense.”
There is actual power behind Paul’s threats under the rules McConnell is planning to abide by. The Politico reports:
After hearing opening arguments and questioning from House impeachment managers and the White House counsel, the Senate is expected to take a vote on whether to consider the witness issue at all, according to senators familiar with McConnell’s plans. If the Senate agrees to hear witnesses, every senator will have the chance to force a motion seeking testimony.
Senators Collins and Murkowski have said they are not advocating for a specific witness but they want the right to hear more evidence during the trials. Collins also went so far to say that she agrees with Paul’s view on “witness parity.”
“If he’s saying that both sides should have an opportunity, I agree with that, to call witnesses. We’ll make the call on which ones. But it isn’t fair to just let one side call witnesses,” she said.
Senator Paul is not going to offer a motion to immediately dismiss because around 10 Republican senators have stated they are against immediate dismissal.
“Sometimes it’s good to have people unified. … I’m for immediate dismissal, but I know it’s not just four [senators]. There might be 10 that are against immediate dismissal. It’ll just be a vote that fails,” Paul said. “When it’s something that we’re trying to stay together and there is the other team trying to attack our leader, I think it behooves us to have as much unanimity as we can.”