Giuliani says he won’t be on Trump impeachment defense team

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has privately acknowledged he believes Trump committed impeachable offenses and that he is pleased Democrats are moving to impeach him, believing it will make it easier for the Republican Party to be rid of Trump, a source confirmed to ABC News.

The New York Times first reported the development.

McConnell has not said publicly whether he'd vote to impeach Trump and a McConnell spokesman declined to comment.

At least three House Republicans -- Rep. Liz Cheney, Wyo., Rep. John Katko, R-N.Y. and Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill. -- have said they will vote to impeach the president.

-ABC News' Trish Turner

House Republican Conference Chair Liz Cheney -- the No. 3 Republican in the House and highest-ranking woman in the Republican Party -- has announced she will vote to impeach Trump for inciting an insurrection at the Capitol. 

"Much more will become clear in coming days and weeks, but what we know now is enough," she said in a statement. "The President of the United States summoned this mob, assembled the mob, and lit the flame of this attack. Everything that followed was his doing. None of this would have happened without the President. The President could have immediately and forcefully intervened to stop the violence. He did not."

"There has never been a greater betrayal by a President of the United States of his office and his oath to the Constitution," she said.

Her announcement follows Republican Rep. John Katko of New York becoming the first House Republican to say he will support House Democrats' efforts to remove Trump from office through impeachment.

Republican Rep. John Katko of New York has released a statement saying he will vote to impeach Trump -- becoming the first Republican to publicly voice an expected vote to remove the president from office.

Katko joins at least 218 House Democrats who have signed onto a resolution charging Trump with inciting an insurrection. A House vote could happen as early as Wednesday, one week before Biden's inauguration at the Capitol.

“To allow the president of the United States to incite this attack without consequence is a direct threat to the future of our democracy,” Katko said in the statement. “For that reason, I cannot sit by without taking action. I will vote to impeach this president."

No House Republicans voted to impeach Trump in 2019.

-ABC News' Benjamin Siegel

The first confirmation hearing for one of Biden's Cabinet picks is officially on the Senate schedule for the day before his inauguration -- which is also the earliest day the Senate is likely to accept an impeachment article against Trump from the House.

Department of Homeland Secretary nominee Alejandro Mayorkas' hearing will be at 10 a.m. on Tuesday, Jan. 19, the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee announced Tuesday.

In the wake of the siege on the Capitol, the incoming Biden administration is making a push to prioritize confirmations for national security nominees, so those officials may assume their roles as early as next week.

Traditionally, the Senate has confirmed national security nominees on Inauguration Day, and did so for Department of Homeland Security secretary nominees in both 2009 and 2017.