Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell proposed Monday to significantly speed up President Trump’s impeachment trial, offering rules that would shoehorn opening arguments into a grueling four-day period of 12-hour days, meaning a major part of the nation’s third-ever presidential impeachment trial could wrap up by the weekend.

A day before the trial starts in earnest, McConnell proposed rules that would give House prosecutors and the president’s lawyers up to 24 hours each — but a maximum of two days each — to present their arguments as to whether Trump should be removed from office.

Lawyers for the president, who initially sought a lengthy impeachment trial so he could mount a robust public defense, also signaled they were hoping to end the trial quickly, urging the Senate to “swiftly reject” the charges, calling them “deficient on their face” and an “affront to the Constitution.”

The lawyers submitted a 171-page legal brief to the Senate, their first major filing in the case, asserting that the two articles of impeachment approved by the House last month are unconstitutional and threaten to set a dangerous precedent by constraining future presidents in foreign affairs.