(CNN) Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said on Monday the Senate "would have no choice but to" take up impeachment if the House passed articles charging the president with crimes, according to the chamber's rules.

"The Senate impeachment rules are very clear," said McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, in an interview with CNBC. "The Senate would have to take up an impeachment resolution if it came over from the House."

Last week, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced an impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump, asserting that Trump had used his office for personal political gain in July, when he asked Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden , a leading Democratic presidential candidate, and his son Hunter. There is no evidence of wrongdoing by either Joe or Hunter Biden.

A whistleblower's complaint and a rough transcript of the Trump-Zelensky conversation publicly released last week by the Trump administration have become the basis of the House Democrats' investigation, which they hope to complete this fall. The Democratic-controlled House needs only a simple majority to pass articles of impeachment, while two-thirds of the Republican-controlled Senate is required to convict and remove the President from office.

On Saturday, a Senate GOP leadership aide told reporters that "there is no way we could somehow bar the doors and prevent the managers from presenting the articles" to the Senate. On CNBC Monday, McConnell made clear that the Senate must consider articles of impeachment. But he added that the amount of time spent on a trial is "a whole different matter."

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