For Rep. George Santos, the clock is ticking dangerously close to midnight.

The House is set to vote Friday on a resolution to expel the embattled New York Republican, marking the third and most serious attempt to boot Santos from Congress amid his mounting legal and ethical troubles. 

The first-term Long Islander easily survived the first two votes aimed at closing the book on his short congressional career. But momentum for his removal has been building on both sides of the aisle following the release of a damning Ethics Committee report last month, raising the real prospect that this week will mark the final chapter in a Capitol Hill saga that has captivated Washington since even before Santos was sworn in.

It remains unclear if Santos will also survive the third expulsion measure, which would require the support of scores of Republicans to meet the high threshold — two-thirds of the House chamber — to be successful. But the controversy has created an early headache for newly installed Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), who is being squeezed between competing interests — and attempting a delicate balancing act — in his approach to Santos’s fate. 

From one side, Johnson faces pressure from Santos’s loudest GOP critics — including vulnerable New York Republicans — to help remove a lawmaker they deem a drag on their reelection chances. On the other are a host of Republicans raising alarms that removing Santos without a criminal conviction would set a dangerous precedent, one that could empower rival lawmakers to override the wishes of voters for political ends.