WATCH: Al Franken does hilarious impression of Mitch McConnell in takedown interview

Many elected Republicans reacted with outrage to special counsel Jack Smith's indictment of former President Donald Trump -- but one-time Republican insider David Frum believes it's all for show.

Frum, a former speechwriter for President George W. Bush, writes in The Atlantic that many Republicans secretly want the former president completely out of the national picture but are too afraid to say so due to wrath from their voters.

Invited on CNN to discuss Donald Trump's 7-count indictment by the Department of Justice, Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) instead invoked Hunter Biden's legal problems and then ranted about Hillary Clinton before suggesting the DOJ had an ulterior motive regarding the timing of the former president's charges.

Speaking with host Kate Bolduan, who gamely tried to keep the South Carolina Republican on topic, Mace complained about the "weaponization" of the Department of Justice and said it was no "coincidence" that the Trump news came out when Republicans were claiming an FBI memo suggests Joe Biden was involved in criminality.

"I heard you say that you don't believe that it is a coincidence or a coordination, and do you have evidence of that?" Bolduan pressed.

"No, but I called it on Tuesday and that is exactly what happened and this president [Trump] primaried me last year and so I am trying to come at this from a measured nonpartisan way, but the irony is not lost on me that it happened yesterday," Mace attempted.

"No one has seen the actual charges or the indictment, and we continue to remind everyone, and everyone is waiting to see what happens there," Bolduan countered.

"Are you open, congresswoman to, after reading the indictment, to being persuaded that a crime was committed here?"

"I am always going to follow the facts, and I'm always going to follow the Constitution in any of these cases," Mace replied. "I always have been as I mentioned earlier, and I've even held the members of the Republican Party in contempt of Congress, so I feel like I can be credible looking at the evidence or the indictment. But the timing of it is too eerie for me, and the president is trying to take out the number one opponent for next year, and the timing is very suspicious to me, regardless."

A state appeals court dismissed Republican megadonor Kelcy Warren’s defamation lawsuit against Beto O’Rourke, ruling Friday that statements by the 2022 Democratic nominee for governor were protected by the First Amendment.

The Austin-based 3rd Court of Appeals said a district court judge in San Saba County mistakenly denied O’Rourke’s motion to dismiss in July 2022. Warren, a Dallas pipeline billionaire, had sued O’Rourke for defamation after the candidate repeatedly invoked Warren while criticizing Gov. Greg Abbott for the 2021 power-grid collapse.