Jim Jordan’s Power Play for the Speaker’s Gavel

He failed one vote on Tuesday, but will force another on Wednesday.

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Rep. Jim Jordan listens to nomination speeches for speaker of the House Tuesday. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

Good evening. We’re sorry for the late edition of this newsletter. On a busy day on Capitol Hill, where members of Congress didn’t even know what would unfold, we thought it better to help you make sense of the day after events unfolded rather than trying to consult a crystal ball beforehand. With that, let’s get to it.

When it comes to electing party leadership, members of Congress typically support colleagues they believe can advance a legislative agenda while guarding the personal relationships they’ve built over time. They want leaders who know individual members’ electoral vulnerabilities and try to protect them. For the speaker of the House, that means elevating the rank-and-file’s legislative priorities, fundraising for reelection campaigns, and, sometimes, keeping members of your conference from having to take uncomfortable votes.

That hasn’t been GOP Rep. Jim Jordan’s reputation. As a founding member of the insurgent House Freedom Caucus, Jordan for years had been seen by many House Republicans as an antagonistic, far-right wrecking ball. Sure, he’s grown closer to his colleagues over the past six years, as most of the party united around former President Donald Trump. And as chair of the Judiciary Committee, Jordan has gained more experience exercising authority than his earlier terms in the House.

But as the Ohio Republican seeks the speakership this week, it’s become clear he still doesn’t understand—or isn’t willing to accept—what it takes to lead in the House. Rather than convincing members he’s on their side, Jordan and his allies have alienated Republicans with what some members saw as intimidation tactics.

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  1. BenP

    The second round just happened, and now there are 22 Republicans opposed - so much for whittling down the holdouts!

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      C C Writer

      Maybe they've been reading Cassidy Hutchinson's book about how she found courage to stand up and do the right thing even under pressure from the Trumpists. Pressure is what those people do. Enough!

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  2. Jnedwards43

    The House Republicans fiddle while the House, and any meaningful progress on dealing with the budget and other important legislative actions, burn. I've been a Republican for almost 60 years and have seen nothing like the current debacle that American voters are confronted with today. We have an arguably senile President who shouldn't be running for another term, but the Democrats can't seem to come up with a viable alternative - yet. The Republicans are faced with having Donald Trump - with a lot of negative baggage - as its 2024 nominee, or who else ??? We've had times in the past when I've had to hold my nose and vote for the "lesser of two evils", but this situation exceeds what my poor nose can withstand. Hopefully, during the next twelve months, rational people in both parties will prevail and we'll have better alternatives to vote for. I won't hold my breath in the meantime.

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      C C Writer

      I suspect these people are beginning to hear directly from normal voters about what we expect, and that we're not going to tolerate any more of this nonsense, so they had better stop enabling it.

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    2. Nancy Krippel

      Just wondering why you call Biden "senile"? He's old, certainly, but senile???

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      1. Jnedwards43

        I say that President Biden is arguably senile because he is displaying the same signs of dementia that we observe here in my retirement community. I am eighty years old and have no problem with keeping track of where I am and what is going on around me. I do not need a staff of people to keep me informed and write speeches for me when addressing current issues or situations. Look up the definition of senile/ senility.

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      2. Hikingguy

        Because Righty media hammers that line and many people absorb it.

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  3. Andrew M

    A Congressman who has consistently failed over 17 years to get any of his own bills passed into law, including the period when his party controlled both chambers of Congress and the presidency, has no business being Speaker of the House, period.

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  4. Robertportercpa

    Haley,
    I live in Steve Womcak's district and was very happy to see his NO vote. Do you have any sense of whether he'll stand firm on voting for someone other than Jordan?
    He's in a very safe district. I don't think he could even get "primaried".

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    Aylene Wright

    Thanks for the wrap-up. I actually found most of the pre-vote analysis to be a waste of time, because 99% of it had a "Jordan is getting closer to the Speakership as the wall of opposition crumbles" spin, that he'd either win outright or only lose by single digits, that turned out not to be true.

    Why were most of the pundits wrong on this? Well, I got the impression that pretty much everyone in the political press, regardless of partisan lean, thinks a Speaker Jordan would be a disaster, and there's always been an overall bias towards emphasizing the negative in news reporting.

    I also found this job description of the Speaker to be a tad head-scratching, for it seems to be a job description not of Speaker of the House, but of Speaker of the Majority Party:

    "For the speaker of the House, that means elevating the rank-and-file’s legislative priorities, fundraising for reelection campaigns, and, sometimes, keeping members of your conference from having to take uncomfortable votes."

    That's certainly what a party majority leader does. But is that always what a House Speaker has been, nothing more than a de facto majority leader?

    It seems that's all the position is now, certainly. But then what does the person with the formal "majority leader" position do? Is he actually just the de facto "deputy majority leader"?

    PS: Also, if it gets to the point that Democrats actually decide to step in, and recruit 5 moderate Rs to vote for a compromise candidate, would that be a totally new thing in the history of the House? I know it's happened in many State Legislatures, but I can't think of it ever happening at the national level.

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    Wilhelm

    While I recognize the House GOP members aren't monolithic, it's rare that we hear the motivation of the individual member's votes. (I had written that off largely as fear of their constituents and lazy reporting by even local media in the districts.) Melding all that together took time, I know.

    Thank you, Haley. That's a very helpful piece.

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    Jerrymasters7vwp

    I'm beginning to understand. I think. Thank you, Ms. Wilt, for reducing my ignorance.

    Given that most reporting and analysis suggests that the House's process here isn't ideal, it would help to read in "Uphill" of efforts to improve.

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  8. Scianti7

    If they are using intimidation tactics now, imagine what it'll be like when he has authority & power.

    For me it'd be a hard pass. I don't react to threats. I take thoughtful action. Hopefully that is what the holdouts do.

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    George.Skinner

    Populism has dumbed down from “you need to listen to the average man!” to “your expertise and experience mean nothing. I’d be just as good at this as you are, and probably better!” As an avatar of populist Republicans, Jim Jordan seems to embody this ethos in thinking he’s in any way competent to be speaker. It’d be fun to see him crushed by a job that he probably thinks is east because of his contempt for previous speakers like McCarthy, Pelosi, and Ryan. Still, I’m not sure if he’d have the wit to realize he’s failing.

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  10. Brook

    Thanks, Haley, for waiting through a long day to give us this informative report. I shall now retire by continuing my reading of a fine biography of Frederick Douglass. It is nice to read about great Americans for a change.

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