Confident of victory, Jim Jordan marched into the House of Representatives on Tuesday wearing a gold-colored tie. He was sure he was in for a sensation. He would finally reach the top, being elected as the new speaker of the large chamber of the US Parliament. From now on he would not only lead the House of Representatives. In an emergency, he would also be number 2 in the succession plan for the presidency.
He would rank just behind Vice President Kamala Harris. He, whom his own party colleague described as a “legislative terrorist”. In 16 years in Congress, the parliamentary terrorist voted against everything and did not initiate a single legislative project. To do this, he first helped his mentor and confidant Donald Trump as best he could to stage a coup against Joe Biden and then successfully saved him from being convicted in the impeachment proceedings.
In recent months, he has stood out as the aggressive chairman of a special committee investigating whether Democrats have weaponized state institutions. In this role, Jordan spreads wild accusations and rumors completely without irony, but he doesn’t show as much interest in dealing with them soberly as he does in the television cameras.
He practices politics like martial arts
With the “Honorable Representative Jim Jordan of Ohio” as the new Speaker of the House, the Trump movement would occupy a crucial position of power in Washington. His supporters see this as the first step on the way back to the White House. They praise him as an excellent tactician and an invincible fighter and point out his track record as an award-winning wrestler.
The 59-year-old also seems to have found inspiration for his rough approach to politics in the ring. He was involved in weakening Kevin McCarthy’s position as Speaker to such an extent that he had to give up the gavel two weeks ago. In the struggle for his successor, Jordan initially outmaneuvered the favorite Steve Scalise. He then used right-wing media to build pressure for his own candidacy. Fox presenter Sean Hannity and Trump’s former advisor Steve Bannon called on the audience to intervene with MPs on Jordan’s behalf. Death threats to Jordan’s opponents followed immediately.
Influential budget politicians consider Jordan unelectable
But the Trump Republicans had underestimated how fiercely the more moderate representatives would resist. The moderates fear that the party would be completely at the mercy of Donald Trump if his puppet were to become speaker. Those representatives who come from districts with many Democratic voters do not want to take part in this. They fear that they will otherwise make themselves vulnerable and fail to win re-election next fall. Influential budget politicians consider Jordan unelectable because he is unwilling to discuss the matter and has wanted to let the country slide into insolvency several times. And everyone was so angry about Jordan’s pressure attempts that they even refused to give him a vote.
So Jordan’s face got longer and longer on Tuesday’s first ballot. He knew well that he would not win immediately: in order to get a majority, he could only lose five votes from his own ranks. But with a good result he wanted to increase the pressure to get behind him. When he ended up missing a full 20 votes, that was too many. It was only the next day that Jordan dared to cast a second ballot. Two additional MPs voted for him – but four others withdrew their support. The bottom line was that 22 votes were missing. Nevertheless, Jordan initially wanted to make another attempt on Thursday, but then canceled it at the last minute.
There is currently no sign of a way out of the impasse. The US Parliament has no longer had a quorum for two weeks now after Trump’s henchmen fired former Speaker McCarthy because he reached a budget compromise with the Democrats. Now the Republicans are thinking loudly about giving interim speaker Patrick McHenry additional powers so that Congress can act again. Time is of the essence: another budget compromise is needed by the end of November, and Israel and Ukraine are also waiting for loan decisions for arms deliveries.
On Thursday, Jordan himself surprisingly spoke out in favor of keeping McHenry in office until January, but other Trump hardliners immediately publicly rebuked him for this. The break is intended to prevent him from having to hit the mat: Jim Jordan seems to be running out of breath.