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In an attempt to rally the troops, Jordan called on Republicans to unify, a somewhat ironic request given that Jordan made a name for himself in Congress by clashing with House leadership. In his nomination speech for Jordan on Wednesday, Congressman Tom Cole of Oklahoma, chair of the House rules committee, said the ouster of McCarthy had “put the Congress in a state of chaos and the country into a state of uncertainty”. "We got to keep talking to members," Jordan told reporters after the first vote.
Vote Count: Mike Johnson Elected House Speaker After Three-Week Vacancy
Boding ill for Jordan, the four Republicans who flipped against him Wednesday do not fall into the categories that many of the previous holdouts do. None of them are on the House Appropriations or Armed Services committees, two panels that have been hamstrung by hard-right lawmakers’ demands throughout the year. Two of the additional holdouts belong to the pragmatic Republican Governance Group, which is working with Democrats on a proposal that could ensure the House can begin governing again by empowering a temporary speaker.
January 3, 2023 Latest on the new Congress and House speaker vote
Patience is running thin, however, as the chamber's leadership crisis collides with escalating problems at home and abroad. "We don't know when we're going to have the next vote, but we'll have conversations with our colleagues," he said. It has been 15 days since Kevin McCarthy was ousted in an unprecedented coup spearheaded by a right-wing faction. Talk is growing in the House of empowering acting Speaker Patrick McHenry for a period of 30 to 90 days. Jim Jordan has lost his second bid to become US House of Representatives Speaker as rank-and-file resistance to his candidacy swells in the chamber.
Hakeem Jeffries received the most votes, so why isn’t he speaker?
Carlos Gimenez of Florida, another anti-Jordan holdout, wrote on X that Mr McHenry's temporary selection would allow Republicans to "get going with the business of the American people". The Trump-backed House Judiciary Committee chairman earned 200 votes in the first roll call on Tuesday, and 199 on Wednesday. Over the weekend, Jordan allies mounted intense lobbying efforts behind the scenes to persuade holdouts to back his bid, but the latest push made little headway overnight. The House’s slim margin is what led to McCarthy’s removal at the hands of a band of eight GOP rebels – and now a similarly sized group of House Republicans could block Jordan’s ascension, too.
Jordan has served in the House for about 16 years and represents the 4th congressional district of Ohio. Joyce, chair of the Republican Governance Group, a caucus of moderate Republicans, will be a crucial House Republican to keep an eye on ahead of the second speaker ballot. Without a speaker, the House is effectively paralyzed and unable to take any legislative action, which means it is currently unable to address a looming government shutdown next month or pass an aid package for Israel. Twenty of his fellow Republicans voted against him, opting for candidates such as GOP Reps. Steve Scalise of Louisiana or Kevin McCarthy of California. But just because Democrats have rallied around Jeffries doesn't mean he'll become the lower chamber's new speaker.
Jordan is expected to lose this vote, but this ballot will be a major tell as to whether Jordan’s bid for speaker can survive. The famously shirt-sleeved Jordan donned a suit jacket to whip votes for his speaker's bid, drawing all sorts of comments on social media. As the House remains in limbo following Jim Jordan's second failed ballot for speaker, lawmakers are increasingly talking about temporarily empower Patrick McHenry to get the House moving again. Rep. Jen Kiggans, R-Va., one of the Republican lawmakers who voted against Jordan for speaker of the House, shared on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter "I will never regret standing up for the military and for doing what’s right for Virginia’s Second District." The conservative firebrand needed to win 217 out of the House's 433 voting members in order to claim the gavel, but fell short of that threshold.
Republican Jim Jordan loses first US House speaker vote, plays for time - Reuters
Republican Jim Jordan loses first US House speaker vote, plays for time.
Posted: Wed, 18 Oct 2023 07:00:00 GMT [source]
Biden-district Republicans
Following the first ballot, Jordan huddled with his close allies on the House floor, before interim Speaker Pro Tempore Patrick McHenry called a recess of the House. Minutes into the vote, Jordan's candidacy was already in peril as a string of Republicans surprised their caucus by voting against the Ohio lawmaker. Jordan ultimately fell short by 20 votes, a higher number than many in the conference had predicted ahead of the vote. House of Representatives failed in a first vote Tuesday, raising the prospect that the Ohio Republican could keep trying with multiple ballots.
The rest of Indiana’s delegation voted along party lines, with six Republicans voting for Jordan and the two Democrats voting for Minority Leader U.S. Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y. Spartz, a Republican representing Indiana’s Fifth Congressional District, was the only House member who voted for U.S. The 19 total Republicans who voted against McCarthy in the first ballot are considering all voting for Jordan on the second ballot, sources tell CNN. With the votes dragging on and no resolution to the speaker standoff in sight, there are discussions underway about an alternative, sources said. Ocasio-Cortez spokesperson Lauren Hitt told CNN that Gosar was asking Ocasio-Cortez if any Democrats were planning to leave the floor or vote present so McCarthy could have a lower threshold, something that hardliners against McCarthy do not want. With the House adjourning for the day without selecting a speaker, Republicans and Rep. Kevin McCarthy have a lot of things to consider, CNN's Abby Phillip and Dana Bash said.
The second round of voting for speaker has begun
Afterward, a spokesman for Jordan vowed the Ohio Republican would “keep going,” even as it was unclear what his path to the necessary votes would be. Later, Jordan said lawmakers would reconvene Thursday instead of continuing to vote Wednesday night. Members of the House are now nominating representatives from their party for the speakership.
Several Appropriations Committee members who voted against Jordan have said they would support such a move. McHenry helped negotiate the debt ceiling deal with President Biden earlier this year. The result intensified questions over whether Jordan, a congressman from Ohio, has any path to the speakership given the rising opposition among more moderate members of the Republican conference. A couple hours after the second vote failed, Jordan informed reporters that the House would not vote again on Wednesday evening.
The role of the 25-person committee is to provide insight and guidance to Treasury leaders so they can address racial disparities and advance racial equality, according to the committee's bylaws. Republican Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio during a House Judiciary Committee hearing, July 14, 2022 in Washington, D.C. Jordan will likely become the committee's chair in the next Congress. Comer was among Republicans who recently accused President Biden's son, Hunter, of influence peddling, and labeled him a national security threat. They accused Biden and his family of crimes, including defrauding the United States, tax evasion, money laundering and more. Here's a look at some of the Republicans who will likely chair House committees and why it matters. House GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy briefly went to the cloakroom when members were done voting and now is back on the floor talking to members.
When reporters asked him Monday night if he would oppose linking aid for Israel with aid to Ukraine, he sidestepped the issue. Representative Doug LaMalfa, Republican of California, voted for McCarthy on the first ballot but said he would switch his vote to Jim Jordan on the next one. Diaz-Balart added that it would be a “very prudent and smart move” to give Patrick McHenry, the interim speaker, full powers of the speaker — a sign he thinks the impasse over selecting a permanent occupant for the role may stretch on a while. Standing on the steps of the Capitol, Representative Hakeem Jeffries of New York, the Democratic leader, said Democrats were willing to work with Republicans to find a speaker but it would not be Jordan. After his defeat, Mr. Jordan met privately with Mr. Scalise to ask for his help in shoring up votes, but he received no such pledge to do so, according to a person familiar with the conversation. Mr. Scalise’s spokeswoman denied that he had refused to help Mr. Jordan, but Mr. Scalise’s supporters remain angry at the way Mr. Jordan’s supporters refused to back the Louisianian.
Meanwhile, the group’s matriarch, Carol Icenagel, 87, sits on the political fence. We’re still waiting on a handful of lawmakers to vote — and remember, lawmakers technically are allowed to change their votes before the gavel falls. But all indications are that Jordan has fallen short once again, with a few more lawmakers than last time rising to oppose him. On Monday night, the eve of the first round of voting to determine Mr. McCarthy’s successor, Ms. Cole was walking through the Capitol basement and rounded a corner to find throngs of reporters waiting for House Republicans to emerge from a closed-door meeting. Representative Vern Buchanan of Florida voted for Mr. Jordan but had expressed anger at the way the Ohio Republican treated Mr. Scalise.
She listed their office phone numbers and urged her followers to call them and tell them to support Mr. Jordan. The list included Representatives Ann Wagner of Missouri, Mike Rogers of Alabama and Carlos Gimenez of Florida, all of whom had publicly stated their opposition to Mr. Jordan. Mr. Jordan’s rise in Congress stems from a number of important alliances he has formed over the years. His strongest base of power is his colleagues in the House Freedom Caucus, many of whom consider him a mentor. He has built a solid relationship with Mr. McCarthy, for whom Mr. Jordan proved a reliable supporter and important validator on the right. Perhaps his most important ally is former President Donald J. Trump, who he has helped undermine faith in the 2020 presidential election results.
At the Urbana Brewing Company on Tuesday, patrons gave Mr. Jordan passing marks. Eric Forson, 50, said that when he wrote to his elected representatives during the 2013 government shutdown, Mr. Jordan was the only one who responded. Representative Nick LaLota, a New York Republican who opposed Mr. Jordan for a second time on Wednesday, told reporters that the latest failed vote “absolutely” served as evidence that the House should explore empowering Mr. McHenry. Still, many lawmakers have grown deeply alarmed about the absence of an elected speaker as wars are raging in Israel and Ukraine and the government is within weeks of shutting down if Congress fails to reach a spending agreement. On Monday night, Spartz released a statement expressing concerns about Jordan’s leadership and if the Ohio Republican would adopt what she called “intimidation” tactics used by McCarthy to gain speaker votes.
Ms. Porter added that she disagreed with Mr. Jordan’s hard-line opposition to abortion and believed he now spends too much time in Washington, where he helped establish the ultraconservative House Freedom Caucus. Representative Doug LaMalfa of California had said after voting against Mr. Jordan on the first ballot that he was prepared to support him on the second time around. After winning 200 votes on Tuesday, the Judiciary Committee chairman won 199 on Wednesday, after picking up the votes of two Republicans while losing the support of four others. One Republican who had been absent on Tuesday, Representative Gus Bilirakis of Florida, voted for Mr. Jordan on Wednesday. But Republicans were divided even on doing that, with some Jordan loyalists arguing that it would set a damaging precedent.
