The Petty and Bitter Chaos of the House GOP’s Speaker Drama

When 20 House Republicans voted to block Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) from winning the speakership on Tuesday, it was a stark demonstration of just how far away the House GOP remains from resolving a crisis of its own making.

But after the House holds another vote on Jordan’s speakership Wednesday morning, Republicans aren’t expected to be any closer to ending their nightmare either.

In fact, they may be further away.

While Jordan was able to flip at least one member who voted against him by Tuesday evening, rumors were flying around the Capitol that more Republicans planned to vote against Jordan on the next ballot—a potential death knell for Jordan’s candidacy and a signal that the archconservative Ohio Republican should perhaps step aside for someone else.

Publicly, however, Jordan—the chief architect of the modern day House GOP’s legislative hardball tactics—showed no signs of bowing out. Instead, he wanted to continue applying pressure on his detractors, with the help of his allies in right-wing media, and even to blame current House GOP leaders for not getting him the votes.

One rift that was already emerging Tuesday involved Jordan and his initial rival for the speakership: Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-LA).

Last week, Jordan narrowly lost to Scalise in a private vote for the party’s speakership nomination. Afterward, Jordan allegedly told Scalise he would back him as the conference’s pick for one ballot—with the expectation that Scalise would drop out and endorse Jordan if he didn’t get the speakership on the first vote.

Scalise chose not to even go to the floor, after it was clear he couldn’t get the near-unanimous GOP support it would take to win.

After winning the nomination himself, Jordan faced the same problem. But he decided to move to a floor vote anyway, hoping that the prospect of putting his colleagues on the record publicly—under the scrutiny of a fired-up conservative base—would deliver him a victory.

The strategy didn’t work.

But instead of stepping aside, Jordan is moving ahead with another vote, and sources indicated to The Daily Beast that Jordan is blaming everyone but himself for his lackluster showing on Tuesday.

“Attacking members and laying the blame anywhere but your own feet when you’re 20 votes down shows you don’t know the first thing about bridging divides,” a senior GOP aide told The Daily Beast. “This is 2013 Jim Jordan all over again and it shows he’s not mature enough to lead the conference.”

(In 2013, Jordan helped orchestrate a government shutdown designed to defund Obamacare. The strategy didn’t work, and Republicans ultimately reopened the government—on Oct. 17, 2013, exactly 10 years to the day before Jordan’s failed speaker vote.)

Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) talks to a staff member and Rep. Warren Davidson (R-OH) while former Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) laughs

Win McNamee/Getty Images

The bad blood between Scalise and Jordan has become an especially bitter flashpoint, and their tense relationship was reflected in a Tuesday afternoon conversation about whether the Louisiana Republican would formally nominate Jordan in a speech ahead of the second round of voting.

Two sources familiar with the discussion told The Daily Beast that Jordan wanted Scalise to nominate him for the second ballot—a largely perfunctory honor that Jordan’s allies hoped would signal to Scalise diehards that they should finally get behind the Judiciary chairman. (Scalise won seven of the 20 votes from Republicans who sided against Jordan Tuesday.)

But Scalise and Jordan never reached an agreement regarding a nomination, according to these sources. And to add insult to injury, their spat was leaked to The Daily Caller, further signaling to Scalise fans that they shouldn’t fall in line. In fact, one source told The Daily Beast that the whole ordeal would likely lead to more Scalise allies voting against Jordan on Wednesday.

A source involved with Jordan’s operation confirmed to The Daily Beast that the tensions between the two men and their allies have gotten worse.

“Members outside of the immediate Jordan team have suggested that the Scalise allies are actively whipping with the tacit approval of Steve Scalise,” this source said.

The source suggested that, even if Jordan fails again on Wednesday—as expected—the Judiciary chairman intends on pressing ahead. That strategy could be difficult if Jordan’s numbers get worse on Wednesday. But this source also said Jordan’s team is actually expecting more Republicans to vote against him on the second ballot—and that, even if the opposition grows Wednesday, Jordan intends to continue running.

Part of the Jordan team’s optimism is rooted in where his opposition is coming from. A close look at the interests and concerns of the 20 lawmakers who opposed Jordan reveals a roadmap for him to potentially win the gavel.

With two exceptions, every member of the group falls into at least one of three categories.

The first group comprises members of the powerful Appropriations Committee, which determines annual government funding. These lawmakers tend to be pragmatists who want government to work, and would like to spend federal money at the levels Democrats and Republicans agreed to earlier this year.

They chafe at Jordan’s suggestions of a 1 percent cut across-the-board, as well as the strongarm tactics that the far right used to oust McCarthy and push Jordan. Rep. Kay Granger (R-TX), the committee’s chair, voted against Jordan, as did committee members Steve Womack (R-AR), Mario Diaz-Balart (R-FL), Mike Simpson (R-ID), John Rutherford (R-FL), Tony Gonzalez (R-TX), and Jake Ellzey (R-TX).

The second group of Jordan detractors is defense hawks—the members who sit on the House Armed Services Committee and have little faith that Jordan, with his inclinations toward shutdowns and opposition to Ukraine aid, can handle the job. This group includes Reps. Don Bacon (R-NE), Carlos Gimenez (R-FL), and Jen Kiggans (R-VA).

A source close to the Jordan team also noted to The Daily Beast that almost all of the 20 Republicans who voted against Jordan support Ukraine aid, undermining—in their minds—a report that came out Monday that Jordan had made a deal on that military assistance.

The third group is Republicans who represent competitive districts—places where Joe Biden won in 2020 and a Jordan speakership could be toxic. That group includes Reps. John James (R-MI), Lori Chavez DeRemer (R-OR), Bacon, Kiggans, and Gonzalez.

A subset of these lawmakers are Republicans from New York who represent solidly Biden districts: Reps. Mike Lawler, Nick LaLota, Andrew Garbarino, and Anthony D’Esposito.

Jordan’s team seems to think the New York Republicans would all fall in line if Jordan showed some momentum—or perhaps if they gave these Republicans a floor vote on raising the cap for the state and local taxes deduction.

Jordan’s allies believe the first key is flipping the appropriations members. Those seven members, combined with the four New York Republicans, would get the opposition into single digits. From there, direct appeals—or direct pressure—on some of the most vulnerable Republicans could get Jordan the rest of the way, in their thinking.

Whether that’s through promises that these members won’t face primary challengers, or that Jordan would put the full force of his outside conservative money machine at their beck and call, or, conversely, that there could be hell to pay if they didn’t back Jordan—all of those options are on the table.

The only two Republicans who don’t fit into these categories are Victoria Spartz (R-IN), who has already flirted with the idea of voting present or being the decisive vote for Jordan, and Ken Buck (R-CO).

Buck is perhaps the most interesting vote against Jordan. Both men have served together for years in the House Freedom Caucus and on the Judiciary Committee, where Buck was passed over for a key subcommittee chairmanship this year. But once again, Jordan’s team is hopeful that, if it came down to one vote, Buck would flip.

With those two exceptions, Jordan’s opposition comes from some of the GOP’s biggest team players. It is not the hardline, intractable Republicans who have nothing to lose. And Jordan’s team seems to think, if they can just wait out the storm, if conservatives can insist that they will only support Jordan, eventually, the opposition will break.

Of course, that could all be short-lived.

If the vote on Wednesday really does turn into a bloodbath, the pressure for Jordan to step aside will continue to mount. And where conservatives might have been able to just insist on their guy—and only their guy—Republicans already seem to be coalescing behind a strategy of just shoring up the powers of the existing caretaker speaker, Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-NC).

A proposal to empower McHenry—who has adopted an extremely limited view of his abilities as speaker pro tempore—to temporarily take on full speaker responsibilities has been picking up steam.

Speaker of the House Pro Tempore Patrick McHenry (R-NC) departs a House Republican Conference meeting.

Kevin Lamarque/Reuters

Some GOP lawmakers, including certain Jordan holdouts, have called for granting McHenry short-term expanded authority so the House can resume full operations. And some Democrats have also jumped on board with that plan. The Blue Dog Coalition, a group of 10 centrist Democrats, endorsed the idea last Friday.

And the co-chair of the bipartisan Problem Solvers Caucus, Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ), also sent a letter last week with three other centrist Democrats backing a vote to expand McHenry’s power.

On Tuesday evening, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) suggested to reporters that he could work with McHenry and added that the caretaker speaker was “respected on our side of the aisle.”

Jeffries said he doesn’t have meetings planned with McHenry, but that high-level Democrats are “ready, willing and able to have those conversations.”

Former GOP speakers are also going to bat for a McHenry speakership. Former Speaker Newt Gingrich said Monday on FOX News he expected Jordan to win the speakership on the first or second ballot, but by Tuesday evening, he supported keeping McHenry in charge.

“Speaker Pro Tempore McHenry is a lot better solution than gridlock and chaos. He should be empowered this week and let’s get on with the peoples’ business,” Gingrich wrote in a forthcoming column, according to CBS reporter Robert Costa.

Former Speaker John Boehner responded on Twitter with a simple but clear quote tweet of Gingrich’s proposal: “I agree.”

But McHenry himself has been less enthusiastic about holding onto the gavel—at least at this point.

“I voted for Speaker-designate Jordan on the House floor, and it should be Jim Jordan,” he told CNN. “I supported Steve Scalise before, I support Jim Jordan now. We need to get this done.”

Still, a temporary McHenry speakership would be one of the cleaner outcomes available to Republicans. It would give them an exit from the current cul-de-sac of failed speakers and allow them to act on urgent priorities without waiting for the party to extricate itself from the knot in which it has tied itself.

But a temporary Speaker McHenry idea relies on Jordan bowing out. And he certainly doesn’t appear to be ready for that yet.

While Jordan may be a little more open to cut some deals with his detractors, he has thus far avoided the types of concessions that might get him the rest of the way. And he hasn’t had the same sorts of goodies that speaker candidates at the beginning of a congressional term have to hand out—chairmanships, committee assignments, promises on bills.

Of particular note has been Jordan’s refusal to make a clear deal on Ukraine aid.

His camp has stridently pushed back on reporting indicating that he expressed openness, for instance, to linking U.S. aid to Israel with continued assistance to Ukraine.

A lead Jordan ally, Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX), dismissed the idea that Jordan would need to make any such agreements in order to get the post, even after 20 lawmakers voted to block him on Tuesday.

“People aren’t looking for him to be, you know, cutting deals,” Roy said.

But Buck told The Daily Beast on Tuesday that he had discussed Ukraine aid with Jordan, and he suggested that Jordan’s squishy promises of openness to some funding wasn’t enough for him or potentially other reluctant Republicans.

“I want it to come to the floor,” Buck said. “That’s my bottom line.”

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