Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) faces a possible third House vote Thursday on his speakership bid after falling well short of a majority on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Now Jordan, who secured the nomination for speaker in another round of votes by the conference on Friday, faces the same challenge: how to bring a divided conference together and get nearly all Republicans on board with his candidacy to prevail on the House floor.
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Rep. Mike Johnson (R-La.) was elected speaker Wednesday by the full House on a first vote. See how each House member voted.
The firebrand conservative from Ohio has garnered a key endorsement from former president Donald Trump. But that was not enough to persuade enough of his GOP colleagues to vote for him on Tuesday’s first ballot or Wednesday’s second ballot.
Jordan has risen in the ranks of the Republican conference since first being elected to Congress in 2006.
He previously served as chairman of the House Freedom Caucus, a group of the most conservative House members. He also has been the top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee since 2020 — fighting off investigations into Trump and launching investigations of President Biden since becoming chairman of the committee this year.
Trump, for his part, offered his “Complete & Total Endorsement” of Jordan on his social media platform, Truth Social, early Friday.
“He is STRONG on Crime, Borders, our Military/Vets, & 2nd Amendment,” Trump wrote. “He will be a GREAT Speaker of the House.”
Jordan, 59, has a reputation as a political flamethrower — lobbing attacks against Democrats and being unafraid to disagree with his party’s leadership. He was one of eight House members who served on Trump’s defense team during his first impeachment trial in the Senate. Before he left office, Trump awarded Jordan the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor.
Jordan has had a hand in high-profile investigations of Democrats. As a leader of the House hearings on the deadly 2012 terrorist attack on U.S. diplomatic facilities in Benghazi, Libya, he questioned then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. He is now one of the leaders of the impeachment inquiry into Biden.
He encountered controversy in 2018 when former Ohio State University wrestlers accused him of knowing about the alleged sexual abuse of wrestlers decades ago and failing to act. Jordan, who was an assistant wrestling coach at the university from 1987 to 1995, denied knowing about the allegations against Richard Strauss, a former doctor in the school’s athletic department.
Jordan has been considered for House speaker before: In January, hard-right Republicans who opposed McCarthy nominated him.
Jordan, however, maintained that he supported McCarthy for the speakership at the time.
While many House Republicans initially expressed reservations about supporting Jordan, by midday Monday, more had announced their support.
Leigh Ann Caldwell, Marianna Sotomayor and Mariana Alfaro contributed to this report.
