House speaker vote today: Jim Jordan scrambles for support after loss

Jim Jordan was called out for his failure to pass any legislation during his 16 years in Congress just before he lost the first vote in his bid to become House speaker.

Democratic Rep Pete Aguilar of California offered a scathing rebuke of Mr Jordan’s record in a speech nominating Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries against the Ohio Republican on Tuesday.

Mr Aguilar slammed Mr Jordan as a “legislative terrorist”, claiming his actions are “not the actions of someone interested in governing or bettering the lives of everyday Americans.”

He began by citing Mr Jordan directly: “He once said, quote, ‘I didn’t come to Congress to make more laws.’”

“His words speak for themselves,” Mr Aguilar continued. “When New Yorkers recovering from Hurricane Sandy needed Congress to act, he said no. When wildfires ravage the West, destroying homes and businesses, and those residents needed disaster assistance, he said no.

Mr Jordan, a back-to-back NCAA national wrestling champion in 1985 and 1986, served as the assistant coach on the Ohio State wrestling team between 1987 and 1995.

Four wrestlers have come forward claiming that Mr Jordan failed to shield them from the alleged sexual abuse by team physician Richard Strauss, who died by suicide in 2005. There have been no allegations made that Mr Jordan committed any sexual misconduct but members of the team claim that he was aware of Dr Strauss’s violations and that he chose to turn a blind eye to it.

Mr Jordan hasn’t faced arrest or charges for failure to report, but the four wrestlers named him in a lawsuit against the school.

Mr Jordan has rejected all allegations of wrongdoing and he has declined to take part in the investigations against Dr Strauss. He told Fox News that the “lies” had been “sequenced and choreographed” by “the left”.

Former OSU wrestler Mike Schyck is one of hundreds of students who say they faced sexual abuse from Dr Strauss.

“Do you really want a guy in that job who chose not to stand up for his guys?” he asked, according to NBC News. “Is that the kind of character trait you want for a House speaker?”

If Mr Jordan becomes speaker, he may still be deposed in one of the legal filings.

Dunyasha Yetts, also a former wrestler at the university, has accused Mr Jordan of lying when saying he was unaware of the alleged abuse, calling his “hypocrisy … unbelievable”.

“He doesn’t deserve to be House speaker,” Mr Yetts told the network. “He still has to answer for what happened to us.”

Fellow former OSU wrestler and attorney representing a number of the plaintiffs, Rocky Ratliff, told NBC that Mr Jordan “abandoned his former wrestlers in the Ohio State sexual abuse scandal and cover-up”.

An unidentified individual referred to as John Doe in the most recent legal filing said that he thinks that while Mr Jordan is qualified to be speaker, he struggled to endorse his bid.

“My problem with Jimmy is that he has been playing with words instead of supporting us,” the individual said, according to NBC. “None of us used the words ‘sexual abuse’ when we talked about what Doc Strauss was doing to us, we just knew it was weird and Jimmy knew about it because we talked about it all the time in the locker room, at practices, everywhere.”

“His locker was just a few spots away from mine and mine was near Dr Strauss,” Mr Schyck noted. “And we were always talking about Dr Strauss. There’s no way he didn’t know what was going on.”

Mr Ratliff called it an “open secret”.

“Everybody talked about Strauss,” he said, according to NBC. “Everybody knew if you went to him, the first thing he would do is take down your pants. Everybody knew he was taking unnecessary showers with the team. His locker was near Jimmy’s locker.”

Democrats have been slamming Mr Jordan as an “insurrectionist” who played a key part in former President Donald Trump’s attempt to stay in office despite his 2020 election loss. Mr Jordan is also reported to have spoken to the then-president on the day of the Capitol riot – January 6, 2021.

The Congressional Integrity Project watchdog shared an ad on Monday (16 October) slamming Mr Jordan for his role in the riot, writing on X: “Every Republican who votes for Jim Jordan to be Speaker of the House should be held accountable for his efforts to overturn the 2020 election, support for the attack on our country on January 6th, and attacks on our democracy.”

The video begins with the words: “Right now, the leading contender to become Speaker and second in line to the presidency is a co-founder of the far-right House Freedom Caucus, election-denier MAGA-extremist. He’s arguably the member of Congress most involved in Donald Trump’s attempted coup.”

The ad from the left-leaning group includes footage from news reports and comments by Republicans criticising Mr Jordan.

“Jim Jordan knew more about what Donald Trump had planned for January 6 than any other member of the House of Representatives,” former Rep Liz Cheney of Wyoming says in a clip in the video.

Cassidy Hutchinson, a former aide to Trump Chief of Staff Mark Meadows and later whistleblower, says in another part of the ad: “Jim Jordan was privy to nearly everything, if not everything, about and pertaining to January 6. Jim Jordan can’t be trusted with the Constitution.”

In a virtual committee meeting later in January 2021, Mr Jordan said, “What happened at the Capitol on January 6 was as wrong as wrong can be,” according to The Washington Post.

Rep Elise Stefanik claimed that Mr Jordan would be “America’s Speaker” as she nominated him for speaker on the floor of the House.

She also faced jeering when she mentioned Mr Jordan’s past as a wrestler.

A truly emotional moment took place when Rep  Mary Peltola of Alaska cast her first vote for Rep Hakeem Jeffries. It was her first vote since her husband Buzzy died in a plane crash. The entire chamber was on its feet.

Here are the 20 Republicans who voted against Jim Jordan on the first ballot:

1. Don Bacon of Nebraska
2. Lori Chavez-DeRemer of Oregon
3. Jake Ellzey of Texas
4. Mario Diaz Balart of Florida
5. Anthony D’Esposito of New York
6. Andrew Garbarino of New York
7. Carlos Giménez of Florida
8. Kay Granger of Texas
9. Tony Gonzales of Texas
10. Mike Kelly of Pennsylvania
11. Jen Kiggans of Virginia
12. Nick LaLota of New York
13. Mike Lawler of New York
14. John Rutherford of Florida
15. Mike Simpson of Idaho
16. Steve Womack of Arkansas
17. Ken Buck of Colorado
18. John James of Michigan
19. Doug LaMalfa of California
20. Victoria Spartz of Indiana

Rep Jim Jordan, the rightwing bomb-thrower whom former Speaker John Boehner, a fellow Ohioan, called a “legislative terrorist”, has gone through a number of scandals and controversies which affected his bid to lead the chamber the work of which he’s been steadfastly trying to grind to a halt since 2007.

The California congressman’s fate was sealed by his own warring party, as eight Republicans joined Democrats to vote to remove him from the speakership.

Mr McCarthy had grown increasingly at odds with the far-right wing of the party – notably lead rebel and MAGA Republican Matt Gaetz, who filed a motion to vacate the speaker in outrage that Mr McCarthy struck a deal with Democrats to avert a government shutdown (one that could have temporarily shuttered key services for American people and furloughed federal workers).

After Democrats declined to bail out the speaker and members of his own party turned on him, Mr McCarthy was removed in a 216-210 vote to vacate – marking the first time in American history that a speaker has been ousted by other lawmakers.

The House was plunged into turmoil – with no leader at a time when the US is once again careening towards a government shutdown.

Rep Elise Stefanik claimed that Mr Jordan would be “America’s Speaker” as she nominated him for speaker on the floor of the House.

She also faced jeering when she mentioned Mr Jordan’s past as a wrestler.