2023-10-17 20:29:27
Republican Jim Jordan failed in the first attempt to become chairman of the US House of Representatives. Due to dissenting votes from his own group, the confidant of former US President Donald Trump did not achieve the necessary majority in Tuesday’s vote. He clearly missed the required majority of 217 votes. But Jordan might try to assert himself in further rounds of elections.
In addition to the Democrats, 20 Republicans also voted once morest the 59-year-old right-wing hardliner, who wants to succeed chairman Kevin McCarthy, who was deposed two weeks ago. When he was elected in January, McCarthy needed 15 rounds to win the state’s third-highest office. He was ousted as the chamber’s first leader in U.S. history just nine months later in a rebellion by his party’s far-right wing.
During the chaotic search for a successor, Jordan, who supported Trump, was nominated behind closed doors by the Republican faction last Friday – but the vote there was extremely close. The day before, Republican Majority Leader Steve Scalise, who was initially nominated by the group, threw in the towel following it became clear that he would miss the necessary majority in the plenary session.
A lack of a majority had also become apparent in Jordan in the run-up to the vote on Tuesday. Many moderate Republicans have strong reservations regarding the current chairman of the influential House Judiciary Committee, who is known for sharply right-wing positions and an aggressive political style.
The Republicans currently have 221 representatives and the Democrats 212. Because one Republican was missing from Tuesday’s vote, Jordan might only have afforded three dissenters. Significantly more party colleagues then refused to support him.
The dispute among the Republicans has far-reaching consequences: without a chairman, the House of Representatives is largely paralyzed. This means, among other things, that Congress cannot decide on any further military aid for Israel, which is attacked by the radical Islamic Palestinian organization Hamas, or Ukraine, which is attacked by Russia. The USA is also threatened with a so-called shutdown in mid-November without a solution to the budget dispute.
The previous chairman of the parliamentary chamber, Kevin McCarthy, was voted out of the powerful post in a historic vote at the beginning of October. Radical Republicans had driven him out of office. It was the first time in US history that a chairman of the House of Representatives lost his job in this way. The office comes third in the United States’ hierarchy following the president and his vice president.
The drama among the Republicans in the House of Representatives has largely brought the US Parliament to a standstill for the time being. Until a new chairman of the chamber is appointed, the legislative work there will largely lie idle – and this in the middle of a time of major international conflicts in Ukraine and Israel that need the attention of the US Parliament. Among other things, Congress has to decide on further possible aid for Kiev, as well as on a federal budget as a whole. For now, only a transitional budget has been agreed until mid-November, which does not include any support for Kiev.
The Republican faction in the House of Representatives is extremely fragmented and difficult to bring to a common denominator. McCarthy only managed to become chairman in the 15th ballot in January. After he was voted out, the group initially identified the right-wing conservative Steve Scalise as a possible successor to McCarthy. But Scalise was unable to secure the necessary majority within his own ranks and withdrew his candidacy before a vote in the plenary session.
The Republicans only have a slim majority in the House of Representatives. That’s why Republican dissidents have powerful leverage in voting. The group currently has 221 seats in the parliamentary chamber, while the Democrats have 212 seats. Jordan would have needed 217 votes for a majority. So he might only afford four dissidents in his own ranks – but 20 party colleagues opposed him. Jordan might not count on votes from US President Joe Biden’s Democrats in the vote.
The representative from Ohio belongs to the right-wing fringe of the group, represents extreme positions and has stood firmly at Trump’s side for years. The ex-president had aggressively campaigned for Jordan before the vote. The Democrats, on the other hand, had warned before the vote that it would send a “terrible message” if the House of Representatives made a supporter of a nationwide abortion ban, an election denier and an insider of the attack on the US Capitol the leader of the chamber.
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