Rep. Jim Jordan angles to lead a possible House Republican minority

Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) is not known for being generous with moderate colleagues. During the earliest days of his two decades in the House, the far-right firebrand often ignored, or publicly defied, the more centrist members of his party.

But with his sights again set on the highest echelon of House Republican leadership, Jordan seems eager to make amends.

He is steering clear of the intraparty fights he once seemed to relish, selling himself as a potential bridge between House Republicans and the MAGA front line, and raising — and sharing — a lot more money with his colleagues, including a significant investment to House Republicans’ campaign arm, the National Republican Congressional Committee.

This cycle, Jordan has given a hefty sum — $1.7 million — to the NRCC and contributed to a range of campaigns. It’s a stark contrast from the early years of his career when he did not give any money to the NRCC and only fundraised for ultraconservative colleagues.

Jordan’s fresh push to lead marks an incredible shift for a man who was a notorious thorn in the side of House leadership and highlights just how much he and his party have changed as populist and antiestablishment views gained ground in the Trump era.

It is not yet clear if he has a shot. Much depends, of course, on the outcome of the election, particularly whether Donald Trump wins the presidency and who controls the House. Jordan has not publicly stated his ambitions and declined to comment for this article.

But a review of his fundraising and interviews with dozens of GOP lawmakers and aides suggest he is making an early and informal play on the chance that the unruly and often times ungovernable GOP conference loses its majority in November or that the conference becomes so disenchanted with Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) that its members look for an alternative.

“It is clearly obvious that everyone is positioning for what might be next,” said Rep. Marcus J. Molinaro (R-N.Y.), who voted against Jordan once it became clear he had no pathway to becoming House speaker and has since invited him to campaign in his swing district.

Jordan’s most obvious play is if Republicans lose power, these people said, because it is highly likely that they will toss aside Johnson. Such a scenario opens the door for Jordan to seek a leadership slot and possibly face off against Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.) for the top spot of minority leader once again.

Jordan’s pathway to leadership is harder if Republicans keep the majority, because he would need 218 lawmakers to be elected speaker. More than 20 Republicans voted against Jordan twice on the House floor last year when he sought the speakership, after his foe-turned-mentor Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) was ousted, with over 150 ultimately supporting he end his candidacy in a private ballot.

For Jordan, it was a moment when he realized he doesn’t have as much support within the conference as he thought. So, he started to build bridges.

“Jordan’s play is to be ready,” said one longtime Republican aide who has worked closely with him. “I don’t think he wants to challenge Mike or anyone, but you don’t know when that moment is going to come.” The aide, like many others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private deliberations.

Of those Republicans that publicly voted against Jordan on the House floor during the messy speaker’s fight last October, a handful were moderates and represented districts that President Joe Biden won in 2020. Most were pragmatic lawmakers who value governance and worried a Speaker Jordan would run the House like the raucous Judiciary Committee hearings he chairs. It is these groups he is angling to win over.

Rep. Kelly Armstrong (R-N.D.), an ally of House leadership and a fan of Jordan, said Jordan has “evolved and matured so much” in the six years the North Dakotan has been in office and calls his positioning for leadership so far “smart.”

This is not the first time Jordan has had his sights on competing for the top leadership spot — he challenged McCarthy for minority leader after the 2018 midterms. After Jordan lost, winning only 43 votes in a secret ballot, McCarthy and other Republicans advised Jordan that if he wanted to rise through the ranks of House leadership, he needed to step up his fundraising for all of his colleagues, according to two people familiar with the meeting, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to detail a private discussion.

He started to fundraise for more ideologically diverse Republicans, but it was not until 2022 — when he was vying to become House Judiciary Committee chairman if Republicans regained the majority — that he donated $100,000 to the NRCC, his first donation to help House Republicans.

The refusal by roughly two dozen Republicans to elect him as speaker last year was the impetus for Jordan to get serious, spending time away from Washington campaigning for Republicans and cutting fundraising checks to colleagues for the first time.

This cycle, Jordan has given to 23 Republicans representing swing districts since October 2023 — when Jordan lost his speakership race — through June 2024, which is the last time campaign finance reports were filed to the Federal Election Commission.

One of the people Jordan donated to for the first time is Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.), a moderate who represents a district Biden won by more than 6 percent in 2020. Bacon voted against Jordan for speaker last year and received threatening phone calls and emails because of it, an episode that further soured their already frosty relationship.

Now, Bacon says he’s appreciative of Jordan’s financial support this year. “I’m grateful to him,” he said.

Jordan has shocked many pragmatic Republicans who supported his candidacy — including moderate Rep. Dave Joyce (R), a fellow Ohioan — by cutting checks for their campaigns for the first time. Jordan also donated to Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.), an influential committee chairman, who was challenged by a far-right candidate supported in the primary by the Freedom Caucus’s political arm.

Jordan has also been campaigning for members, who often invite him to their districts to rile up the GOP base.

“I think Jim’s perspective [is] if Trump is president and we have a slim majority, he could be the right conduit and protection between those two — our body in the slim majority and the MAGA Republican constituency. And I would say that he’s intimated that without saying it,” Molinaro said earlier this year.

It would be quite the pivot. Jordan was elected in his conservative district in 2006. In his first term, he led a group of antiestablishment Republicans to tank President George W. Bush’s Wall Street bailout during the 2008 financial crisis. He sharpened his claws on conservative media and built a reputation as a foil not only against Democrats, but also against leadership in his own party.

In 2015, he co-founded the ultraconservative House Freedom Caucus to represent a new generation of rugged, just-say-no Republicans who blocked compromise, pressured two GOP speakers — Paul D. Ryan (Wis.) and John Boehner (Ohio) — to resign, and refused to help his less dogmatic Republican colleagues win reelection, including by refusing to pay mandatory dues to the House Republicans’ campaign arm.

Not everyone will be ready to work with him. Some Republicans still remain irate and may not ever support him in leadership because of how he comported himself during the last speakership election. After a bitter falling out during the speakership fight last year, Jordan refused to fully endorse Scalise when the conference elected their majority leader to succeed McCarthy, which prompted a backlash among ardent Scalise allies. And Jordan’s allies on the Hill and across conservative media made matters worse by threatening lawmakers to vote against the Ohio congressman for speaker, some of whom received death threats for their opposition. Jordan denounced the threats at the time.

Others just don’t trust Jordan given how he had notoriously shunned helping out his non-Freedom Caucus colleagues throughout his early career in Congress. His scorched-earth tactics and refusal to be a team player and contribute to the party’s campaign coffers drew the ire of many colleagues who believed that he contributed to Republican losses in close races. Those actions set the example for a larger crop of far-right members who still refuse to donate to the NRCC and now campaign against GOP colleagues in primary elections, helping to drive intraparty divisions.

But several lawmakers who were skeptical of him last year have become more open-minded about the idea because Jordan could play the role of messaging bulldog in the minority, especially if Vice President Kamala Harris becomes president.

“I never close the door on things,” said Rep. Carlos A. Gimenez (R-Fla.). “For me and Jordan, it was never personal. I just didn’t support him, that’s all.”