WASHINGTON − House Republicans elected Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan to be their next leader, signaling a combative stance with the incoming Democratic majority.
House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-Louisiana, declined to run for minority leader in the next Congress, after Republicans lost control of both chambers during last week's midterm elections.
His second-in-command, Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-Louisiana, ran against Jordan to become minority leader.
Cheers rang out from the closed-door meeting where Republicans cast secret ballots to elevate the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee. Jordan won with a vote of 106 to 73.
Before voting in the afternoon, many GOP lawmakers wouldn’t signal exactly whom they planned to support on the secret ballot,
but Rep. Glenn Thompson, R-Pennsylvania, the chairman of the House Agriculture Committee, said he was looking for one specific “number one skill.”
“When it comes to leadership, there’s no trait more important than communication,” he told USA TODAY.
Jordan has been a vocal ally of President Donald Trump during both terms, from a seat in the minority during investigations on the House Oversight Committee and now as chairman of the Judiciary Committee.
Scalise is also conservative and much praised by Trump after he recovered from being shot at a practice for the annual congressional baseball game. But Republicans in both chambers voiced an appetite for new leadership after significant losses in the midterms.
Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, R-Florida, said she backed Jordan because Scalise worked too closely with more moderate Senate Republicans over the course of Trump’s second term. She’s one of many House GOP lawmakers who’s expressed frustration with current leaders for not digging in to pass conservative priorities like voting reforms.“They called Scalise and actually brokered back-end deals,” Luna said, referring to Senate Republicans. “So we had no leverage. That's why I'm supporting Jim Jordan.”
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-New York, who is in line to become speaker next year, said the 258 confirmed Democrats in the 435-member chamber is the largest majority for either party this century.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: House Republicans elect Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan as next leader in shakeup
