Three in Texas GOP help sink Jordan’s first speaker bid
WASHINGTON — A trio of Texas Republicans helped sink conservative U.S. Rep. Jim Jordan’s House speaker bid in an initial round of voting Tuesday, joining 17 other members of the GOP who held out on the Ohio Republican.
U.S. Reps. Tony Gonzales of San Antonio, Kay Granger of Fort Worth and Jake Ellzey of Midlothian all cast votes against Jordan in the first House floor vote since Kevin Mccarthy was ousted nearly two full weeks ago.
The House has been in limbo as the GOP struggles to coalesce around a nominee to replace Mccarthy, even with a government funding deadline just weeks away and a new war breaking out between Israel and Hamas.
The next round of voting is expected to occur today as Jordan tries to chip away at opposition, but it is unclear how many Republicans he will be able to sway. Mccarthy endured 15 rounds of voting in January before he was able to claim the gavel.
None of the Texans immediately responded to requests for comment on their opposition to Jordan, and all had been quiet about how they planned to vote heading into Tuesday’s floor action.
Gonzales and Granger cast their votes for U.S. Rep. Steve Scalise, the Louisiana Republican who was briefly the GOP nominee for speaker last week. Scalise, who is the No. 2 Republican in the House, dropped out of the race after it became clear he lacked enough support to win a vote on the floor.
Granger, who chairs the powerful Appropriations Committee, wrote on social media that a second round of voting should begin immediately.
“The House needs to get back to work now,” Granger wrote, without explaining her vote.
Gonzales was an early and vocal supporter of Scalise, whom he described as “exactly the steady hand that House Republicans need to get this country back on track.”
Ellzey, a former Navy pilot who had backed Scalise, voted for U.S. Rep. Mike Garcia, a California Republican who also served as a pilot in the Navy. Garcia was not in the running.
The House recessed after the vote with no clear plan of what comes next. Jordan’s supporters have said he should continue pushing through additional rounds of voting.
U.S. Rep. Chip Roy, an
Austin Republican who is among Jordan’s most vocal backers, told conservative radio host Glenn Beck on Tuesday that he anticipated there would be several holdouts, though he predicted only as many as 10, and that the GOP would meet again after the first vote to try and win them over.
Roy said the speaker choice shows the “battle for the soul of this country isn’t just red shirt, blue shirt, it’s really inside the Republican Party, where we are trying to change the Republican Party to be a party that is fighting for the hardworking American against this town.”
After the first vote, Roy wrote on social media that some Republicans’ resistance to Jordan showed the defense and spending “world does not like to be challenged. Tsk. Tsk.”
Jordan was a controversial pick to many. The Ohio Republican, who chairs the Judiciary Committee, was a key player in former President Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election and is a founding member of the right-wing Freedom Caucus. He is a regular no vote on major government funding bills, including the stopgap bill that averted a shutdown last month.
The GOP infighting has lasted nearly two weeks and led to fraying nerves among Texas Republicans, who make up the largest state delegation in the party. U.S. Rep. Michael Mccaul, an Austin Republican who chairs the Foreign Affairs Committee, warned colleagues last week that the dysfunction was “dangerous.”
“The world’s on fire, our adversaries are watching what we do — and quite frankly they like it,” Mccaul said at the time. Israel is likely to need aid within “weeks,” he said, and the United States “can’t govern without a speaker.” Mccaul voted for Jordan in the initial round.
Democrats, meanwhile, slammed Jordan ahead of the vote as an “extremist.” All Texas Democrats voted for Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, who finished with 212 votes — 12 more than Jordan, but not enough to claim the gavel.
U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, a Houston Democrat who serves on the Judiciary Committee with Jordan, wrote on social media: “Republicans have a choice: Vote to hand the gavel to MAGA extremist Jim Jordan, or commit to working for the American people by partnering with Democrats to forge a bipartisan leadership pathway forward.”