2023-10-13 22:43:26
Jim Jordan, chairman of the Judiciary Committee and elected Republican from Ohio to the House of Representatives, in Washington, October 13, 2023. ELIZABETH FRANTZ / REUTERS
One of the leading Republican Trumpists, Jim Jordan, was named his party’s candidate for the presidency of the House of Representatives on Friday, October 13. This choice comes at a time when the House, controlled by the Republicans, has been virtually paralyzed since the surprise dismissal, on October 3, of its speaker Kevin McCarthy, following an internal rebellion which exposed the gaping fractures of the Republican Party , one year before the presidential election.
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The United States is currently unable to vote for any new aid to Israel, a historic ally engaged in a war with Palestinian Hamas. Nor even an additional envelope for Ukraine, under discussion for weeks.
This is the second vote this week within the Republican parliamentary group, torn between moderate elected officials and troublemakers gravitating in the orbit of former President Donald Trump. The previous one, on Wednesday, was narrowly won by Steve Scalise, leader of the Republican majority in the House and elected from Louisiana, against Jim Jordan, chairman of the Judiciary Affairs Committee and elected from Ohio, supported by Mr. Trump. But Steve Scalise announced Thursday evening that he was abandoning his candidacy, unable to gather enough votes to be elected speaker.
Fixed situation
Jim Jordan, who beat Austin Scott, another member of the conservative wing of the party, elected from Georgia, in a secret ballot on Friday, could find himself in a comparable situation, given the narrow Republican majority ( 221 votes, against 212 Democrats), according to political commentators.
He received 124 votes against 81 for his opponent, American media reported. Then, during a second vote to find out how many Republican elected officials would actually give him their vote in front of the entire House of Representatives, he obtained 152 for and 55 against, a deficit of 65 votes, according to the same sources. Unless there is a dramatic turn of events, the situation therefore appears frozen until next week. By late Friday afternoon, many elected officials from both parties had left Washington.
Although defending fairly similar conservative positions on the right to abortion, the death penalty or firearms, Jim Jordan and Austin Scott dissociated themselves during the vote on the certification of the election of Democratic President Joe Biden in 2020, vehemently contested by Donald Trump. The first had voted against the validation of the results and the second, for.
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