U.S. Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) talks briefly with reporters after an hours-long House Republican members meeting at the U.S. Capitol October 19, 2023 in Washington, DC.
of the House GOP to settle on a leader shows what happens when a party surrenders an ideological rudder for one driven by personalities, petty grievances, and petulance.votes to give him the Speaker’s gavel, and said he would be fine with Rep. Patrick McHenry staying in the role of acting Speaker through the end of the year.
Since Donald Trump put his marker on the party, Republicans have faced versions of this struggle. The burn-it-down fringe that emerged in the early hours of Barack Obama’s presidency hasto the center of the power dynamics, and the ultra-conservative Freedom Caucus—of which Jordan was a founding chairman—now finds a hub near the fulcrum of most Republican choices. The GOP cannot write these voices off as they once could, and these forces have driven.
Republicans don’t have a way out of this mess at the moment. The Thursday afternoon session emerged with one consensus, and that was that there was no consensus. Jordan cannot get to 217 votes from Republicans, and it’s increasingly clear that no one else can, either. Until and unless Republicans blink, the standoff will continue. There is no appetite for a stopgap leader, and Jordan’s effort at promoting that option probably hurt more than it helped.
Ultimately, Washington will need to snap out of this stubborn streak or it will break itself. The search for ideological and identity-based purity is one that has led Republicans to trap themselves in a cul-de-sac without a map. Party leaders aren’t stepping in, activists are trying to sabotage any compromise, and donors are left on the outside wondering just what this mess will cost. The GOP has been heading toward this crisis for years. It has finally arrived at a fork in the track.
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