Without question, Jim Jordan is one of the most loathsome creatures in politics, or, more broadly, in American society. The sight of Jordan makes your skin crawl, and the sound of his abrasive voice makes your ears ring for days.
He is equal parts repulsive and repugnant, which are two of his best attributes. I’d rather wrestle a pack of rats than watch Jordan on TV with the sound muted.
This maniacal egomaniac wants us to believe he's “stepping back” from his leadership roles in the House. But Jordan would lie, cheat, and steal — well, he’s already done all three things oodles of times, but he’d do it all again — to be the leader of the Republican Party.
This week, at the laugh-and-a-half joke of a first-ever Republican Party midterm convention in Dallas, Jordan announced he won't seek a waiver to keep his gavel atop the House Judiciary Committee, and he confirmed he has no interest in returning to lead the House Oversight Committee either.
After stints running two of the most aggressive investigative panels in the House, Jordan is walking away from both, and he’s not doing this to make room for the next generation of GOP House talent, or because he wants to become a back-bencher. No, no, no. Jordan’s ambition is like the hunger of a shrew.
Because Jim Jordan doesn't do anything without it being about Jim Jordan or Donald Trump. No less an authority on repugnancy and repulsiveness, Matt Gaetz, said that Jordan stepping back from Judiciary is a sign he “has his eyes on a bigger prize.”
One of Trump’s biggest bootlickers, Sen. Jim Banks, who is also one of Jordan's biggest fans (can you imagine the type of person you must be to like Jordan?) put it even more bluntly, saying that Jordan “will never be a back-bencher.”
Jordan, an obnoxious, power-hungry ogre, is circling the top of House Republican leadership, and he's doing it now, ahead of a midterm that could very well cost his party the majority.
If Republicans get wiped out in November, which we should all be saying the rosary for daily, if not hourly, the message voters will have sent is unmistakable. They will be screaming for Congress to stop the chaos, stop the extremism, stop rewarding the loudest, angriest voices in the room.
And no one encapsulates all the elements of those messages more than Jordan.
So, how would Jim Jordan and the House Republican conference respond to those messages?
By handing more power to Jim Jordan. A man who thinks he’s the tough guy, former wrestler, with his no-suit-jacket, sleeves-rolled-up costume and his jaw clenched, playing the aggrieved macho man for the cameras while wimpishly getting down on his knees for Donald Trump. Not to pin Trump, but to roll over and play dead.
He's been one of Trump's most reliable attack dogs for a decade, and now he somehow believes that loyalty, despite what voters have to say, has earned him a promotion.
Here's the thing about Jordan's tough-guy bravado. It’s the shammiest of shams. First, he is not at all liked in the House, even among his own colleagues. That’s because, let’s just be honest here, he is not a likable human being. Even if you like Jordan’s schtick, you don’t like Jim Jordan. It takes a lot of work to be that disliked.
And one of the reasons he’s anathema is because of his role in the Ohio State abuse scandal. For those unaware, an independent investigation revealed that the late Ohio State University athletic team doctor, Richard Strauss, sexually abused at least 177 male students, predominantly wrestlers, over a two-decade span while university officials and staff failed to stop him. During part of this time, Jordan was the assistant wrestling coach at Ohio State, and he claims he had no knowledge about what was going on.
Which, by many accounts, is questionable, just like everything else that comes off of Jordan’s lying lips.
Because of his apparent lies, Jordan has zero integrity. He has a documented, well-established history of denying that he knew about the abuse. Survivors have said for years that Jordan knew about the abuse happening under Strauss and did nothing.
Jordan has denied it, repeatedly and unconvincingly, for years. A very revealing HBO documentary revisited that history not long ago, and it was the wrestlers, not Jordan, who showed courage, honesty, and dignity. And in the film, Jordan is shown exactly as he was.
He abandoned these young men who trusted him to protect them. Just for this alone, putting all of his sycophancy for Trump aside, Jordan has no business being handed more power over anyone.
Frankly, his denials, despite blatant evidence to the contrary, should disqualify him from public office altogether, let alone elevate him to the top of his party's leadership.
Which brings us to another phony, Speaker Mike Johnson. If Republicans get slaughtered this fall, Johnson will be the first to go. Frankly, it would be hard to imagine that Johnson would put his name forward to be House minority leader since he’s been such an epic failure.
Jordan clearly sees the opening, i.e., thinking a bogus bruiser can replace a whiny wimp. He ran for speaker once already, in 2023, and lost. He's not going to sit quietly and watch this opportunity pass him by twice.
If Jordan does make his move, I hope it puts his pathetic past and measly record back in the spotlight where it belongs. The Ohio State cover-up, the years spent foaming at the mouth for Trump, and the fallacious tough-guy act.
Because if the House Republican conference looks at all of that and decides Jim Jordan is their guy, it will prove, definitively, that they learned nothing from whatever punishment voters hand them in November.