About
Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) was first elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 2006, representing Ohio’s 4th Congressional District. As one of the most conservative members of Congress, Jordan is a founding member of the far-right House Freedom Caucus, serving as its first chair from 2015–17. Jordan is running for reelection in 2022 with Trump’s endorsement and in May 2022 told Fox News viewers that “the Trump endorsement is the most powerful political endorsement in American history, without a doubt, we understand that. The country has common sense… The Republican Party is the party of common sense and regular people; [the] Democrat Party is the party of craziness.”
Before being elected to Congress, Jordan was a member of the Ohio House of Representatives from 1995–2000 and the Ohio Senate from 2001–07. Earlier in his career, when he was a wrestling coach at Ohio State University, several former wrestlers said that he was aware of, but declined to act on, sexual abuse committed by team physician Richard Strauss. Jordan denied any knowledge of misconduct by Strauss. In February 2020, a former team captain testified before the Ohio state legislature that Jordan aided and abetted in the university’s cover-up of the abuse.
Jordan adamantly defended Trump during the 2019 impeachment proceedings related to his withholding aid to Ukraine unless its president, Volodymyr Zelensky, opened an investigation into the Biden family. After the 2020 presidential election, the congressman continued to show his loyalty to Trump by voting against certifying the Electoral College results, against impeaching Trump for inciting the mob that attacked the Capitol, and against establishing a special House committee to investigate the attack, among other measures.
On January 11, 2021, President Trump awarded Jordan the Medal of Freedom in a closed-door ceremony. Later in the year, the congressman led the opposition in the House to the John Lewis Voting Rights Act, claiming that “it’s never been easier to vote in America.” Despite his objections, the bill passed in August 2021.
January 6, 2021
- Just before the riot disrupted the Electoral College vote count, Jordan spoke on the House floor to question how “the guy who never left his house” during the 2020 presidential campaign could have possibly won. He argued that Congress needed to object to certifying the outcome because “60 million Americans think [the election] was stolen.”
- Just hours after Trump supporters stormed the Capitol, Jordan joined 146 other congressional Republicans in refusing to certify Biden’s win of the 2020 presidential election.
- Jordan blamed Democrats for the attack on the Capitol because the party “spent the whole summer saying rioters and looters” at Black Lives Matter protests were peaceful, supported police reform measures, and failed to increase security at the Capitol during the Electoral College certification process.
- Jordan led the House opposition to impeaching Trump for his role in inciting the insurrection, saying, “It’s not just about impeachment anymore, it’s about canceling… the president and anyone that disagrees with [Democrats].”
- Jordan voted against establishing a House committee to investigate the Jan. 6 attack, calling the effort politically motivated and a distraction from President Biden’s shortcomings in terms of crime, inflation, gas prices, and the U.S. exit from Afghanistan.
- In December 2021, the House Select Committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack sent Jordan a letter asking him to provide details on multiple communications he allegedly had with Trump on Jan. 6. Although he acknowledges that he spoke to Trump that day, as of June 2022, Jordan still refused to cooperate with the committee, echoing the former president’s claim that the effort is just another one of the Democrats’ “partisan witch hunts.”
The Big Lie
- In October 2020, Jordan claimed that Democrats were working to steal the election and two days after the election, he spoke at a “Stop the Steal” rally in Pennsylvania. However, on Jan. 11, 2021, during a remote House session, he claimed that he “never said this election was stolen,” a comment CNN found factually false.
- In November 2020, Jordan participated in a meeting at the White House with other Republican members of Congress on how to use the Electoral College certification process to challenge Biden’s election victory.
- On Dec. 10, 2020, Jordan signed an amicus brief in a lawsuit filed by the state of Texas urging the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn the results of the presidential election in four swing states: Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.
- Both before and after the election, Jordan publically pushed endless unfounded claims of cheating in the 2020 presidential election.
- On Jan. 5, 2021, Jordan railed on Fox Business that “there was fraud on top of the unconstitutional way they ran the election,” as the New York Times points out in a comprehensive piece detailing how Republicans legitimized the myth of a stolen election.
- Texts obtained by the Jan. 6 House Select Committee indicate that former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows tapped Jordan as a go-between for House members willing to promote false voter fraud allegations. They also show that Jordan sent a text message to Meadows on Jan. 5 outlining a legal theory that Vice President Mike Pence could block certification of the 2020 election results.
- In June 2021, Jordan called for an investigation of Justice Department officials who declined to investigate Trump’s various claims of voter fraud after the 2020 election.
Election Audits
- As early as November 10, 2020, Jordan called for an audit of the presidential election and called mail-in ballots a “recipe for disaster.”
- In October 2021, he testified at a hearing about the Arizona election, asking rhetorically, “Why do Democrats hate audits?” and claiming that Pennsylvania made “unconstitutional changes” to its election laws to benefit Biden.