Jim Jordan should not be Speaker, he should be a co-defendant in Trump’s attempted coup case

Jordan was a criminal co-conspirator in the coup

On Wednesday, GOP Rep. Jim Jordan announced he’s running for Speaker of the House. In reality, the only thing Jordan should be announcing is how he pleas in response to criminal charges for being part of Donald Trump’s illegal effort to overturn the 2020 election.

Let’s be very clear: No member of Congress was more involved in Trump’s attempted coup than Jordan. We know that by the way of the House Jan 6 committee report which detailed Jordan’s actions.  As the Jan 6 committee’s final report bluntly states, Jordan was "a significant player in President Trump's efforts" to overturn the election.  

For starters, the report details that Jordan “spread lies about the election,” such as when he travelled from his home state of Ohio to speak “at a “Stop the Steal” rally in front of the Pennsylvania State capitol in Harrisburg, just days after the November election.” Jordan also trafficked in election lies “during interviews with friendly media outlets.”

But Jordan’s actions went far beyond amplifying Trump’s election lies. He was one of the key players in plotting to prevent Congress from certifying Biden’s victory.  

As the Jan 6 report explains, Jordan “participated in numerous post-election meetings in which senior White House officials, Rudolph Giuliani, and others, discussed strategies for challenging the election, chief among them claims that the election had been tainted by fraud.” (As Jordan knew full well, the election had not been “tainted by fraud” as every court that considered Trump and his allies claims to overturn the results back up.)

The report also documents Jordan’s leadership role in the effort to prevent the certification of Biden’s victory. For example, the report explains that, “On January 2, 2021, Representative Jordan led a conference call in which he, President Trump, and other Members of Congress discussed strategies for delaying the January 6th joint session.”

During that call, they talked not only strategy for the Jan 6 certification process but also stunningly “discussed issuing social media posts encouraging President Trump’s supporters to “march to the Capitol” on the 6th.  In other words, Jordan helped with encouraging people to head to the Capitol on Jan 6 that led to the attack on the very chamber he now wants to lead!

After that conference call, Jordan spoke to Trump for 18 minutes in a one on one conversation.

But Jordan was not close to being done in his efforts to block the peaceful transfer of power. The Jan 6 committee report further details, on Jan 5, “Jordan texted Mark Meadows [Trump’s then chief of staff], passing along advice that Vice President Pence should “call out all the electoral votes that he believes are unconstitutional as no electoral votes at all.”  Yes, Jordan was specifically giving advice on how Pence should illegally prevent Congress from certifying Biden’s win.

Jordan was so integral to Trump’s plan that Trump praised him to DOJ officials just a week before the Jan 6 attack. As the report notes, during a December 27, 2020, phone call between Trump and Acting Attorney General Rosen --as Trump was trying to enlist DOJ’s efforts in his coup—he praised Jordan as a “fighter.

The Jan 6 committee report goes on to document many more interactions between Jordan and Trump in the service of Trump’s effort to overturn the 2020 election, including speaking to Trump at least twice on Jan 6 via phone. However, as the report highlights--Jordan made “inconsistent public statements about how many times they spoke and what they discussed” on Jan 6.

As the report further tells us about Jordan, he “had materially relevant communications with Donald Trump or others in the White House” which is why the bipartisan committee subpoenaed him.

But Jordan refused to comply with the committee’s subpoena seeking his testimony.  Given the committee was winding down in December with the new GOP controlled House taking control come Jan 3, the most the committee could do was refer Jordan--and other Republicans who did the same like Kevin McCarty--to the House Ethics committee. As the report noted, if Jordan and others who ignored the subpoenas are  “left unpunished,” it “undermines Congress’s longstanding power to investigate in support of its lawmaking authority.”

Instead of punishing Jordan, however, the House GOP leadership elevated him in January to chair of the Judiciary Committee. And now the House GOP may reward Jordan for his efforts as part of Trump’s coup attempt--and ignoring a congressional subpoena--by elected him as Speaker of the House.

In reality, Jordan should be charged as co-conspirator with Trump in the attempted coup case in Washington, D.C, where Trump is facing  four felonies.  In that case, Trump is charged with conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, obstruction of and attempt to obstruct an official proceeding and conspiracy against rights.

The evidence is undisputed that Jordan was working with Trump to achieve his goal of preventing the certification of Biden’s victory by Congress on Jan 6 for which Trump is now charged with crimes. And Jordan took numerous overt acts in furtherance of that illegal goal, which is the very definition of being a criminal co-conspirator.

In reality, none of this matters to today’s MAGA GOP given their overwhelming support for Trump despite his attempted coup, inciting of the Jan 6 attack, refusal to act for three hours as his supporters on Jan 6 brutally beat police officers and threatened to kill elected officials including his own vice president and his pledge to pardon the Jan 6 terrorists. We can expect MAGA to elect Jordan as Speaker to reward him for his efforts in the service of Trump’s attempted coup.

As President Biden warned last week in his vitally important speech on protecting our nation: “There is something dangerous happening in America now. There is an extremist movement that does not share the basic beliefs in our democracy: the MAGA Movement.” He added, “Their extreme agenda, if carried out, would fundamentally alter the institutions of American democracy as we know it.”

The President is 100% correct.  That is why we must loudly call out Jordan—as well as Trump’s wrongdoing and crimes. We do so not in an effort to persuade MAGA, but to reach our fellow Americans who believe in safeguarding our democratic Republic.

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