U.S. Rep. Jim Jordan discusses the potential GOP takeover of Congress with at an NFIB lunchon at Willoway Nurseries in Avon, Ohio.
Sabrina Eaton | cleveland.com/The Plain Dealer (TNS)
AVON – Republicans hoping to take over the U.S. House of Representatives in November, plan to roll out a plan that tells voters how they would wield their newly regained power, Rep. Jim Jordan said Wednesday, echoing a campaign strategy that helped the GOP win control of the chamber nearly 30 years ago.
Jordan told a Wednesday National Federation of Independent Business lunch meeting in Avon that his caucus will roll out its “Commitment to America” plan later in September.
“I think a change is coming,” Jordan said. “I travel all over the district, all over the state, I travel all over the country. I go to Florida tomorrow, I was in Wyoming and Florida last week. People have had it and I do think there’s going to be a change on November 8th, I really do.”
Modeled on the “Contract with America” that Republicans led by Newt Gingrich used to take control of Congress in 1994, Jordan said the agenda will include passing legislation to address border security, reduce energy costs, repeal taxes imposed by Democrats, and address censorship that conservatives say they face from big technology companies. It will be a revamped version of a “Committment with America” plan that House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy launched two years ago.
Jordan said the measures it contains probably won’t become law right away because they’re unlikely to pass the U.S. Senate, where most bills require a 60-vote majority for passage. He expects a Democratic president like Joe Biden won’t sign them.
But Jordan said the House-passed legislation will show where the party stands in advance of the 2024 presidential election. He hopes a Republican candidate –preferably former President Donald Trump – will win that election and usher the policies into law.
“I know that’s a long way away, and it’s frustrating for me, too, but that’s just the nature of American politics,” Jordan told the group.
He believes Republicans have a good chance of taking over the House of Representatives and said he’s done his best to make it happen by travelling the country to raise money for GOP candidates he supports.
If Republicans take over the U.S. House of Representatives, Jordan will be in line to chair the powerful House Judiciary Committee. He said he’d use the post to investigate whether politics is motivating U.S. Department of Justice investigations. He said 14 Federal Bureau of Investigation whistleblowers have brought claims of political bias to his office in the past eight months.
The Justice Department has become a target of Republican ire in the weeks since the FBI searched Trump’s home in Florida as part of an investigation into the former president’s possession of classified documents.
Because Jordan’s committee has primary jurisdiction over immigration law, he said he plans to conduct hearings on border security. He criticized Biden for stopping construction of the wall that Trump promised to build on the U.S. border with Mexico, and for ending the Trump administration’s requirement that immigrants who wanted to seek asylum in the United States by coming across its southern border stay in Mexico until U.S. immigration courts can hear their cases.
“They know they’re going to get released in the country and never have to really show up for a court proceeding,” Jordan told the group. “And until you change that, they’re going to keep coming.”
Jordan also expects his committee or others will conduct hearings on whether coronavirus resulted from U.S. government-funded experiments on animal viruses, and “suspicious activity reports” that the U.S. Treasury Department made on Hunter Biden’s banking and business transactions.
“If we win, all we can do in the legislative branch is we can analyze the problems, and we can let the American people get the facts” said Jordan. “I take that very seriously.”
