As President Obama and Democrats in Congress continue acting like they didn’t lose last November, Ohio Republican Rep. Jim Jordan worries, “We are not using the powers of the legislative branch, as we should.”
A December poll by Pat Caddell indicated a growing rift between Republican leaders and their base, with expectations that a strengthened Republican Congress would fight against Obamacare, amnesty and the president’s excessive use of power.
For the most astute activists fighting executive amnesty, March 3 was a defining moment in the battle against egregious presidential actions, when the House passed homeland security funding stripping the provision to stop Obama’s executive order. Rep. Jordan played a critical role with 166 other House Republicans who worked against House Speaker John Boehner’s capitulation. Jordan retells the inside story of the big surrender that played out.
America watched 75 Republicans vote with every Democrat in the House to allow Obama to rewrite citizenship rules without Congressional approval, another troubling sign of our government’s fundamental transformation. Jordan, in this video interview, tells the inside story of how Republican leaders picked this homeland security bill last December as the place to fight Obama’s executive amnesty.
Most importantly to this conservative congressman, Republicans failed to drive a public campaign and message, despite having compelling arguments, quotes from campaigning Democrats and even a Saturday Night Live skit on their side. When Obama made GOP leaders cave, Jordan found himself, along with 12 other conservatives in the House, the subject of critical ads run by a group associated with the Republican establishment.
Known for being a champion wrestler in his youth, this energetic, passionate conservative sees the most important battle — one he would even be willing to lose his seat over — as the government harassment of Obama opponents. IRS attacks on conservatives threatens the “hallmark of a free society and our form of government,” Jordan says. He believes it is exercising our freedom to speak and dissent from our national government without being targeted and punished that most animates him. Jordan has been the most resolute leader in fighting the IRS from his committee perch on accountability.
With the Inspector General of the IRS having found the backup tapes in February that the IRS commissioner, John Koskinen, repeatedly told Congress were destroyed, Rep. Jordan is now ramping up pressure on the agency. Many are starting to ask if the IRS commissioner lied to Congress, to avoid accountability and embarrassment. After all, President Obama told Bill O’Reilly, there was “not a smidgen of corruption” at the IRS.
“The average family is so fed up with this place. They don’t think anyone is fighting for them.”
Jordan describes the everyday citizen he tries to keep in mind to get through the distractions, urgencies and “fog” of Washington.
Keeping these types of people in mind, he and 39 of his conservative colleagues have formed a new Freedom Caucus. Other conservative groups in the House include the Tea Party Caucus lead by Rep. Tim Huelskamp (R-KS), and the Conservative Opportunity Society lead by Rep. Steve King (R-IA).
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