Rep. Jim Jordan’s rise to House Republican leader may have finished off the hard-right caucus he helped create, according to a new analysis.
House Republicans chose the Ohio congressman as their leader Tuesday, which MS NOW’s Hayes Brown wrote has transformed the House Freedom Caucus that Jordan co-founded has gone from “tea-party insurgent to avatar of the establishment.
“Quite the journey,” Brown observed.
The promotion undercuts whatever relevance the Freedom Caucus still had, the columnist argued. The group was already weakened during President Donald Trump’s second term and took another hit in last week’s midterms, which left Republicans with fewer House seats than at any time in 30 years.
The caucus was built for one purpose – obstruction. It was most powerful when Republicans held slim majorities, because its members could withhold votes to stall or kill legislation. Former Speaker John Boehner once called Jordan a “legislative terrorist,” and the group celebrated Boehner’s 2015 resignation as a major victory.
Now its members seem unsure what they’re they’re supposed to be doing.
Politico reported Thursday that the caucus is asking “big questions” about its role now that “the GOP’s top man is one of their own.” The answers so far have been strikingly modest for a group famous for bomb-throwing.
Rep. Clay Higgins of Louisiana said “our principles are the same,” but that the caucus would focus on “strategic alignment to protect the gains that we have indeed made.” Rep. Marlin Stutzman of Indiana went further. He said the group would move to a “think tank model where we’re pulling good information together … to really inform the rest of the conference.”
That’s a comically low ambition for a group that was built to burn things down and responsible for shutdown standoffs and toppling a speaker, Brown wrote.
The decline started well before the midterms. Trump could undo any pressure the caucus put on Speaker Mike Johnson with a phone call, and its holdouts repeatedly caved for little in return.
The caucus also had a miserable 2026 primary season, as several of its heavy hitters left for other offices or lost their re-election bids.
In a Democratic-controlled House, the remaining members’ votes will barely matter. Making deals with Democrats is far outside Jordan’s wheelhouse, and rebelling against their own co-founder would likely backfire.
The group might rebrand as a MAGA Caucus to carry Trump’s torch after he leaves office, Brown suggested. For now, though, “whatever the Freedom Caucus members do is unlikely to make much of a difference — to anyone.”
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