In a news conference Friday morning, Rep. Jim Jordan made it clear he has no immediate plans to abandon his bid for House speaker.
“We need to get to work for the American people. We need to do what we said we were going to do, we need to do what we told them we were going to do when they elected us and put us in office, and frankly, we can’t do that if the House isn’t open. We can’t open the House until we get a speaker,” Jordan said, as the House entered day 17 without a speaker.
“The quickest way to get all this working is to get a speaker elected. That’s what I’m hoping we can do today,” he added.
Despite the pep rally-style speech, Jordan gave ahead of the expected third round vote at 10 a.m. ET for his flailing speakership bid, he did not lay out a clear plan for his path forward.
“The plan this weekend is to get a speaker elected to the House of Representatives as soon as possible,” he told CNN’s Lauren Fox when pressed for specifics on how many rounds he will go.
Weekend votes are expected but given his plans have changed constantly this week, there is a lot still up in the air. The pressure he will feel when he keeps bleeding votes, as is expected, will be immense.
He made the case for selecting a speaker as soon as possible. “We need to get back to our committee work. And frankly, we need to continue the oversight work that I think is so darn important.”
Additionally, he said the House needs to help Israel. There was no mention of Ukraine.
The House remains effectively frozen as long as there is no elected speaker – a perilous situation as Congress faces an impending government funding deadline and the threat of a shutdown.
CNN’s Clare Foran, Melanie Zanona, Haley Talbot, Annie Grayer and Lauren Fox contributed reporting to this post.
