House Republicans Elect Jim Jordan Minority Leader, 106-73 Over Steve Scalise

House Republicans on Tuesday, Nov. 10, elected Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio as their minority leader for the 120th Congress. He beat House Majority Leader Steve Scalise of Louisiana, 106 votes to 73, or roughly 59 percent to 41 percent.

The vote was a secret ballot, so there is no record of how individual members voted. President Donald Trump stayed out of the race.

Jordan will lead the conference starting Jan. 3, 2027. By ABC News' count, House Democrats hold a 254-166 edge going into the new Congress, with 15 races still undecided. Al Jazeera reports Democrats flipped at least 40 seats.

How Johnson's exit set this up

Speaker Mike Johnson announced the morning after the Nov. 3 election that he would step down from leadership. Weeks earlier he had told CBS News that if Republicans lost the majority, he would expect colleagues to ask him to keep leading the conference. They did not.

Johnson has not said whether he will serve out the rest of his term as a rank-and-file member, according to The Guardian. He praised Jordan after the vote. "Jim was a mentor of mine when I first came to Congress 10 years ago," Johnson said. "He's going to do an extraordinary job."

Jordan and Scalise both entered the race right after Johnson's announcement. Scalise has been in House GOP leadership for about 12 years and has been the No. 2 Republican since 2023. He is in remission from multiple myeloma.

Jordan's pitch

Jordan's letter to colleagues made the case that the party needs to stop reacting. "In these next two years, our job cannot be merely to spotlight how radical this new Democrat party is. Offense, not defense, wins elections," he wrote.

He also took a shot at the way the conference has operated. "For too long, we have operated without a clear plan to survive the hour or the day in front of us," he wrote. He called himself "battle-tested on the oversight front" and said he knows "the Democrats' playbook."

After the vote, Jordan told reporters: "When Democrats offer more government, we'll offer more freedom, and we will bring that fight in committee, on the floor, and on the stump every single day."

Scalise ran on a similar warning. His letter said "the socialists are coming to Washington" and promised to "discredit their 'investigations' and put them on defense."

The contest was less about ideology than about posture and track record. Scalise leaned on experience. Jordan, who co-founded the House Freedom Caucus and has chaired both Oversight and Judiciary, promised a break from how the conference has run.

The criticism of Jordan

Not everyone sees the pick as a fix. MS NOW's commentary argues Republicans "reward failure," and says Jordan has run investigations that ended in failure, including his "weaponization" probe and his inquiry into social media companies. It also reports that Scalise's allies argued Jordan cares more about investigations than legislating.

The same commentary cites former Speaker John Boehner, who in 2021 called Jordan a political "terrorist" and said he "never saw a guy who spent more time tearing things apart, never building anything."

Jordan's allies describe him differently. Freedom Caucus Chairman Andy Harris called him "a fierce fighter, uniter, principled conservative, and relentless advocate for the American people."

Jordan has been through a leadership fight before. In 2023 he briefly ran for speaker after Kevin McCarthy's ouster, and that bid collapsed when he could not lock down enough votes. Minority leader needs only a simple majority of his own conference, a lower bar than the speakership.

The rest of the leadership slate

Rep. Tom Emmer of Minnesota, the current whip, was elected minority whip over a challenge from Texas Rep. August Pfluger. Rep. Lisa McClain of Michigan won conference chair, the No. 3 job, beating Reps. Erin Houchin of Indiana and Greg Steube of Florida.

Emmer said Republicans will "regain the trust and confidence of the American people" to rebuild a majority in 2028. He also had a message for the other side: "Enjoy this honeymoon phase because come January 3rd, 2027, you will regret ever putting your name on a ballot."

Rep. Tim Burchett, a conservative, told reporters before the vote he wanted someone who would "admit that we made mistakes."

Senate Republicans keep Thune

Senate Republicans re-elected Thune after three separate closed-door meetings Tuesday. He ran unopposed, and the loss of at least seven Senate seats left some of his members unhappy.

Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri objected to rushing the vote. "If you don't think after losing seven Senate seats minimum that we need to change course, I don't know what planet you're on," he said. Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin had pushed to postpone and walked out as voting began.

Sen. Jim Justice of West Virginia said there was a "legitimate argument" for asking why the party would keep the same leadership after such a loss. He added that the current leaders "didn't cause this problem to happen." Sen. Rick Scott of Florida pressed for a plan to get the Republican agenda done, and members urged Thune to keep the Senate in session around the clock in coming weeks to move war spending and other priorities before power shifts.

Thune said the party remains "united in our commitment to advancing conservative priorities." Two Senate races, in Alaska and Mississippi, are still uncalled and could cut the GOP's numbers further.

What comes next

Jordan takes the job on Jan. 3, 2027, when Democrats will hold their largest House margin in years and have promised to investigate the Trump administration. Whether the remaining 15 House races and the two Senate races change the final math is still open. So is Johnson's own plan for the rest of his term.