Jim Jordan will be remembered as Donald Trump's crude, rude jacketless fool

Edward J. Gallagher is a retired professor of American literature at Lehigh University. He is working on a book entitled “History Remembers the Trump Enablers.”

If Jim Jordan’s congressional career ended right now, he would be remembered as the attack dog for Donald Trump, arguably the most corrupt president in American history.

There is no landmark legislation, there are no consequential speeches affixed to the Urbana Republican’s name to show for his nine terms in Congress, during which his forte has been destruction not construction.

Entertainingly, Jordan’s highlight tapes will show future generations a loud, crude, truculent, abusive, strident, aggressive, intimidating, bullyish brawler in signature coatless attire shredding witnesses and colleagues alike in slashing and gnashing style in his role as Trump’s junkyard dog — perhaps Trump’s most loyal congressional ally and most effective congressional accomplice in the furtherance of the Big Lie of a fraudulent election that was the greatest threat to the stability of our government since the Civil War.

The Medal of Dishonor.

Jordan’s claim to the Hall of Infamy will be voting against certification of Joe Biden’s valid election to the presidency while the very heat of the January 6, 2021, insurrection could still be felt in the Capitol.

And, stunningly, without notice, five short days later, in closed-door ceremony, Trump demeaned the “nation’s highest honor” by awarding Jordan the Medal of Freedom for precisely valiantly defending Trump through the “witch hunts” and impeachments by his chimerical deep state enemies.

Never was medal conferred so selfishly.

Never was medal accepted so dishonestly.

Trump dishonored the honor embodied in the medal by adding Jordan, a man completely without appropriate merit, to a distinguished company of such cultural giants as Marian Anderson, Andrew Wyeth, John Kennedy, Walt Disney, Cesar Chavez.

Bestowing an award that, to even the most detached future observers, will feel more like a payoff or a pardon – and a national disgrace. History will see this as outrageous behavior as glorification of a hit man, a raised middle finger to our cultural norms.

More: Republicans are saying 'hell no' to Jim Jordan. Let's hope it stays that way.

More: ‘SNL’ skewers Jim Jordan's losing vote with Donald Trump, Lauren Boebert, George Santos

Jim Jordan soulless loyalty to Donald Trump.

In the Trump post-presidency, the bone this attack dog has aggressively chewed on most in his role as chair of the House Judiciary Committee has been the putative link of Biden to potential criminal business activities by his son Hunter.

The sensational notion of a “Biden crime family” is designed to distract the already clouded attention of Trump supporters from the several major criminal indictments against him handed down this year, as well as stoking their irrational anger, the emotion that fuels Trump’s populist political engine and his disruptive candidacy for the presidency in 2024.

History will record such examples of Jordan’s totally soulless loyalty as his response to a CNN interviewer who asked whether he had ever heard Trump – whom the Washington Post calculated made over 30,000 false or misleading statements during his presidency – tell a lie, to which Jordan responded without a blush, "I have not . . . nothing comes to mind. . . . I don't know that [Trump has ever] said something wrong that he needs to apologize for."

An absurd vision of Trumpian perfection, of human perfection even.

Which was breathtakingly stupid on Jordan’s part. Jordan not only facilitated the Big Lie in the service of Donald Trump but here is one instance of many in which he told one as well.

More: Jim Jordan didn't have to tap out of House speaker's bid. Thankfully his party did it for him

So the disgraced Trump and the errantly bemedaled Jordan are birds of a feather.

Jim Jordan has no teeth.

Trump’s threatening challenge of "IF YOU GO AFTER ME, I’M COMING AFTER YOU," aimed at the prosecutors of his multiple indictments, is mirrored in the past few days in the torrent of bullying and physical threats, even credible death threats, made by Jordan supporters – though perfunctorily disavowed by Jordan himself -- against House opponents of his ultimately humiliating bid to be Speaker.

History will record the attack dog’s bark but not his bite, because in the final analysis so far it has been toothless.

And history will wonder why Jordon was fool enough never to see though the sham that is Trump.

“Saturday Night Live” last Saturday did.

SNL’s “Jordan” asks why “Trump” endorsed him for Speaker then disappeared, to which “Trump” replies, echoing his vicious comment about prisoner-of-war John McCain, “I don’t like losers.”

Loyalty is not a two-way street for Donald Trump. Which lesson learned and acted upon might well reverse history’s now inevitable judgment on Jim Jordan.

Edward J. Gallagher is a retired professor of American literature at Lehigh University. He is working on a book entitled “History Remembers the Trump Enablers.”

This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Jim Jordan legacy: Being mocked by SNL, Trump's toothless junkyard dog