As the House voted Tuesday on whether to elect U.S. Rep. Jim Jordan as speaker, Rep. Summer Lee blasted the Ohio Republican as a “white supremacist antisemite” and said his rhetoric “motivated” the shooter who carried out the Pittsburgh synagogue massacre almost five years ago.

She said she was “horrified” that Republicans were moving ahead with Mr. Jordan’s nomination “at a moment when our Jewish communities are in so much pain.” The Palestinian group Hamas, designated as a terrorist organization by the U.S., attacked Israel more than a week ago.

Mr. Jordan did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Ms. Lee, D-Swissvale, joined every other House Democrat in supporting House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York for speaker in the first vote Tuesday afternoon. Mr. Jordan fell short of the votes he needed as 20 Republicans, including Rep. Mike Kelly, R-Butler, chose another candidate.

Ms. Lee, who has faced blowback and a primary opponent for criticizing Israeli policies and was one of only nine lawmakers who opposed a resolution this summer condemning antisemitism, cited Mr. Jordan’s embrace of Ye, the rapper formerly known as Kanye West who made antisemitic remarks and praised Adolf Hitler.

She also said Mr. Jordan had embraced the great replacement theory, which claims Jews are responsible for bringing in nonwhite immigrants to the U.S. to outnumber native-born whites. Before murdering 11 Jews at a Squirrel Hill synagogue in October 2018, Robert Bowers issued screeds against the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, or HIAS, which helps resettle refugees in the U.S.

At a House Judiciary Committee hearing in February, Mr. Jordan, the committee chair, suggested that the influx of immigrants “seems premeditated” and “intentional.” He continued: “Make no mistake: The Biden administration is carrying out its plan” and “trying to make it easier for people to get here.”

That led Ms. Lee to charge that “Jordan also used his chairmanship and his taxpayer-funded platforms to peddle white-supremacist and antisemitic replacement theory that motivated the murders of 11 beloved members of my community in the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting,10 Black grocery shoppers in Buffalo, 23 Latino community members in El Paso, and 51 Muslim worshippers in Christchurch.”

Several progressive groups echoed Ms Lee’s call.

“Jim Jordan embodies the worst and most dangerous impulses of the far right,” said Rabbi Jason Kimelman-Block, Washington director of Bend the Arc: Jewish Action. “That Jordan is on the precipice of becoming Speaker must serve as a wakeup call: what we may have previously considered ‘fringe’ and hateful views are now fully in the mainstream of our political discourse.”

“He has consistently promoted baseless conspiracy theories like the antisemitic great replacement theory, which has driven repeated acts of racist mass violence,” said Lindsay Schubiner, director of programs for the, Western States Center. “This is particularly dangerous given the increased risk of antisemitic and anti-Muslim violence sparked by the conflict abroad.”

When Mr. Jordan was the top Republican on the Judiciary Committee in 2022, the panel tweeted out”Kanye. Elon. Trump,” and referring to Ye, who was making antisemitic statements; Elon Musk, who had allowed white supremacists to return to Twitter, now X, after he bought the social media site; and former President Donald Trump, who had been banned from Twitter after the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot. The tweet was not removed for months.

And in 2019, Mr. Jordan tweeted out an attack on Tom Steyer, a big Democratic donor, using a dollar sign in place of the “S.” Rep. Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., who preceded Mr. Jordan as Judiciary chair, blasted the tweet as “antisemitic.”

Jonathan D. Salant, [email protected], @JDSalant

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