The House Freedom Caucus is staring down an unfamiliar new reality in 2027: questionable relevance.
That’s partly because the ultra-conservative group achieved an indubitable triumph this week, when its co-founder and first chair, Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan, was elected Tuesday to serve as the next top House Republican leader.
It’s also because the group has traditionally wielded its power by acting as a holdout bloc in thin Republican majorities. Now the GOP is on track to hold the smallest House minority any party has had in more than 30 years.
“It's completely variant from being the most powerful faction within a legislative body that has legislative authority through majority control,” said Rep. Clay Higgins of Louisiana, a caucus member. “Well, that's off the table now.”
Founded in 2015, the Freedom Caucus persisted through a prior stretch in the minority, under then-Leader Kevin McCarthy, from 2019 to 2023. But Jordan’s ascendance is prompting big questions about the role of a group that was established to prod party leaders rightward now that the GOP’s top man is one of their own.
Higgins said, for example, “our principles are the same” but the group would now be more focused on “strategic alignment to protect the gains that we have indeed made over the last few years.” Another member, Rep. Marlin Stutzman of Indiana, said it would move to a “think tank model where we're pulling good information together … to really inform the rest of the conference.”
At a Wednesday news conference where members of the group blamed the GOP’s huge election losses on current party leaders’ timidity, several rejected the notion that there would be any diminishment of its influence — including several who are expected to vie to be elected caucus chair in the next Congress.
Asked what the point of the Freedom Caucus was with Jordan as leader, Rep. Andrew Clyde of Georgia scoffed: “What you're saying, basically, is that the whole entity of the Freedom Caucus can be found in one man. That's not right.”
But others acknowledged in some fashion that the group’s relationship with Jordan could be complicated.
Rep. Eric Burlison of Missouri, who like Clyde is running for caucus chair, said he expected that the group would have to pressure Jordan at times.
“It's like when you hire your brother to build your house,” Burlison said in an interview. “There may be some awkward moments, but at the end of the day, we have a shared goal and a shared vision.”
How the Freedom Caucus can deliver pressure is in doubt. In the past it has asserted itself on procedural votes and other matters where it has enough numbers to deny GOP leaders a Republican majority on the floor. That logic simply does not hold in the minority, where it’s generally easier for the out-party to unite against the majority.
Members of the group have joked, “When you’re in the minority, everyone’s in the Freedom Caucus.”
The group is also suffering from the loss of several influential veteran members, such as Reps. Chip Roy of Texas, Ralph Norman of South Carolina and Andy Biggs of Arizona — who all lost bids for higher office. Reps. Scott Perry of Pennsylvania, a former chair like Biggs, lost his seat to a Democrat, and Rep. Lauren Boebert of Colorado is trailing in her race.
The Freedom Caucus’ political arm also failed to make serious gains during the midterms, spending in several races but only winning a handful after a particularly brutal primary season.
Several potential GOP newcomers have shown interest in joining the group, according to Rep. Andy Harris of Maryland, the outgoing chair. He predicted that the Freedom Caucus would have more members by the midpoint of the upcoming Congress than it has in the current one.
While current members see Jordan’s promotion as a huge win for the group, they also said they understand he now has a mandate to lead the full range of GOP members.
That’s how Jordan has acted more recently, anyway. He attempted to make inroads with GOP moderates ahead of his leader run and otherwise adopted a more mellow approach from the days more than a decade ago when then-Speaker John Boehner referred to him as a “legislative terrorist.”
Jordan has been a less central presence in the Freedom Caucus in recent years but still frequently attends its meetings. A spokesperson said Jordan still considers himself a member of the Freedom Caucus as well as the Republican Study Committee, a larger and less militant conservative group.
When asked after his election Tuesday about his role, Jordan said it is to “help House Republicans get back to the majority.” The spokesperson responded to a question about his future relationship with the Freedom Caucus by saying, “We look forward to working with the entire Republican conference to unite against and defeat the radical Democrat agenda.”
“The further you go up in leadership, the broader your responsibility,” Rep. Keith Self of Texas said. “So we don't expect him to be a direct advocate for HFC. He will certainly be a friend of HFC.”
Those outside the group are puzzling out how they’ll adapt to the new reality. Rep. Chris Smith of New Jersey, one of the two longest-serving House Republicans, said it will “have relevance, but I'm not sure what their issues will be.”
Smith added Jordan is “going to be very faithful to what the conference wants him to do.”
Asked if Jordan might need to be pushed right on occasion, Harris said there’s “no question” that he is a conservative and praised him as “a superb communicator” and “exactly what we need.”
Several members predicted the Freedom Caucus could serve as an internal heat shield for Jordan — giving him cover to build support for more conservative positions as he works with President Donald Trump to battle Democrats.
“Jim will still need the deep rudder of this ship to guide the Republican Conference,” Higgins said. “He'll need us to align strategically and be willing to draw lines in the sand that would be more difficult for him to do as the leader of the conference.”
