Every single time we have learned that sedition-backing Donald Trump likely committed a crime, it takes no more than a day for House Republicans to begin planning out how they will best defend him. Every single time, the chosen defense is not that Trump didn’t do whatever astonishingly crooked thing investigators have uncovered; instead, they declare that whoever discovered the corruption is part of a vast conspiracy against the career con artist, and that the investigators are the ones who need to be punished and/or jailed.

And every damn time, a coatless Rep. Jim Jordan flings himself in front of the news cameras to be the loudest person whining about it.

Now the House Judiciary Chair, which is about as neat a summation of Republicanism’s decline as you could ask for, Jordan is already leading the House Republican charge to sabotage the new federal indictment of Trump under Espionage Act charges. He and his fellow Republicans have settled into a pattern; Jordan is using his perch in Congress to demand that the Justice Department turn over documents about the active criminal case. CNN is now reporting that Jordan is “exploring ways to force [special counsel] Jack Smith to testify or provide information” about the criminal case, and that Jordan has declared that “all options are on the table” when it comes to forcing Smith and others to comply.

This is the now-standard means by which House Republicans look to undermine all investigations into Trump’s various acts of corruption; Jordan and House Republicans turned to it immediately after Trump’s indictment in New York for cooking Trump Organization books to hide hush money payments during his 2016 campaign. It quickly came to light that House Republicans were coordinating with Trump himself in their efforts to discredit the Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.