I changed it up trying to get it to work and used while instead for loop.
I noticed that all the records all selected then all records unselected so the cursor is not working like I want it to. One by one
import arcpy, time
mxd = arcpy.mapping.MapDocument ('CURRENT')
df = arcpy.mapping.ListDataFrames(mxd,"Layers")[0]
field = "OBJECTID"
fc = r'Orders_High_RD'
lyr = arcpy.mapping.ListLayers(mxd, fc, df)[0]
df.scale = 1000
cursor = arcpy.SearchCursor(fc)
row = cursor.next()
while row:
row = cursor.next()
arcpy.SelectLayerByAttribute_management(fc,"NEW_SELECTION")
time.sleep(5)
df.extent = lyr.getSelectedExtent()
arcpy.RefreshActiveView()