But with the final march of leading her army in the national movement behind her, and her final landmark bill protecting same-sex marriage rights signed by the president, even Pelosi’s season is over. We recognize that we have stopped.
So it turns out Pelosi is unusually expansive at lunch on Tuesday when she went with several female journalists. She talked about how much things have changed since her early days working as a backbench congresswoman from San Francisco in an organization where only 23 of her 435 members were women. About the choices she made and the chances she took while she was unlikely to become the most powerful woman in U.S. history. And about the challenges her successors will face.
Not only did Pelosi become the first female public speaker, she wielded the power of the office more effectively than anyone in modern times. After raising five children as a stay-at-home mom, Pelosi was very undercover when she arrived in the House of Representatives in 1987 at the age of 47. They had established what they call a tight, masculine “pecking order”. The only time she heard from someone high up in the caucus was when they asked her to host a fundraiser in California.
“You know the first time I was in the Democratic chairman’s office?” Pelosi said over lunch. “The first time I came to the Democratic Party’s chairman’s office was when I was chairman.”
When she made a bold bid for the top post in House leadership — when the fortunes of Democrats had changed and were unfortunately in the minority — the reaction Pelosi heard from her more hardened male colleagues was: It was as follows.Who said you could run? ”
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“Poor baby,” Pelosi added with a laugh.
When a male colleague suggested that women make a list of things they want and hand it over to men to handle, Pelosi replied, “No, we’ve been waiting for over 200 years.”
Growing up the daughter of a Baltimore mayor, Pelosi learned how to win elections one vote at a time. And it turns out she has enough of her colleagues who want to see the old order overthrown: Pelosi came out on top in the 2001 Democratic secret ballot. 118 to 95 voteJust a year later she became a minority leader. In 2006, she pushed her midterm election strategy to regain the Democratic majority and serve as chair.
Then, in 2018, Pelosi became the first speaker since Sam Rayburn to lose a majority, then came back with the gavel for the second time. She remained in the minority for eight years and fought, she said, because she decided the Republican Party would not be allowed to carry out their promise to dismantle her most important and glorious legislative achievement. So I stayed,” she said.
No other place in the US Capitol is more emblematic of its ancient history get along Pelosi first encountered it in the floor-to-ceiling room where she had lunch on Tuesday. These days, it’s her favorite meeting place while her grand official office is packed. It is known as the “Board of Education,” a small group of people elected by Rayburn, a Texan who was a speaker three times between 1940 and 1961. Bourbon and Scotch after the day’s work.
The hideout was where Vice President Harry S. Truman had a drink when he received an emergency call from the White House switchboard informing him that Franklin D. Roosevelt had died and Truman had been placed in the Oval Office. It was a relaxing place. And a 28-year-old Texas freshman congressman named Lyndon B. Johnson got an early lesson in legislative tactics, along with the most useful information to pass on to the White House’s new dealers. One Robert Caro later wrote that the appetizer to the school board was “the greatest boon that Rayburn gave him.”
The current speaker has renovated the school board. The ragged carpets, tufted chairs and Robert E. Lee portraits of the Rayburn era are long gone. One wall still adorns the Texas coat of arms, another wall depicts a bright scene of the Golden Gate her bridge, and a third wall shows a woman gaining the right to vote. A mural commemorating the 100th anniversary of the “I’m going to have a female member come and see it tomorrow because it’s brand new,” she said.
Pelosi describes today’s Democratic caucuses as “about 70% female, people of color, LGBTQ, and 100% brave.” She has appointed chairmen of various committees and takes pride in starting her doors, which were once closed to her subordinates, from her own office. “They are always there,” she said. “That’s another day.”
Over the years, Pelosi has come to appreciate some of the antagonists. In particular, she thinks President George W. Bush was “beautiful, lovable, and a wonderful person to work with, despite the war in Iraq.” About their collaboration, she said: No one knew about this room, so no one followed us or his secretary.
Pelosi, who is preparing to run again in the House of Representatives, joins fellow House Democrats who lost a narrow majority in the midterm elections to head the caucuses. “I have been a speaker and minority leader to three presidents: Bush, Obama, and What’s His Name, and then with President Biden,” said Pelosi. said, while being effective in minorities sometimes means that party unity means party members have to do things that are unpopular in their districts.
As for her own plans, Pelosi has talked about writing a memoir. “We have to set the record straight on certain things we hear about how we did this and how we did it,” she said, referring to the 2008 financial crisis and how things have changed. began the harrowing story of how close she came to a complete collapse of the financial system before she finally helped garner $700 billion in votes. Problematic Asset Relief Program.
“I think that’s why we lost the 2010 election because on the one hand it created a tea party and on the other hand we took over Wall Street,” she said. “Everyone complains that we bailed out Wall Street at the expense of Main Street. It wasn’t true, but that’s how it was perceived.”
The commentary wasn’t always right about Pelosi. That’s true, but history would certainly be correct. At the unveiling of her official portrait on Wednesday, the soon-to-be former Speaker recalled the slogan of her first race to Congress: “Voices will be heard.” I could never have imagined how true that would be, not only for generations to come.
