The Scene
CHICAGO — It’s Kamala Harris’ convention. But another California woman, one with no current Democratic leadership role, is just as inescapable here.
House Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi showed up on seemingly every network ahead of her remarks to the convention on Wednesday night. It was a media tour ostensibly designed in part to plug her new book, “The Art of Power,” but Pelosi’s near-constant presence also reinforced the key role she played in helping nudge President Joe Biden off the top of the ticket. Or as she put it to CNN earlier this week: “I did what I had to do.”
As Democrats inject “forward” into their messaging, from their super PAC to their concept art, Pelosi’s expression of power couldn’t help but take them back — to her long reign as the party’s highest-ranking woman in Congress. And they weren’t all complaining: Several Democrats at the convention sported lapel pins labeled “The Godmother,” mimicking the iconic mafia film’s logo, that swapped Marlon Brando’s face with Pelosi’s.
But as relieved as most Democrats are that Pelosi made her move against Biden, some betray uneasiness about her subsequent victory lap. After all, the party’s goal next year is putting Harris in the White House and electing New York Democrat Hakeem Jeffries, whom Pelosi stepped aside for nearly two years ago, as the first Black speaker of the House.
In addition to picking at wounds over the current president’s exit, Pelosi’s return to prominence raises questions about her role next year. She had given Jeffries room to lead his caucus but leapt ahead of him last month to publicly channel members’ dissatisfaction with Biden.
“I tried to be a Paul Revere” warning of the cost of nominating Biden this fall, “not a George Washington,” said Minnesota Rep. Dean Phillips, who ran a brief Democratic primary bid that focused on the departing president’s age. “And that’s perhaps the difference. I’m not writing a book about the experience.”
Asked if Pelosi was prepared to return to elder-stateswoman mode and recede from the spotlight in favor of Jeffries, Phillips told Semafor that it was “a fair question.” He praised her as “exceptional during [Jeffries’] early tenure there, to support him — but behind the scenes, not taking center stage.”
Rep. Glenn Ivey, D-Md., told Semafor that “I don’t know how it’s gonna play out” within the caucus after the intense public focus on her support for replacing Biden as the nominee. “I know there are people who have mixed feelings about how that plays out down the road.”
Democrats “need all hands on deck to win this,” Ivey added, saying of Pelosi’s media tour: “I don’t know that those conversations really move the ball forward.”
Another House Democrat, speaking on condition of anonymity, gave a telling answer when asked about Pelosi’s prominence during the convention. “Maybe you should title your piece, ‘Did America already have its first woman president?’”
Pelosi’s office did not respond to a request for comment.
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Pelosi, 84, ushered in a generational shift among House Democratic leaders after the 2022 elections by ceding her top spot to Jeffries, 54, and assuming the title of “Speaker Emerita.” It amounted to an early preview of the 81-year-old Biden making way for the 59-year-old Harris, though Pelosi has by all accounts remained a fundraising and guiding force for her party.
Not to mention the biggest difference between her handover of power and Biden’s; Pelosi’s happened on her own terms, and last fall she silenced speculation that she might retire outright from Congress by running for another term.
Biden’s handover, on the other hand, might not have happened if not for Pelosi.
“Nancy Pelosi has been the backbone of the Democratic Party for 20 years,” party strategist Jesse Lee said. Lee, a former aide to Biden and Pelosi, listed her long track record of muscling through legislative victories on health care and climate change as well as her open rebellion against then-President Donald Trump.
“One of her final, most difficult acts was speaking hard truths to somebody she loved deeply,” Lee added, referring to Biden. “Both her and Biden will be remembered as amongst the greatest public servants the country has ever known because she had the fortitude to do it, and he had the grace to listen.”
Even as she told CNN of her lobbying for Biden’s exit that “sometimes you have to take a punch for the children,” Pelosi added to the network that “my concern was not about the president; it was about his campaign.”
That was enough for her closest House Democratic allies.
“I am sure she would say that she wasn’t taking a victory lap,” Illinois Rep. Mike Quigley said.
Other House Democrats were less eager to talk about Pelosi this week.
“Ask me something about the agenda,” Washington Rep. Pramila Jayapal said. “About Michigan, about Georgia.”
Pelosi herself offered a more measured version of events to CBS host Stephen Colbert during a live appearance on Tuesday night. She began the appearance by praising Biden’s record, and demurred when asked about the public’s perception that she led the charge for his exit.
“The president made his own decision, and they should respect him for that,” Pelosi said.
Colbert’s second guest, after Pelosi? Jeffries.
Kadia’s view
Yes, Biden chose on his own to make way for Harris. Yet her coronation this week would have been harder, if not impossible, to pull off without Pelosi’s sway.
While Pelosi has seemed at ease giving up control to Jeffries, his newbie status as leader meant that he couldn’t have stood alone in forcing out a president with decades more experience -- even if he wanted to.
As Phillips put it to Semafor, Pelosi, “and only she, probably could have influenced President Biden the way she did. And by the way, that is something Leader Jeffries probably could not have done, [not] successfully and certainly not comfortably.”
That reality is bound to raise questions about Pelosi’s next moves and her relationship with the new, younger class of party leaders. The answers won’t be simple and won’t become clear until after Election Day, which congressional Democrats are now feeling much more confident about.
Rep. Becca Balint, D-Vt. illustrated the dynamic in one brief pause while talking about Pelosi. Balint cited the “tremendous amount of respect for the fact that the Speaker” – then caught herself mid-sentence to remember to add “emeritus” – “lives and breathes for the people.” Balint also mimed a crown after the flub.
One thing is clear: Pelosi’s time as speaker emerita is now defined in large part not by legislative sway but by her impact on Harris’ nomination. It’s hard to remember that she initially favored an open primary if Biden bowed out.