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Live: Nancy Pelosi on the Midterms
00:25:13
A conversation with the retiring former speaker of the House
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Jess
Carla.
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Hanna Rosin
I'm Carla Lally, cookbook author and snack enthusiast.
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Jess
Do you have a sweet tooth?
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Hanna Rosin
Check out Sweets Unwrapped, a podcast from Ferrero and Atlantic. Rethink, the Atlantic's creative marketing studio. Together we're celebrating the traditions that make life sweet. Tune in now. Hey, before we get started today, we have an announcement. This show is adding three new dimensions. Number one, episodes now, every Monday, in addition to the Thursday episode. Number two, we have a new host, Adam Harris. You have probably heard him on the show. He's co hosted. He's also been a guest on the show. And number three, the Monday show is gonna be on video. You can watch it on YouTube. Adam, how you feeling about that? You looking good.
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Adam Harris
I am feeling great. It's been really exciting to get this show off the ground and I'm excited to get started.
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Hanna Rosin
So if you had to make a show right now, this week, what would it be about?
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Adam Harris
You know, there's just so much in the news. You have the Iran deal. You have the sort of ongoing unfolding dimensions of the Jeffrey Epstein scandal. You have the start of the World Cup. I think one of the reasons why I was really interested in coming back and joining you as the co host on Radio Atlantic is, is because there is so much to explore and there's just so much news to cover. And so it's honestly a bit of a blessing that you that we're able to look at the world through this lens of this magazine that's been around for 170 years.
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Hanna Rosin
But let's say you could do a show about literally anything you wanted. Like, it wouldn't even have to be news related. Would you create an alternate reality where
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Adam Harris
The spurs won 100%, 100% both in 2017 and now?
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Jess
Got it.
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Hanna Rosin
I'm Hanna Rosen. This is Radio Atlantic. Nancy Pelosi is a lot of things, but one thing people can agree on is that she knows how to get things done. And if she doesn't like you, especially if you're a president she disagrees with, she will not try to hide it. Pelosi was a key figure in pushing through the Affordable Care act under President Obama, speaker of the House, an icon of Democratic politics for the last few decades, whipping up votes, negotiating bills, and in one memorable moment from 2020, ripping up a speech at the State of the Union.
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Adam Harris
A stunning moment here at the end of the president's speech, Nancy Pelosi tearing
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Nancy Pelosi
up what appeared to be a copy
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Hanna Rosin
of the president's speech earlier this month. I sat down with Pelosi at the Cascade PBS Ideas Festival in Seattle. We talked about the midterms, if the Democrats could win back the House, possibly the Senate. We talked about gerrymandering and the future of the Democratic Party just as she's about to retire from it officially.
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Jess
So you are. We're coming on. It's 39 years, about which is amazing. Next week, June 9, is the anniversary of your swearing in. Right?
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Nancy Pelosi
Right.
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Jess
Yeah. Amazing. Which means you have five months to go. How are you liking the term emerita? Like, do you feel relieved? Like, oh, I don't have to do this anymore? Do you feel panic? Like, what do I do now?
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Nancy Pelosi
Well, I'm only there for one reason right now, in addition to meeting the needs of my constituents. But my purpose is to win the House for the Democrats. And that's it. That's it. So right now it's like every day counts and have to make every day count. And so I'm not looking in terms of five months or what. That's what it is, five months. Mine's about three days. And we will have the election, and we want to make sure that everybody knows that the election will be safe and will be protected, that we will win the election and what we will do when we do so. I'm busy.
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Jess
Yeah, I knew you weren't going to sound like a person who's five months from the way a lot of us would sound if we were five months from retirement. It's just impossible to imagine. Like, when I think Nancy Pelosi, I think action verbs like wrangling, you know, there are things we associate with you, and none of them are fishing. So looking at the House map. Help us understand. From your perspective, is looking at the map of the nation and winning the House. Do you think of it the same way you think of winning a vote, like gathering your people? Is it the same kind of thing?
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Nancy Pelosi
Well, let's define our terms when we say winning the House, let's think back to our founders as we celebrate, mostly celebrate, the 250th anniversary of our July 4, 1776, and then what they did after that to write the Constitution. They wrote in the Constitution very clearly about the House and its purpose. So in order to talk about what we want to do, it's important to note this. Our founders thought that the House of Representatives should be a reflection of the American people. And that's why there's proportional representation. The Senate at the time, too, for, you know, we have 40 million people in California. We have two senators. Some other states have 1 million persons, have two. But that's what we take an oath to protect and defend. And they were at the time just appointed by, like the state legislature, just to go back in history a bit. But the Founders, the one thing that they had total agreement on is they did not want a monarch. So the way they set up the Constitution for the election was the President would have a four year term and the House would have a. So people ask me all the time, including members, how come we have to run every two years? It's because the genius of our founders, they wanted the race for the House in two years to be a referendum on the executive. And that's exactly how it turns out. So when we say we have to win the House, that means we have to be a referendum, as our founders intended, that, that we not have a monarch. So we fully intend to do just that.
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Jess
What would you put the chances of Democrats winning the House? Right now,
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Nancy Pelosi
not only are we going to win the House, we're going to win big. And that's what our plan is.
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Jess
So that number is 100.
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Nancy Pelosi
Hakeem Jeffries will be the speaker, speaker of the House, and he will be great. And right now, he's planning how we win, how we protect the election, and what we will do when we win.
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Jess
What about the Senate? I know the House is your baby and you love the House more, but just asking, what about the Senate?
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Nancy Pelosi
That's true, but I only speak about what I really know. And I know on the ground what is happening with the House. People say, are you being a little arrogant? I said, no, I'm being confident we're going to win the House. The Senate has real possibilities. The bigger we win the House, the better chance for them to win the Senate. But if we win both, that would be a dream come true for our founders. That's what they have in mind.
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Jess
So the person you've been alluding to, but not mentioned by name. I remember hearing you on a podcast right before the presidential election, and this is painful to read. Now, what you said was, I can't even envision a situation where he could win. If he were to win and we didn't win the House, imagine how horrible it would be. I can hardly sleep at night as it is, but that would be unthinkable, impossible for our country. Now, your wish did not come true. So the question is, has it been just as you expected, Worse than you expected? Sort of. How has it rolled out?
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Nancy Pelosi
Let us again define our terms. You're talking about what's his Name he
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Jess
who shall not be named. If you're not naming him, I'll take your name.
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Nancy Pelosi
No, it's worse. This is worse. I mean, the fact is that I didn't come here to talk about him. I came here to talk about me. But. Okay, we'll talk about it. No cheesy. Look, what is at stake, a Constitution where people are represented, where freedom of the press, freedom of speech, all democratic freedoms in the Bill of Rights. And then you have rule of law, due process, separation of powers. My personal favorite, independent judiciary, Supreme Court. So there's so much at stake in this election coming. Not that we can change the court right now, but the. This is election. We must win. But I say to people, because people are concerned about our democracy and we need to be. But I said, when we campaign, we just can't be talking about we save our democracy at the kitchen table. This is about lowering the cost and increasing the availability and accessibility of health care. And it's about ending the corruption that is going on in Washington, D.C. that's what people vote on. We always have to make a distinction between what is important and we can all agree on so many important things, and what people vote on, which is what is important to them at that time. The cost of living, affordability. And that's the fight that we are in.
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Jess
In your book, the Art of Power, you talk about managing George Bush, you talk about John McCain. That just how you handle each one, your intuition, how did you handle Donald Trump? Like, if you had to strategize or you had to get something done or sort of, you needed the White House for some reason, how did you do it?
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Nancy Pelosi
Well, I didn't manage any of those people, but I respected them. You always want the president of the United States to succeed. And for the most part, Democratic or Republican, that was never an issue. We always were patriots. And as I say, you want the president to succeed. In order for there to be cooperation and all the rest, there has to be some truth, I guess that's the best word I could say, some validity as to what that person's agenda might be for our country. So we're having a difference of opinion on policy I'd rather not talk personally about.
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Jess
I am genuinely curious because you're so strategic in the book. You're so, so good at reading people, understanding what you need from each person and how to get it, to sort of get everything on everybody, like all the House members. It's so many people. You know, it's like you have 10,000 children and you have to get them all in line. It's kind of amazing. So I did wonder about how you, when you're faced with a situation like this, but you do have some duty to the country. Like, did you have any personal interactions or any insights about, well, how do you get something done here?
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Nancy Pelosi
Well, the first term was better than the second term, you know, but then we had to impeach him twice, so.
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Jess
So he wasn't a fan.
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Nancy Pelosi
A fan? No, no. But the thing is, somebody said to me the other day, I fought really hard for you to impeach the president. I said, you didn't do any such thing. There's only one person responsible for the two impeachments of Donald Trump, and that person's name is Donald Trump.
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Hanna Rosin
After the break, Nancy Pelosi on the moment when she ripped up a copy of Donald Trump's speech.
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Grant Hill
Leadership today is defined by how you move, how you think, how you listen, how you choose your next step. The drive to lead, a new series from Range Rover and Atlantic Rethink explores how influential minds across industry shape the moment with intention and clarity. From sports entrepreneurs to beauty brand founders. Join me, Grant Hill and others for a deep look at what it means to be a thought leader today. Watch the films@theAtlantic.com DriveToLead.
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Jess
Do you all remember the moment that Representative Pelosi ripped up the speech? Okay. It was so memeable. I feel like it's just going to be around forever. Did you think of that on the spot?
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Nancy Pelosi
Yeah, I did.
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Jess
Really?
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Nancy Pelosi
I'll tell you on a couple of spots. One, here's the way it was. We go to the State of the Union and you want to be respectful. They're guests in our House, the House of Representatives. So anyway, when the president comes in, you probably notice that they hand a copy of the speech the vice president copied to the speaker. So I have my copy there. And he started to speak. And what I was hearing was not consistent with fact. So I tore a little piece and I said, I just have to remember that on this page it wasn't true. And then the next page it wasn't true. And then the next page it wasn't true. The whole speech was really a manifesto of misrepresentations. So at the end I thought, I have to tear this speech up because the whole, every single page had misrepresentation. But worse than misrepresentation, lies. But it's on parchment. So you just can't do this. You have to do this and this and this. But I'LL tell you something. I go all over the world and I'm like, we're so proud of the Affordable Care act and all these things that we did legislatively. All people want to do is. But also they don't like. And I point this past week, for some reason, was today, I was in the airport and a young woman came up to me and she said she had her phone with a picture on it, and she said, I'm the person who took this picture of you in the cabin office pointing at the president. Wow. I didn't know who took that picture, but in that picture, everybody tells me, that's the one I want autographed. That's the one I want autographed. Because in that picture, I'm saying to the president, president, I'm leaving this meeting now because with you, Mr. President, which I called him, all roads lead to Putin. So that, to me, was a more serious assault on what he had to say than just tearing up his manifesto of misrepresentations.
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Jess
I want to talk about Congress more broadly. What do you think about the gerrymandering war that has opened up? I mean, your successors, Hakeem Jeffries, said, maximum warfare everywhere, all the time. The Democrats have definitely jumped into the gerrymandering war. How do you feel about that?
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Nancy Pelosi
Oh, let me back up on that. When we won the majority in 18, so 19 we went in. And then when President Biden was elected in 20, our first bill was HR1 for the people Act. And one of the major provisions of the bill was no more partisan gerrymandering. We have to get to that place now.
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Jess
But the Democrats don't seem to take that position anymore.
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Nancy Pelosi
No, no, they do. You slap me in the face, I'll slap you right back. So they did what they did in Texas. Winning this election is too important. So we did. We didn't want to do what we did in California, but if they're going to try to take five seats in Texas, we'll take five seats in California. Let me say this, but that is, I would rather not have done that, but I'm not going to let them get away with taking five seats and then going here and going down. I know some people like to say, you know, turn the other cheek. No, I'll turn one side, punch you in yours.
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Unidentified Musician
Okay.
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Jess
I feel like I want to rip up my speech.
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Nancy Pelosi
No, I don't mean to sound that way, but that is our bill. We have in California commission redistricting, and we said, we will take this departure right now because what they did in Texas and return to commission redistricting. We have to have it in every state of the union so that everybody knows that's not what it's about anymore. It's about not politicians choosing their constituents. It's about constituents choosing their elected officials. And that's where it has to be.
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Jess
After the last election, there was a lot of hand wringing among Democrats. Who do we need to be? What do we need to evolve into? What should our policies be? What should our message be so that this doesn't tap in again? Do you have a clear answer to that? What the Democrats need to evolve into or change?
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Nancy Pelosi
No, I think the Democrats know what they have to be, and that is we are not a monolith. Your job title and your job description, one in the same representative. So I can't go in there and say everybody should be like me because I'm from San Francisco and this is the right thing to do. We have to listen to other people's views and hopefully across the aisle. So there are elements, exuberances in the party now that should be heard and the rest. But when we have that vote the first couple of days of January, we will all. Not me, because I won't be there. They will all be voting for Hakeem Jeffries for speaker, and then they will. You build the consensus. You recognize the importance of every voice. And everybody doesn't think alike. We are the Democratic Party. The Republican Party has a different attitude. They just do what they're told. That's not what we are. That's not moving on.
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Jess
One theory that I hear a lot and which I am dying to hear, your response to is there's a powerful young generation of politicians who. Whose style is different. It's sort of movement grassroots politics, plus social media influence. You know, AOC is the most prominent example. There was a perception, maybe a media perception initially, that you were maybe resistant to that because it would fracture the Democratic Party or it would somehow not keep the party together. Is that perception true and has your view evolved on how to bring in this new style of politics?
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Nancy Pelosi
Well, let us again define our terms. I was not for candidates coming in and running against our incumbents because we needed to win the House. In other words, weighing the equities. We had to win because we were the referendum on that executive in the White House. We had to win. So, no, I wasn't happy about people saying, let's spend a whole lot of money challenging Democrats. You want to do that, do that. But don't think that that's something that is good for this year. Do it a year when we have the luxury of having the majority, you can't gain by losing. So AOC is wonderful. She's much more operational than I think people may think. So that wasn't the case. The big difference is just social media. How?
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Jess
How. Like, how do you.
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Nancy Pelosi
Well, because there's. There's one of the tragedies or the victims of social media is truth. There's nothing that is sort of. We all agree that this is the choice that we have. It's a lot of misrepresentation. But I. With all due respect to whatever you're quoting there, we're going to win this election. There will be those. Like, in San Francisco, we just had a race where there's a guy who was going after Hakeem, going after me, going after. It's over for him, okay? Because that's not. What is the point. You have to be respectful of all that new energy and young people coming and seeing things in a different way. But the idea that there will be those who would be out there to just take down the incumbents when this is our year to honor the Constitution of the United States. I'm not for that. You run anytime you want and do whatever you want to do. But don't expect that to be welcome when we've got to stay completely focused on saving the Constitution, but more importantly, helping people at the kitchen table. But again, that's the Democratic Party. Look, I was chair of the party in California before I was ever in comp. And I loved it because I would prepare candidates to go out there and win. I knew how to win elections. But I'm a progressive lefty. San Francisco. I had the left left on my case all the time, and that's their right, but it doesn't mean that I'm against them. When you say, have you changed your mind? No, I haven't changed my mind. I'm for winning.
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Jess
We're out of time. There's going to be a lot of debate about your legacy, everything that you've accomplished for a long time after you leave the House. I will say for me personally, one of the great legacies that you've left for me in my life is the Nancy Pelosi clap, which I employ all of the time. So let's give Nancy Pelosi a Nancy Pelosi clap.
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Nancy Pelosi
Thank you so much, Jess. Thank Hannah for putting up with me all this time.
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Hanna Rosin
This episode of Radio Atlantic was produced by Janee West. It's. It was edited by Kevin Townsend Genevieve Finn Fact Checked Rob Smirciak engineered and provided original music, audio and video recordings by Fremont Studios and the Cascade PBS Ideas Festival. Claudina Baid is the Executive Producer of Atlantic Audio and Andrea Valdez is our Managing Editor. Listeners, if you enjoy the show, you can support our work and the work of all Atlantic journalists when you subscribe to the Atlantic and@theAtlantic.com listener I'm Hanna Rosin. Thank you for listening. And don't forget we now have a show on Monday morning with new co host Adam Harris.
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Unidentified Musician
To pursue music seriously, I had to craft my own way. I make my own musical instruments from scratch. I kind of start to riff with various materials that are on my disposal. RPI gave me the time and space to really focus on my voice. Being exposed to a very multidisciplinary program, colleagues and faculties helped me broaden my view on this relationship between technology and art.
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Hanna Rosin
Learn more at rpi.edu barraisers.