WASHINGTON — “DEMOCRAT ELECTED IN SAN FRANCISCO,” read the headline of the short article on page 20 of the New York Times for June 3, 1987. It noted that the Democrat, who would represent San Francisco in Washington, was “nationally prominent level Democratic circles as a fundraiser and party organization worker’. That Democrat was Nancy Pelosi, who would use that organizational and fundraising prowess to become her party’s House leader, the first and only woman to hold that position. During Donald Trump’s presidency, he has been the face of the Democratic resistance, never more so than when he shredded a hard copy of his 2020 State of the Union address, which he had just finished. More fundamentally, she fought against his legislative agenda while also overseeing two impeachment investigations. She could be just as adept at fending off members of her own party, as when a challenge to her leadership materialized in 2018. When she was elected president in 2020, there was no Democratic insurgency to speak of, and Pelosi once again became, as Axios said she is “the most powerful woman in Washington.” Whether he will eventually relinquish that power is one of the top questions in Washington today. Although the congressional midterms were far from the Republican breakout some predicted, the GOP did win back control of the House, where it will have a narrow majority. Rep. Kevin McCarthy of California has been tapped by his party to be the new speaker, and far-right figures like Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia will emerge from the sidelines to serve on prominent committees. Nancy Pelosi rips then-President Donald Trump’s speech after his 2020 State of the Union address. (Jonathan Ernst/Reuters) Republicans seemed more excited by Pelosi’s ouster from the speaker than McCarthy’s nomination, which was fraught with infighting. “House Republicans kept our promise to fire Nancy Pelosi and act as a check on Joe Biden’s destructive agenda,” Rep. Tom Emmer of Minnesota said Wednesday night. Although she has to give up her gavel, Pelosi remains a member of Congress, given how easily she won re-election last week. But will he want to lead a weakened minority party through two years of party research, or will he conclude that the time is right for a change? The story continues Among those pushing her to delay her retirement is President Biden. “I hope you stay,” he reportedly told her in a phone call after intermission. Even in the House, the losses weren’t as big as some had predicted, with Reps. Abigail Spanberger in Virginia and Marcy Kaptur in Ohio easily outpacing Trump supporters in districts Republicans had hoped to win. But among those kicked out was Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney of New York, who headed the Democratic campaign committee. Since his defeat, Maloney has been embroiled in a bitter feud with House progressives, in a display of the kind of family feud Pelosi is known to despise. Pelosi said other members of the House want her to remain leader, but as with Biden — who turns 80 on Sunday — issues of generational change are irrelevant. Pelosi is flanked by House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, left, and House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn. (J. Scott Applewhite/AP) Now 82, Pelosi and her fellow embattled House leaders — Steny Hoyer of Maryland, 83, and Jim Clyburn of South Carolina, 82 — must decide whether it’s finally time to step aside and allow a younger class of Democrats to come into power. . “I think it’s time for a new generation of leadership in Congress,” Rep. Dean Phillips of Minnesota told reporters Tuesday. Many believe she is preparing to anoint Rep. Hakeem Jeffries of New York as her successor. Jeffries would be the first Black leader in Congress. Phillips said Jeffries “would be a good leader for our caucus,” echoing a view widely shared by congressional Democrats. The question of Pelosi’s future comes as her husband, Paul Pelosi, recovers from an attack at the couple’s San Francisco home late last month that left him seriously injured. The accused attacker, David De Pape, was looking for the Speaker of the House, using the same cry — “Where’s Nancy?” — that had animated the violent riots that stormed the Capitol on January 6, 2021. The attack was a reminder of how consistently Republicans have targeted Pelosi over the years — and how easily some conservative media outlets ramp up violent rhetoric laced with conspiratorial insinuations. Representative Hakeem Jeffries at a press conference. (Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call via Getty Images) Pelosi has acknowledged that the attack on her husband is a factor as she considers her future. “I have to say that my decision will be influenced by what’s happened in the last week or two,” he told CNN before the midterm elections. How last Tuesday’s results further changed her thinking is something of a mystery. “Everybody I think is frozen by the situation,” a Democratic official on Capitol Hill told CNN. McCarthy’s election clears up little for Democrats, except to remind them that they have their own internal party politics to deal with. When she was handily elected by her fellow Democrats to serve again as president in 2020, Pelosi vowed it would be the last time she did so. Some congressional observers believed that if Democrats fared particularly poorly in the midterms, Pelosi would announce she was leaving Congress, as opposed to simply giving up her bid for another speech. If he did, he would be following in the footsteps of Newt Gingrich, the House Speaker from Georgia who masterminded the impeachment of Bill Clinton. He announced his retirement from Congress after the 1998 midterm elections, the results of which were widely seen as a rebuke to the GOP he had tried to reshape in his own militant image. Since no such rebuke came in the 2022 midterms, Pelosi may see little reason to walk away. “I have no plans to step away from Congress,” she said in an interview with ABC News last week.
