Regrets, she has a few …
Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) continued to work her way through the stages of grief following Vice President Kamala Harris’ election loss — this time blaming President Biden for not ending his bid for a second term earlier.
“Had the president gotten out sooner, there may have been other candidates in the race,” Pelosi (D-Calif.) told the New York Times in comments published Friday.
“The anticipation was that, if the president were to step aside, that there would be an open primary.”
The 84-year-old went on: “And as I say, Kamala may have, I think she would have done well in that and been stronger going forward. But we don’t know that. That didn’t happen.
“We live with what happened, and because the president endorsed Kamala Harris immediately, that really made it almost impossible to have a primary at that time. If it had been much earlier, it would have been different.”
Biden, 81, did not endorse Harris in his July 21 announcement that he was dropping out of the 2024 race — instead issuing a second statement minutes later giving her his seal of approval.
The bizarre sequence triggered speculation that either Biden had to be persuaded to endorse his No. 2 or that he had tried to clear the field immediately in a display of petulance toward those who forced him out of the campaign.
Pelosi’s comments to the Times appeared to confirm the second theory, even though the former speaker had said during a September event hosted by Semafor: “We had an open primary and [Kamala Harris] won it.”
White House in Washington DC on Nov. 7, 2024. Anadolu via Getty Images
Pelosi publicly turned on Biden nearly two weeks after his disastrous June 27 debate against Trump in Atlanta, despite only a handful of Democrats publicly calling on the president to step aside by that time.
“It’s up to the president to decide if he is going to run,” Pelosi told MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” on July 10, two days after Biden sent a defiant letter to lawmakers saying he was “firmly committed” to staying in the race.
“We’re all encouraging him to make that decision because time is running short,” she added. “It’s not for me to say, I’m not the head of the caucus anymore, but he’s beloved, he is respected, and people want him to make that decision.”
Days before Biden dropped out, Pelosi reportedly warned the president that she would release polling data showing that he had no path to re-election following his debate showing against Trump, which appeared to be the final straw persuading the chief executive to step aside.
Pelosi, who was elected for a 20th House term on Tuesday, was was visibly upset after Harris lost to Donald Trump, refusing to talk to reporters at the veep’s Wednesday concession speech held at Howard University.
On Thursday, Lulu Garcia-Navarro, the host of the Times’ “The Interview” podcast, said that Pelosi was “heartbroken” over Harris’ defeat.
“She also said that she has spoken to the vice president and that it was a very emotional conversation – that they are friends – and that that conversation was difficult for both of them,” Garcia-Navarro said of her sitdown with Pelosi.
In addition to Trump’s victory, Republicans have clinched the Senate majority after four years out of power and are on track to keep control of the House of Representatives.
