Page 35 - Time Magazine, Sep. 17, 2018

Pelosi addresses
members of her
caucus during
a meeting in
February

It is not in Pelosi’s nature to cower or She told Ocasio-Cortez that while she walking tour, but it’s a cold day, and she
grovel. She will be who she is—liberal, loved Crowley, she had always wanted detests the cold.) A few blocks over, there
privileged, unpopular—and let the chips to see more young, progressive women are hipster restaurants and lofts, but in
fall where they may. To some Democrats, in Congress, according to a person with this part of town, the corners still feature
Pelosi’s is an attitude of unconscionable direct knowledge of the conversation. traditional pasta houses.
selfishness: she’s willing to damage “There’s a lot to do,” Pelosi told her. D’Alesandro wore a bow tie and straw
her party to hold on to the position “Thank you for your courage to run. This boater and helmed an old-school urban
she believes she deserves. The story of is not for the faint of heart.” It was typ- Democratic machine, with party bosses
Nancy Pelosi is, inevitably, the story of ical Pelosi—a compliment, wrapped in pledging the loyalty of their tribes: the
what people think of her. The way she is an invitation to join the team, with just Italians, the Irish, the Jews, the blacks.
recognized and remembered, the way she a hint of potential consequences. And it His politics were about favor-trading
is held to account. And so Pelosi doesn’t reflected a political education that, for Pe- and patronage, not grand ideological de-
have the luxury of not caring about what losi, began a lifetime ago. signs. (His aspirations to become gov-
people think of her: it’s the question The youngest of seven children and ernor were thwarted by a corruption
on which her future, and the future of the only girl, Pelosi grew up like royalty. scandal involving parking-garage con-
American politics, depends. Her father Thomas D’Alesandro Jr. was a struction, according to a 1954 TIME re-
member of Congress when she was born, port.) Pelosi has a strong sense of ethnic
THE MORNING AFTER the biggest in 1940, and the mayor of Baltimore by the identity—she credits her Italian heritage
primary upset of 2018, Pelosi placed a time she was7. When young Nancy wasn’t for her stamina—and as a leader she ap-
call to Ocasio-Cortez. The 28-year-old being ferried to a Catholic girls’ school, proaches the factions of the Democrats in
socialist from the Bronx had predicated she was attending her father’s ceremonial a similar party-boss style. As her friend
her campaign against the House’s fourth events or helping him get out the vote. Her the late Congressman John Murtha used
most powerful Democrat on getting rid of father’s ancestors had immigrated from to say, “Don’t think she’s from San Fran-
the old, out-of-touch party establishment, Genoa, Venice and Abruzzo, her mother’s cisco. She’s from Baltimore.”
and pundits were speculating about the from the southern Italian city of Campo- Pelosi’s family made her a Democrat,
implications for other longtime leaders. basso. The family lived in a three-story but it was the 1960s that made her a
Sitting on a goldenrod-colored sofa in brick rowhouse in the heart of Little Italy, liberal. While at TrinityCollege, a Catholic
her airy office on the second floor of the a blue collar community near Baltimore’s women’s school in D.C. now known
Capitol, Pelosi picked up the phone and industrial waterfront. The house appears as Trinity Washington University, she
set to the job of holding her fractious vacant now; Pelosi points it out to me as attended John F. Kennedy’s Inauguration
party together. we drive by. (We had planned to take a and was swept off her feet. “Forget movie
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