Page 37 - Time Magazine, Sep. 17, 2018

2001 2010
Pelosi ascends to Pelosi is instrumental
congressional leadership in the passage of the
when she’s elected Affordable Care Act, at
Democratic whip by her one point demanding the
colleagues in a hard- White House not give
fought internal battle up the fight for universal
against Rep. Steny Hoyer health care

1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 2015 2020

2006 2018
Democrats take back the Pelosi spends eight
House on a wave of public hours speaking
anger at the war in Iraq, continuously on the
which Pelosi opposed; she House floor about the
becomes the first female need for immigration
Speaker of the House relief for Dreamers

She spent the whole time running a hard- stituents who were losing their homes,” ties that died in the Senate, including a
fought race against Representative Steny says John Lawrence, Pelosi’s chief of staff union-boosting measure and climate leg-
Hoyer of Maryland, who had known Pe- at the time. The bailout passed the House islation. Her unruly caucus spanned the
losi since her college days. Pelosi was ac- with the support of 172 Democrats and 91 ideological spectrum, from Blue Dog con-
cused of threatening to punish an unsup- Republicans. servatives to far-left ideologues, but Pe-
portive colleague by getting her district In this and other legislative jams, Pe- losi never lost a major vote. “I was in those
redrawn. Hoyer eventually became Pe- losi’s strategy was persistence, persua- rooms when people were saying, ‘Let’s
losi’s No. 2 and a committed frenemy—a sion and an encyclopedic knowledge of just throw in the towel,’ and she’d say,
situation House Democrats describe as a her caucus: what they wanted and what ‘Give me the names and leave me alone
long-running cold war. they feared. The night before a big vote, for a minute,’” says George Miller, a re-
During the George W. Bush years, Pe- she and her staff would pore over the list tired California Congressman.
losi was a vociferous critic. She was the of uncommitted members, figuring out The crowning achievement of Pelosi’s
most prominent Democrat to oppose the who could be swayed and how. “Invari- career was health care reform. Democratic
war in Iraq from the start, believing the ably, she’d get to the bottom of the list and Presidents had been pursuing universal
intelligence wasn’t solid. In 2006, buoyed go back to the top and start over,” says health care since the New Deal. Pelosi
by an electorate that had come around to Lawrence, “which was not very appeal- helped craft the House version of the Af-
Pelosi’s antiwar position, the Democrats ing at 2 a.m.” fordable Care Act. The trickiest part was
won the House, and Pelosi became Amer- When Barack Obama won in 2008, balancing regional interests, particularly
ica’s first female Speaker. Democrats had their chance to put in setting Medicare and Medicaid reim-
Then, at the height of the 2008 cam- roughly a decade’s worth of pent-up ideas bursement rates, which vary by jurisdic-
paign, the economy collapsed. On the af- into practice. They enacted fair pay for tion. Atone point,Pelosi andothersrecall,
ternoon of Sept.18, Pelosi called Treasury women, college aid and the stimulus, an aide told her there were 67 members
Secretary Henry Paulson and suggested which included a raft of anti-poverty ef- who hadn’t committed to vote for the
they meet with congressional leaders the forts. Pelosi’s House passed other priori- bill and asked how they should split up
next day. But Paulson said it couldn’t wait the work of persuading them. “Give me
that long. That evening, the Republican the list,” Pelosi said, and she made calls
and Democratic leaders of the House and PELOSI’S through the night.
Senate met in Pelosi’s conference room Pelosi also knew when people didn’t
with Paulson, Federal Reserve Chairman want to hear from her and could find other
Ben Bernanke, Securities and Exchange STRATEGY IS buttons to push. To win the vote of Joe
Commission chairman Chris Cox and Donnelly, a conservative Indiana Demo-
White House representatives. PERSISTEN CE, crat who is now in the Senate, she got the
There were just six weeks until the former president of Notre Dame to appeal
election, and it was clear that the bailout PERSUA SION to his Catholic conscience. Zack Space,
Bernanke and Paulson were asking for a Greek-American former Congressman
would be extremely unpopular. House AND AN from Ohio, started getting calls from the
Republican leader John Boehner couldn’t Greek-American donor community when
deliver the 100 votes he had promised. So EN CYCLOPEDIC Pelosi wanted to apply pressure on a dif-
Pelosi went back to her people and begged ferent measure. “She could hear frequen-
for more support. “She had to go to the KN OWLEDGE cies from the caucus that weren’t audible
Democratic caucus and convince them to to others,” says former New York Con-
give a $700 billion bailout to the most un- OF HER gressman Steve Israel.
popular human beings on the face of the In January 2010, Democrats lost the
earth, then go home and face their con- CAUCUS Massachusetts Senate seat vacated by the
29