Daily Broadside | The Ugly Truth About Speaker Pelosi

Daily Verse | Romans 11:25-26
Israel has experienced a hardening in part until the full number of the Gentiles has come in.

Monday’s Reading: Romans 12-16

Last week Nancy Pelosi announced that she will not seek re-election to leadership among the Democrat caucus. She’s led the Dems since 2003 and was the first female Speaker in U.S. history. She held the gavel from 2007-2011 and then again from 2019 until now.

“And with great confidence in our caucus, I will not seek reelection to Democratic leadership in the next Congress,” she said. “For me, the hour has come for a new generation to lead the Democratic caucus that I so deeply respect, and I’m grateful that so many are ready and willing to shoulder this awesome responsibility.”

While she’s achieved some historic accomplishments, I say “good riddance.” The defining moment of her “leadership” for me came during Trump’s 2020 State of the Union speech, when she methodically ripped up her copy of his speech while still on the podium after Trump had concluded his speech.

In that moment she disgraced her position of power and allowed whatever personal animus she had toward Trump to express itself publicly. Instead of the decorum the office deserved, she used the occasion to deliver a moment of ugly disrespect to both Trump and the millions of Americans who supported him.

It was childish, boorish and beneath the dignity of her office. It was also par for the course. She led two highly politicized efforts to oust him via impeachment, both of which failed. Her intent to smear him was evident when she said, “He just got impeached. He’ll be impeached for ever. No matter what the Senate does. He’s impeached for ever because he violated our constitution.”

Whatever personal vendetta she had, she had no right to use the political power she was entrusted with to persecute Trump.

Lots of people praise Pelosi for her tenure as speaker. I don’t. She was and is a disgraceful partisan hack who did more damage to the American political institution than any speaker before her.

She deserved to be gone long before now.

Good riddance.