PASSING THE BATON — After tracing her self-described journey from “housemaker to House Speaker,” Rep. Nancy Pelosi stepped down today from her post after Democrats officially lost their majority. First elected in a 1987 special election, the California congresswoman spent the last 20 years leading the Democratic House caucus. She became the first woman speaker in U.S. history after the 2006 midterm election, and held the speakership until Republicans took back the House in 2010.
When Democrats won control of the House again in 2018, Pelosi regained the speaker’s gavel but promised to step away after 2022. It’s been an eventful second tour of duty: Pelosi has presided over two impeachments of former President Donald Trump, ushered members back to the floor after an armed insurrection in the Capitol and watched her husband land in the hospital after an attacker, who had targeted her, assaulted him in their San Francisco home.
Over the last two years, Pelosi, 82, has been forced to operate with a relatively slim Democratic majority, constantly trying to find the votes needed to pass legislation in the 435-seat House. She would repeat the mantra “if you don’t have 218 people, we’re just having a conversation,” according to John Lawrence, Pelosi’s chief of staff for eight years and author of the recently published Arc of Power: Inside Nancy Pelosi’s Speakership, 2005-2010.
The transition to a Republican majority will also see Pelosi lieutenants Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) and Rep. James Clyburn (D-S.C.) step down from their top leadership positions, with 52-year-old Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) seemingly poised to take over as minority leader. Together, the changes mark a dramatic generational shift of power from the current team of octogenarians. “The hour has come for a new generation to lead,” Pelosi said today in her remarks to the House.
Republicans, who will have a narrow majority, now have to figure out their own leadership. Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy was nominated Tuesday by House Republicans to serve as speaker but faced 31 defections, a sign of resistance from the hard-line House Freedom Caucus. To win the speakership, McCarthy needs to be elected by a majority of all House members who vote on Jan. 3.
Nightly called Lawrence to discuss Pelosi’s legacy and the tumult in House leadership. This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
How do you think Speaker Pelosi’s departure from leadership will affect the Democratic caucus?
I think she likely feels that the Democratic caucus now has in place a number of younger, more diverse, but highly experienced members who have won the support of caucus members in elections. I think she’s encouraged that there is a team of people who are ready to step up and be successful.
So why has she decided to remain a member, but give up her leadership position?
I learned a long time ago not to speak for her. But she has a deep and abiding commitment to the House of Representatives and to the legislative branch as a co-equal branch of government, and to her constituents and the role that she plays in representing them in that legislative branch. I think that, as she said on the floor, she has the capacity to continue to be an effective member for constituents and a valuable asset for the party in the House. She carried the enormous burden of leadership for longer than anyone but Sam Rayburn as leader of a party. And that’s a long, long time. And it’s a lot of pressure.
What will be the differences in Democratic leadership now, with new people stepping up?
You need to work diligently to find common ground within the caucus, which she was able to do over a very long period of time. She knew the members of the caucus. I always say that she followed the political philosophy of the great English political theorist Mick Jagger, “You don’t always get what you want, but you get what you need.” She could figure out what people needed better than most people. It remains to be seen, but hopefully the next people learn those lessons.
What made her a good leader in your mind?
Well, her caucus selected her every two years. She earned that vote of trust every two years. She did so because people in the caucus were confident that they would have a fair opportunity to influence the legislation and strategy, that they were being heard and that the needs of their constituents were being heard. It’s hard to be an effective leader if you don’t have that trust — we saw that in the problems [former GOP Speaker John] Boehner had with his conference.
How does a new leader, from either party, build that trust?
You have to listen to the members. The members do not give you power, the members give you authority to act on their behalf. And if you don’t have the members believing that you’re acting in their best interest, it is very difficult to govern the House of Representatives. Rep. Pelosi was willing — I saw this far too many times to count — to take a phone call at one o’clock in the morning or two o’clock in the morning when members insist they must talk to her. That’s how you build loyalty, and there’s no shortcut to doing that.
Members these days are much more independent, but they need the party leadership — you can’t have people going off in all different directions. As she always says, if you don’t have 218 people, we’re just having a conversation. You have to figure out how to get to 218. There are challenges with new people who want to come in and promote themselves, you know it’s not unheard of for a politician to want to promote themselves. Good leadership can help a candidate become part of a governing caucus.
I have a lot of trepidation about whether Republicans will be able to do that, because even when we had 245 members or something in 2009-2010, we still only passed the Affordable Care Act by three votes. I have concerns about whether, with two or three votes to spare, McCarthy is going to be able to produce the 218 votes, whether he’ll be a strong enough leader and have loyalty from his conference.
Welcome to POLITICO Nightly. Reach out with news, tips and ideas at [email protected]. Or contact tonight’s author at [email protected] or on Twitter at @calder_mchugh.
While final vote counts are still being tallied in some states, scores of newly elected members of Congress are descending on Washington, attending new member initiations, touring the Capitol and getting a crash course in the functions of their new jobs after months of campaigning. At Nightly, we’ll also be conducting a crash course before they are sworn in on Jan. 3 — on rising stars to watch and other congressional issues and trends to follow.
HUNTING HUNTER — Now that they’ve taken the majority at last, House Republicans made it explicit today: Their long-simmering investigation into Hunter Biden investigation is really about his father, writes Jordain Carney.
“I want to be clear: This is an investigation of Joe Biden, and that’s where the committee will focus in the next Congress,” said incoming Oversight Chair James Comer (R-Ky.), who’s seen as the party’s leading player in Hunter Biden oversight.
Comer and others haven’t been shy about their efforts being a probe in search of a problem — a hunt for a smoking gun that would provide a still-unproven direct link between Joe Biden’s decisions as vice president or president and his son’s business dealings. But the public rollout of those plans, one day after Republicans officially won the House in the midterm elections, shows where a GOP facing partisan gridlock will focus much of its attention for the next two years.
House Republicans kick-started the push today by doubling down on document requests to a flurry of agencies and releasing an interim report that skirted around the lack of evidence implicating the president. It said Biden “misused his public position” to benefit his family financially and “created the potential” that he could be influenced.
‘WOKE’ WALL STREET — Wall Street loves Republican tax cuts and deregulation. It’s going to hate the GOP’s plans for 2023, write Zachary Warmbrodt and Sam Sutton.
Republican lawmakers, who will be in the House majority come January, are pressing party leaders to send a message to big financial firms: Stop appeasing the left with “woke” business practices, keep financing fossil fuels and cut ties with China. Republicans will have committee gavels and subpoena powers to back that up.
GOP lawmakers are singling out major asset managers and their Washington trade groups as targets because of climate investing practices they see as hostile to oil, gas and coal. Some Republicans want to continue hauling in big bank CEOs to publicly testify — a tradition established by liberal Democrats. GOP senators are already demanding that law firms preserve documents related to how they advise clients on environmental and social initiatives, signaling a potential investigation. Wall Street firms and Washington lobbyists are preparing for subpoenas.
THE APPRENTICES — Multiple new members of Congress have some previous experience on the Hill, as congressional staffers. The staffers-turned-members include: Alabama Senator-elect Katie Britt, who won big in the general election to succeed retiring Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) and had served as Shelby’s chief of staff from 2016 to 2018; Representative-elect Daniel Goldman (D-N.Y.), who served as the senior adviser and director of investigations for the House Intelligence Committee; and Representative-elect Zach Nunn (R-Iowa), who served as part of Sen. Chuck Grassley’s (R-Iowa) legislative staff way back in 2004.
— Bass promises quick action on homelessness in first remarks since winning LA mayor race: Rep. Karen Bass (D-Calif.) promised quick action on homelessness and had kind words for her billionaire opponent in her first public remarks since winning the most expensive mayor’s race in Los Angeles history. The congresswoman pledged to tackle the large numbers of people living on the streets — a major theme of both her campaign and that of her opponent, developer Rick Caruso. She said her first priority upon taking office next month will be to declare a state of emergency over homelessness, which rose during the pandemic, and tap into city, state and federal resources to expand assistance and build housing.
— Trump Org. cleaned up illegal practices when Trump became president, ex-CFO testifies: The Trump Organization engaged in an effort to clean up its act and stop fraudulent tax practices to avoid scrutiny when Donald Trump became president, the company’s former chief financial officer told a jury today. Allen Weisselberg, a longtime top executive at the Trump Organization, took the stand for his second day of testimony at the company’s criminal tax fraud trial in state Supreme Court in Manhattan.
— Dem organizing groups to donors: 2024 is already here: A trio of prominent Democratic groups primarily focused on organizing in down-ballot races has an urgent message for donors: 2024 has already arrived. Leaders from Arena, Run for Something and Sister District — all of which were founded in the wake of Trump’s election in 2016 — told donors on a call earlier this week that the party must start investing money now in preparation for a slate of non-presidential elections also coming up in 2024, from state legislative races to campaigns for positions administering local elections.
— Biden will ask Supreme Court to revive student debt relief plan: The Biden administration will ask the Supreme Court to revive its student debt relief program as it fights to reverse lower court rulings that have upended its plans to forgive up to $20,000 of debt for tens of millions of Americans. The Justice Department said in a court filing today that it planned to ask the Supreme Court to reverse an injunction issued earlier this week by the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals that prohibits the administration from carrying out student debt relief.
— Man with ax, sword asked to enter New York Times newsroom, police say: A man with an ax and a sword went into the lobby of the New York Times building today and asked to speak to the political section, authorities said, then handed over his weapons and waited for emergency personnel when he was denied entry. The New York Police Department said officers responded to the Times’ building in midtown Manhattan shortly after noon after getting a 911 call about a man with a knife. He was taken to the hospital for evaluation.
TWITTER IN TURMOIL — After Elon Musk bought Twitter — and fired almost anyone whose job it was to deal with regulators — the social networking giant is now facing a flood of legal challenges across the European Union, write Mark Scott, Vincent Manancourt, Laura Kayali, Clothilde Goujard and Louis Westendarp.
The question now is whether the EU’s watchdogs can live up to their ambitions to be the world’s digital policemen.
Ireland’s privacy regulator wants to know whether the company’s data protection standards are good enough. The European Commission doesn’t know who to ask about its upcoming online content rules. The bloc’s cybersecurity agencies raise concerns about an increase in online trolls and potential security risks.
Twitter’s unfolding turmoil is precisely the regulatory challenge that Brussels has said it wants to take on. The 27-country bloc has positioned itself — via a flurry of privacy, content and digital competition rules — as the de facto enforcer for the Western world, expanding its digital rulebook beyond the EU’s borders and urging other countries to follow its lead.
Now, the world’s richest man is putting those enforcement powers to the test.
SOBER UP — If your New Year’s plans were to stay in and watch CNN hosts get tipsy, you’re out of luck. According to reporting from Brian Steinberg in Variety, as part of CNN’s makeover, viewers are not going to be treated (or subjected) to hosts drinking in the wee hours on camera during the New Year’s Eve broadcast. Not all hope is lost for lovers of drunk TV, however, as Anderson Cooper and Andy Cohen will reportedly still be permitted to imbibe from Times Square.
Did someone forward this email to you? Sign up here.
