Presidential historian Douglas Brinkley joined CNN Inside Politics John King on Friday to talk about Nancy Pelosi’s place in history. As Brinkley tells it, Pelosi is the most significant Speaker in American history because she helped pass liberal legislation, mainly Obamacare.
King began by asking, “Nancy Pelosi's place in history will be what?,” Brinkley got straight to the point, “It's large. I think she's maybe the most important Speaker of the House in American history.”
After running through some of the other contenders, Brinkley gave his reasoning, “Nancy Pelosi has a legacy that is so large not just for shattering the glass ceiling of being a woman but I think the Affordable Care Act.”
Brinkley was not content to just label Obamacare as a significant piece of legislation, but had to qualify that it was good legislation as well, “I mean, that really has provided so many people with the ability to pay for operations, surgical procedures, saved lives, and Obama and Harry Reid say it couldn't be done without Nancy Pelosi. That's a big feather in her cap and John, I don't think she's going away.”
Concluding his thoughts on Pelosi, Brinkley was grateful that, “She's going to be in the temple, as she calls it, the Capitol, and like John Lewis who stayed as an icon in the -- in Congress until the very end, she will be there instructing these new generation of elected officials in the Democratic Party on what to do, how to do procedures. She’s now the grand leader of the Democratic Party and she’s not going away, she’ll be a big asset for these freshmen congressmen and women of this entering class.”
The two then shifted to Brinkley’s new book about the history of the environmental movement but, like Obamacare, you will have a difficult time reading it ahead of time and will have to buy it to find out what is in it.
This segment was sponsored by Sleep Number.
Here is a transcript for the November 18 show:
CNN Inside Politics with John King
11/18/2022
12:51 PM ET
JOHN KING: But, first, Nancy Pelosi's place in history will be what?
DOUGLAS BRINKLEY: It's large. I think she's maybe the most important Speaker of the House in American history. Now, some like James K. Polk, he used the speakership to become president, in the 20th century you had people like Joseph Canon during the Theodore Roosevelt-Taft era who loom large, Republican from Indiana.
Sam Rayburn’s often talked about as one of the greats during Eisenhower and Kennedy and Tip O’Neill due to his friendship with Ronald Reagan is epic stuff, but Nancy Pelosi has a legacy that is so large not just for shattering the glass ceiling of being a woman but I think the Affordable Care Act.
I mean, that really has provided so many people with the ability to pay for operations, surgical procedures, saved lives, and Obama and Harry Reid say it couldn't be done without Nancy Pelosi. That's a big feather in her cap and John, I don't think she's going away.
She's going to be in the temple, as she calls it, the Capitol, and like John Lewis who stayed as an icon in the -- in Congress until the very end, she will be there instructing these new generation of elected officials in the Democratic Party on what to do, how to do procedures. She’s now the grand leader of the Democratic Party and she’s not going away, she’ll be a big asset for these freshmen congressmen and women of this entering class.
