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Nancy Pelosi tells us how she really feels

The former House speaker on the midterms, Trump, and democracy.

Nancy Pelosi’s record of impact is undeniable. Over more than three decades in Congress, the San Francisco juggernaut is frequently cited among the effective legislative operators of her generation — the person who held together the votes for the Affordable Care Act, who twice ascended to the House speaker’s chair, and who built a fundraising machine that reshaped how her party competes.

Last week, at the SXSW conference in Austin, Texas, I spoke with Pelosi about that record. In front of a packed crowd of innovators at the Vox Media Podcast Stage, I asked Pelosi about key moments in her career, her unshakable faith in the American electorate, and the outlook for November’s midterm elections.

Pelosi is preparing to leave Congress at the end of this term, and it comes at a time of profound uncertainty for the Democratic Party. Republicans control the White House. Her party’s polling favorability has reached historic lows, and a once solid liberal majority seems to be fraying on lines of age, race, and class. There’s no consensus about what went wrong or who should lead next.

Regardless, Pelosi told me she has absolute confidence that Democrats will take back the House this year. And it’s hard to argue with such a legendary vote counter. Below is an excerpt of our conversation, edited for length and clarity. There’s much more in the full episode, so listen to Today, Explained wherever you get podcasts, including Apple Podcasts, Pandora, and Spotify.

You’ve been called the most effective speaker in history. I wanted to know, what is the skill or trait that you think made you so effective?

The thing about it is that when you’re a legislator, you have one, shall we say, dynamic at work. You have hearings, you have public comment, you do all those things, and so you have time to make a decision. When you become the speaker or the governor or the mayor or whatever — the executive position — you then have to act.

The reason you have to act is because if you don’t act immediately, people think, “Oh, she’s gonna think about........

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