(AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez)
First Lady Jill Biden reflected bitterly on the pivotal role former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) played in removing her husband from the top of the Democratic Party’s 2024 ticket in a new interview with The Washington Post.
After President Joe Biden’s disastrous performance in his debate with Donald Trump last June, Pelosi worked subtly in public — and tirelessly behind the scenes — to get Biden to step aside.
In her interview with the Post, the First Lady reflected bitterly on Pelosi’s betrayal.
“Let’s just say I was disappointed with how it unfolded,” said Biden about her husband’s sidelining. “I learned a lot about human nature.”
Asked specifically about Pelosi, Biden said “I’ve been thinking a lot about relationships.”
“It’s been on my mind a lot lately, and-” she continued. “We were friends for 50 years. It was disappointing.”
After Biden’s replacement, Vice President Kamala Harris, was defeated by Trump in November, Pelosi rubbed salt in Biden’s wounds.
“Had the president gotten out sooner, there may have been other candidates in the race. The anticipation was that, if the president were to step aside, that there would be an open primary,” Pelosi told The New York Times. “And as I say, Kamala may have, I think she would have done well in that and been stronger going forward. But we don’t know that. That didn’t happen. We live with what happened. And because the president endorsed Kamala Harris immediately, that really made it almost impossible to have a primary at that time. If it had been much earlier, it would have been different.”
In another interview with The New Yorker, Pelosi said that she had “never been that impressed with his [Biden’s] political operation.”
“They won the White House. Bravo. But my concern was: this ain’t happening, and we have to make a decision for this to happen. The President has to make the decision for that to happen,” she added.
