By Frank Holmes, reporter
Mark the date on your calendar: the last day of the 117th Congress
According to one of the most authoritative newspapers in the country, it will be the last time you’ll see Nancy Pelosi inside the Capitol.
The Democratic Speaker of the House will hang up the gavel and go back to San Francisco, according to D.C. insiders.
It has been speculated for months. But now, even The Washington Post said that Pelosi is largely “expected” to retire from leadership at the end of this term regardless of how the 2022 midterm elections come out.
Many of her fellow Democrats say it hasn’t come a moment too soon.
Pelosi has been the leader of the House Democrats for nearly 20 years, and she’s been slowly losing her grasp on her members for years.
The change really came to the fore when Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., was elected… and the first thing she did was lead a far-Left protest inside Pelosi’s office.
Things haven’t gotten much better, as AOC and “The Squad” have dragged every member of the House Democratic caucus so far to the Left that many Democrats now consider Pelosi — who was always thought of as an ultra-liberal — as an old school centrist.
“It’s the effing progressives,” a moderate Democrat told Fox News last year, saying the far-Left House members were demanding “unreasonable things” from everybody else.
But the socialists inside the House shouldn’t count on Pelosi stepping down immediately. While she’s promised to quit as House speaker next year, she’s been all over the place on the topic of re-election.
When Pelosi’s role as Democratic leader seemed threatened before Democrats retook control of the House in 2018, Pelosi cut a deal to sure up her support: She would adopt a three-term limit for leaders. Under the plan, she could only run for a fourth term as House leader if two-thirds of Democrats gave the OK. And the plan was retroactive, to include her two terms as House Speaker under Presidents George W. Bush and President Barack Obama from 2007 to 2011.
“I am comfortable with the proposal and it is my intention to abide by it whether it passes or not,” Pelosi promised.
As recently as late 2020, she promised to keep her promise to her fellow House Democrats.
Then the time to step down got close, and things got fuzzy.
Last October, when a reporter asked if she planned to keep her promise to retire in 2023, Pelosi stoked controversy by refusing to answer.
“Why would I tell you that now?” a testy and defensive Nancy Pelosi asked the reporter. “Probably I would have that conversation with my family first, if you don’t mind.”
Pelosi announced last month that she plans to run for reelection to the House in 2022—and she’d almost certainly want to stay on as leader of the House Democrats at the age of 82.
Republicans are expected to win a landslide in the 2022 midterms. Many D.C. analysts say Pelosi wouldn’t want to stay around Washington and take the blame for the drubbing that lies in store.
Others say she’s bluffing; she doesn’t want to be seen as a lame duck and is running to increase her leverage for the next year.
But many believe she’s going to retire, just like almost two dozen other House Democrats.
The Washington Post even went so far as to begin picking successors to Pelosi in the top spot in the House. Some people who may want to take up her position as the leader of House Democrats include Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., Majority Whip James Clyburn. D-S.C.; Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif.; and Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y.
The leader of the House’s left-wing members, the House Progressive Caucus chair Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., may also run, just to express their power to the rest of the party.
Whoever is elected, House progressives have no intention of taking a step backward. But if Nancy Pelosi finally gives up the gavel and goes home to her commercial-grade freezer full of ice cream, America just might take a huge step forward.
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Frank Holmes is a veteran journalist and an outspoken conservative that talks about the news that was in his weekly article, “On The Holmes Front.”