It’s no secret that Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) was one of the major people involved in pushing Joe Biden out of the race. They thought if they shoved him aside and swapped in someone else — Vice President Kamala Harris, as it turned out — they’d be increasing their chances. But they lost anyway when karma came back to haunt them.
But Joe and Jill Biden were not happy about what went down or with what Pelosi did. Nancy had been trying to reach out to Joe, but he’d blown off any real reconciliation effort. Jill indicated publicly how ticked off they were, saying they had been friends for fifty years, saying she was “disappointed,” and adding that she learned something about “human nature.” Ooofa.
READ MORE: Et Tu, Nancy? Jill Biden Laments Pelosi’s Betrayal, Death of Their 50-Year Friendship
Now there’s more to the saga, and it says something else about human nature.
Since breaking her hip in Europe last month, Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi has been deluged with messages, flowers and calls of concern from heads of state, colleagues in both parties and even royalty, most notably Luxembourg’s Grand Duke Henri, who was hosting her when she fell and has been solicitous through her recovery.
Yet it’s who she has not heard from that’s most remarkable, and that has infuriated Pelosi’s friends and family: Joe and Jill Biden.
Yes, Pelosi threw them under the bus, and now they’re blowing off her serious injury. That might have been the time to come together to repair the relationship. But it shows you how angry both Joe and Jill are about what Pelosi did that they’re not reaching out.
And that’s not sitting well with the Pelosi family, especially daughter Alexandra Pelosi. What she had to say was raw and not holding back.
“If I was Lady McBiden, I’d put on my big girl pants, play the long game and think about my husband’s legacy,” Alexandra Pelosi, the former speaker’s daughter, told me Saturday. “There aren’t that many people left in America who have something nice to say about Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi is one of them.” The younger Pelosi made clear she was speaking only for herself.
Oh, my. I think it’s fair to say that might just put a final fork in the Pelosi-Biden friendship. It doesn’t sound like the Pelosi clan thinks Joe Biden should be on Mount Rushmore anymore. But it also shows how Democrats are thinking about Jill, although they wouldn’t generally say it. “Lady McBiden” is quite the shot, let alone “big girl pants.” That’s the description that confirms she’s the power behind the scene. She’s also saying Jill can’t handle losing. Alexandra is right that the Bidens have pretty much tanked any positive legacy that Joe might have had.
There was one other funny element in the report.
When I asked a longtime Biden adviser this week why he was so consumed with anger toward Pelosi and not, say, Barack Obama, the adviser said the president took it personally with Pelosi because they had a kinship whereas he had long recognized his Obama relationship was but a political arrangement.
So much for the “bromance” they tried to sell. That was always nonsense.
The White House isn’t talking in response to this latest drama. But it’s another indication of how lost they are at this point when they’re circling the drain and attacking each other like this. All their machinations have imploded in on themselves—and it couldn’t happen to more deserving people.
