“We are four weeks away from electing the first woman president. I have no doubt,” U.S. House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi told a packed house at the University of Minnesota Humphrey School of Public Affairs. She said if the election were held today Democrats would “win it all” — the House, the Senate and the Presidency. However, she said that 28 days in American electoral politics is “an eternity.”
Pelosi was interviewed by Professor Larry Jacobs who also asked her questions submitted by the audience. Pelosi told Jacobs that while electing a Democratic majority to congress would solve the problem of gridlock, she said Republicans have not always been so obstructionist. She pointed to past cooperation and compromise between the parties and presidents from both parties on immigration reform. “What’s happening in Congress is not dysfunction; it’s obstruction.”
Public support and public pressure on congress is what can also break that gridlock. She pointed to the first Republican president, Abraham Lincoln, who had to build public consensus before he could end slavery.
Pelosi is convinced that America will continue to elect more women to congress and mentioned that she expected two of those women to be DFL candidates Angie Craig in Minnesota’s second congressional district and Terri Bonoff in Minnesota’s third congressional district. Both races are expected to be close this November.
Asked if she thought more women in positions of power would help heal the rift in American politics, Pelosi said “We’ll soon find out” when Hillary Clinton is elected president.
Former Vice President Walter Mondale who spoke before Pelosi agreed. “I think I know who is going to win and she’ll be a good president.”
The Humphrey school has also extended an invitation to House Speaker Paul Ryan to come and speak.
