Farewell the most powerful woman in US politics ever

The day representative Nancy D’Alesandro Pelosi, became leader of the House Democratic caucus, the song at the top of Billboard’s Hot 100 chart was Eminem’s Lose Yourself”.

- ANDREW FEINBERG

The president of the United States was George Walker Bush, the US was executing one invasion in Afghanistan and gearing up to launch a second invasion in Iraq. And the site where the World Trade Centre once stood was still a rubble-filled hole in the ground.

Ms Pelosi, the daughter of a former mayor of Baltimore, Maryland, and the sister of another former mayor, had spent most of her adult life in San Francisco with her husband, Paul Pelosi, before being elected to the House in 1987.

On Thursday 17 November, she announced that she would step down from her post as Democratic leader after Republicans secured a majority in the House of Representatives by a slim majority. Ms. Pelosi will continue to serve in Congress.

House Democrats elected her as the caucus whip the No 2 position in the party in late 2001. They chose her to lead the caucus after the 2002 midterm elections when the Republican Party defied historical trends by gaining seats and retaining control of the House despite having control of the White House.

She took her place atop the House Democrats on 3 January 2003 and for the next two decades Ms Pelosi would maintain an iron grip on her caucus through thick and thin.

Ms Pelosi became the first and thus far the only woman to lead either party in the House or Senate and would become the first woman to serve as speaker of the House just three years later after leading Democrats to massive gains in the 2006 midterm elections.

From 2007 to 2011 - and again from 2019, she presided over a string of Democratic victories that advanced long-held priorities for the party and cemented her status as the most powerful woman ever to serve in American politics to date.

Healthcare