Returning to speaker’s role may be challenge for Pelosi

NANCY Pelosi wants to be House speaker again. Far from certain is whether enough of her fellow Democrats want the same. We could find out later this year.

Pelosi, D-Calif., has been in Congress since 1987 and by any measure is a highly skilled politician who’s an expert at raising money for the party. These are prized traits in Washington. Yet she is also 78, and has already had a four-year run as speaker that brought us the Affordable Care Act.

Republicans won control of the House in 2011, with Pelosi serving as minority leader since then. Democrats are looking to assume control once again by winning a net of 23 seats during November’s midterm elections. The Cook Political Report rates 84 seats now held by Republicans as competitive — clearly, a changeover is possible.

But it’s also possible Pelosi’s quest to return to the speaker’s chair may hurt the party’s chances. Only 21 percent of voters had a favorable view of Pelosi in a March poll by NBC News and The Wall Street Journal; 43 percent had a negative view. That same month, Democrat Conor Lamb won a special House election in Pennsylvania after saying he wouldn’t support Pelosi as speaker. The Journal noted this week that about a dozen Democrats in Congress have said they wouldn’t support her, and many Democratic House candidates aren’t saying anything about Pelosi.

The spokesman for the National Republican Congressional Committee, Jesse Hunt, said Pelosi is “the most unpopular politician in America” and Republicans hope she campaigns in competitive races this year. You’d expect that from the opposing party, although criticism of Pelosi is coming from Democratic-leaning voices as well.

In an April 29 column for The Hill, pollster Douglas Schoen said Democrats appear poised to make midterm gains but, “First and foremost, the Democrats must promote fresh faces and elevate new leadership.” (Pelosi’s team includes Rep. Steny Hoyer of Maryland, who is 78, and Rep. Jim Clyburn of South Carolina, who is 77.)

While Lamb was running for the House, CNN’s Bakari Sellers, a former Democratic legislator in South Carolina, said Democratic leadership was “old and stale” and needed a change. He mentioned Pelosi along with former Vice President Joe Biden and Sens. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, the youngest of whom is 68.

Sellers applauded the work Pelosi has done during her career, but said a succession plan is needed to allow younger members of the Democratic Party the opportunity to assume leadership roles.

Schoen echoed those sentiments. Democrats, he wrote, “can either continue to campaign under the banner of ‘resistance,’ using similar faces, messages and policies that proved so uninspiring in 2016, or they can present the American people with a new generation of leaders and a new slate of ideas.”

Pelosi clearly falls into the former category, not the latter, which could put her on shaky ground if House Democrats emerge victorious in November.