Spoiler

This troublemaker with a gavel is the highest-ranking female elected official in the nation’s history and, on Thursday, Pelosi will also mark a personal milestone: her 80th birthday. Fittingly, it comes at the end of Women’s History Month. Just as appropriately, Pelosi will be marking it by attempting a huge, complicated and vitally important legislative lift — marshaling support for a massive spending bill to blunt the impact of the coronavirus. Click to expand... Click to shrink...

A few days after Trump’s inauguration, his combative chief strategist Stephen K. Bannon took the measure of the then-House minority leader at a meeting in the White House dining room. Trump had begun the session by repeating his fantastical claim that he would have won the popular vote in 2016 had it not been for millions of fraudulent ballots cast on Hillary Clinton’s behalf.



“There’s no evidence to support what you just said,” Pelosi said sharply. “And if we’re going to work together, we have to stipulate to a certain set of facts.”



“She’s going to get us,” Bannon whispered to colleagues. “Total assassin. She’s a total assassin.” Click to expand... Click to shrink...

In 2007, Nancy Pelosi made history.As the first female Speaker of the House, she presided over the most productive Congress since the Great Society. She passed a public option; a cap-and-trade bill; ended Don't Ask, Don't Tell; enshrined hate-crime protections for the LGBT community; and passed a bailout and stimulus to. President Obama's achievements wouldn't have materialized without her legislative acumen and uncanny vote-counting abilities. She had no shutdowns, no rogue members showing their asses and holding her hostage - just good, solid legislating.Even in the minority, she's demonstrated her skill, providing votes when ineffectual GOP Speakers (redundant) would have us default on the debt and enter an economic meltdown. In the first two years of Trump's presidency, she capitalized upon GOP divisions and got a number of liberal priorities included in an omnibus bill: increased funding for the arts, permission for the CDC to study gun violence, etc. Moreover, she ensured that not a single Democrat voted for the ACA repeal or Republican tax scam, maintaining party unity in the face of regressive legislation.These achievements represent only a fraction of a storied career dedicated to progressive causes. Elected in 1987, she came to Congress intent on fighting AIDS and supporting LGBT people in- and outside her district:She opposed normalizing trade relations with China because of its egregious human rights abuses and evenShe opposed the Defense of Marriage Act, the Iraq War, and ICE.On the backbenches and in the highest echelon of leadership, she has striven to improve the lives of vulnerable people in this country and to pass the most progressive policy possible.Now, in her second act as Speaker, she's gone even farther:Not only has she spearheaded another raft of progressive legislation (albeit stymied by an evil Republican Senate) - the Equality Act, the Paycheck Fairness Act, universal background checks - she has also endeavored to check and defeat a lawless president. Since January 2019, Pelosi has been a thorn in Trump's side personally and legislatively. She routinely outmaneuvers Trump and McConnell in negotiations; she keeps her diverse, sometimes unruly caucus unified, even on grave matters such as impeachment; and she refuses to allow Trump's lies and distortions to pass unchallenged.Quite a comeback for someone whose return to the Speakership was declared unlikely time and time again , no?In short, she has become a leader for this moment. Does she always get it perfectly right? No. Has it taken some adjustment? Yes. But she continues to be a competent public servant who genuinely tries to help the American people - the complete antithesis of Trump and Trumpism. Moreover, her rise has set an example for all women, telling them that theyrise to the highest echelons in government, that theyshape public policy, that theyoutsmart and outwork any dumbass man.Happy birthday, Madam Speaker. May she keep her majority this November.