For Pelosi, Feinstein and Boxer, D.C. is now a bleak landscape

Sen. Harry Reid (left), D-Nev., will likely relinquish the majority leader post to Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., while Rep. John Boehner, R-Ohio, will retain the House speakership he rested from Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco, in 2012. less Sen. Harry Reid (left), D-Nev., will likely relinquish the majority leader post to Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., while Rep. John Boehner, R-Ohio, will retain the House speakership he rested from Nancy Pelosi, D-San ... more Photo: J. Scott Applewhite / Associated Press Photo: J. Scott Applewhite / Associated Press Image 1 of / 3 Caption Close For Pelosi, Feinstein and Boxer, D.C. is now a bleak landscape 1 / 3 Back to Gallery

California’s top three Democrats in Washington — all of them older than 70 and all with outsized influence on national policy that took decades to achieve — woke up Wednesday to crippled prospects and questions about their future in politics.

With the Republicans’ Senate takeover, Sen. Barbara Boxer, who turns 74 this month and must decide whether to run for re-election in two years, will hand the helm of the environment committee to outspoken climate-science denier Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, 81, must relinquish the gavel of the Intelligence Committee, where she became a national heavyweight on defense policy and oversaw a years-long investigation into torture under the Bush administration that has yet to be made public.

But the stakes may be highest for former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, 74, of San Francisco, the city where she retains deep roots and where she began her ascent more than 25 years ago to become the highest-ranking female politician in U.S. history.

The loss of at least 13 House seats in Tuesday’s elections gave Republicans their most lopsided majority in more than 80 years. That could dash Pelosi’s dream of serving again as speaker, next to the first female president, should her friend Hillary Rodham Clinton decide to run and win.

“The most difficult news for Democrats on Tuesday wasn’t the loss of the Senate,” said Dan Schnur, a veteran Republican campaign strategist and director of the Jesse Unruh Institute of Politics at the University of Southern California. “Rather, it was the additional losses in the House, because that makes the prospect of getting a majority back in 2016 much less likely.”

Leadership prospects

Pelosi was “almost certainly the most valuable asset Democrats had in this election cycle,” Schnur said, “but it’s looking less and less likely that she may be House speaker again in her career.”

People in both parties said Pelosi’s fundraising prowess — she brought in $101 million this cycle and averaged nearly one campaign appearance a day over the past two years — all but ensures she can remain Democratic leader as long as she likes. She announced in a letter to colleagues Wednesday that she is running for minority leader again, laying out plans to pursue workplace issues such as a higher minimum wage that proved popular with voters, and to increase turnout among Democrats.

Nader says go

“I don’t see Nancy Pelosi leaving unless Nancy Pelosi wants to leave,” said Democratic Rep. Mike Thompson, a Pelosi ally who easily won re-election to his St. Helena seat. Thompson blamed the White House for the election losses and said he has heard no grumbling from the ranks about Pelosi’s leadership.

So far, former presidential spoiler Ralph Nader is the only prominent liberal who has called on Pelosi to step down, saying House leaders “should now recognize the wisdom of baseball’s 'three strikes and you’re out,’” to save the country from “the ravages of today’s Republican Party.”

To which Rep. Jared Huffman, D-San Rafael, retorted, “Ralph Nader brought us President George Bush, and frankly he should be living in a cave somewhere.”

Pelosi “personally raised over $100 million for the caucus,” Huffman said. “There’s no one else on Earth who could do that. When you’ve got a leader that has poured so much energy and time and dedication into the job, she deserves our continued support.”

Pelosi’s record in the last three elections, however, has not been good. Republicans now have their biggest House majority since 1929. Tuesday’s devastation followed a historic loss of 63 Democratic seats in 2010 that toppled Pelosi from the speakership. In 2012, President Obama won re-election but Democrats netted just eight seats, far short of what Pelosi needed to reclaim the speaker’s gavel.

Incumbents protected

Gerrymandering to protect incumbents has left only about 50 of 435 House seats in play in any election. Democrats would have to win practically all of them in 2016 to retake control, GOP analysts said.

“Not only does this election put 2016 out of reach — the next conceivable time that Democrats can retake the House is 2020,” said GOP strategist Ford O’Connell, arguing that Democrats will have to wait for the next census to redraw district maps.

“I don’t think that a Hillary presidency could flip this back,” O’Connell said. If Clinton is the next president, he said, then history indicates the 2018 midterms will only cost Democrats more seats.

The next two years out of power look equally bleak for Boxer and Feinstein.

Boxer issued a statement saying the election results were “brutal for me” not because she lost the leadership of the Environment and Public Works Committee, but “because America lost such dedicated and caring public servants.”

Speculation has been rampant that Boxer will call it quits when her fourth term is up in 2016. Before the election, she said she wouldn’t decide until next year. But she told reporters that she has served half her Senate career in the minority and half in the majority, and learned that “I really like the majority much better. Much, much better.”

Feinstein was silent on the results, and like Boxer did not respond to interview requests.

Ray of hope

Huffman said it is “nonsense” to think Democrats can’t retake the House and Senate in 2016 as well as the presidency, because factors unfavorable to Democrats this time around will be reversed in two years. Obama will not be on the ballot, and the Senate map will have Republicans playing defense in seven states that Obama won in 2012, while Democrats have no seats to defend in states that GOP nominee Mitt Romney won.

A scattered GOP presidential field could divide the party, and Republicans will have a bare majority in the Senate that could require cooperation from Democrats to pass legislation.

Even GOP analysts agreed that despite their huge victory, Republicans have work ahead.

“It’s important to remember that an election is never quite as good for the winners or quite as bad for the losers as it looks the morning after,” Schnur said. If Democrats “are able to avoid a divisive presidential primary campaign, their prospects look much better two years from now.”

Carolyn Lochhead is

The San Francisco Chronicle’s Washington correspondent. E-mail: clochhead@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @carolynlochhead