Pelosi Says She Faced Male Chauvinism While House Speaker...

 

NJ: Why did the Republicans make you an issue? Is it because, as with Hillary Rodham Clinton, some voters aren’t comfortable with a strong woman leader?

 

PELOSI: First of all, we were effective at making change. What did we do but stand in the way of Wall Street, big health insurers, Big Oil, and people opposed to collective bargaining? My situation was different from Hillary in that most people did not know me. If your opponents want to mischaracterize you, they can say anything, and they had endless money, secretly amassed. But it was not just about that. It was 9.5 percent unemployment. It didn’t matter if you said to people, “It would be 15 percent if we hadn’t done what we did.” If you don’t have a job, that is all you know.

 

NJ: What kind of chauvinism have you faced in Congress?

 

PELOSI: At first the men thought having women in the House was nice. Then they started to get a little threatened—it wasn’t as cute. When I decided to run for leadership, they said, “Who said she could run?” And I thought, “Perfect. That is exactly right. Who said she could run? Not you.” That is how they thought not that long ago.