Thursday, June 18, 2026

Nancy Pelosi blames Biden for Trump’s victory 

“The anticipation was that, if the president were to step aside, that there would be an open primary,” she said.

• November 9, 2024
Nancy Pelosi and Joe Biden
Nancy Pelosi and Joe Biden [Credit: BBC]

Nancy Pelosi, former speaker of American House of Representatives, has blamed President Joe Biden for the electoral defeat of the Democratic Party in the just concluded presidential election.

President-elect, Donald Trump of Republican Party, defeated

Vice President Kamala Harris in the November 5 presidential election.

Ms Pelosi, in an interview with New York Times on Saturday, blamed Mr Biden for delaying to drop out of the race, adding that his decision hampered open primaries to choose his replacement.

“Had the president gotten out sooner, there may have been other candidates in the race,” Ms Pelosi said. “The anticipation was that, if the president were to step aside, that there would be an open primary.”

For Ms Pelosi, Mr Biden’s late withdrawal from the race and his eventual endorsement of Ms Harris barred the Democratic Party from conducting a primary election.

“And as I say, Kamala may have, I think she would have done well in that and been stronger going forward. But we don’t know that. That didn’t happen. We live with what happened. And because the president endorsed Kamala Harris immediately, that really made it almost impossible to have a primary at that time. If it had been much earlier, it would have been different,” Ms Pelosi said.

Ms Pelosi’s outburst comes a few days after Trump defeated Ms Harris in the presidential polls, winning both popular and electoral votes. 

In August, Mr Biden dropped out of the race under intense pressure from his party over his declining mental acuity, endorsing Ms Kamala for the race.

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