>> i'm jennifer palmieri and i'm excited to welcome my friend susan page to annapolis. [applause] a proud edgewater resident. susan and i have known each other for a long time because we have covered a lot of people i worked for. i was hillary clinton's

communication director and i worked for president clinton. [applause] john edwards presidential campaign and in some ways it's a lot. nancy pelosi would say the same thing. you kind of grow and think about and learn from the losses in the tough situations more than other situations. and then the victories which come a little easier. susan and i come i first met her -- [inaudible] sara asked me if i would moderated and i was likee susan page? talking about nancy pelosi this is definitely my wheelhouse.

i'd on experiences of working for hillary and the second book she proclaims the declaration of independence. not a declaration of war and thats is what it's about. there's just something about her i don't like. sometimes there's just something about her that's incredible and there's something about her that is incredible and incredibly effective. and susan and i talked about this and thought for our discussion of madam speaker -- "madam speaker" to start with the question of what makes her so affect the? she's incredibly effective and even john boehner, her faux house republican speaker john boehner said she was probably the most effective speaker ever,

right? we will do that in three categories andhe then we will do q&a. one is role models and people who helped her along the way. i went to ivy brown jackson ceremony at the white house and it was remarkable. her entire thing except for the end where she quoted maya angelou was her thanking people who had helped her from the time she was a child or family, mentors the white house team, naming everyone and it's not something you would normally see at jurist do. so we will do all models of people who helped her along the way, her early experience of motherhood which is important as the leader and the criticism and because i worked for hillary and wrote about those experiences we

will mix hillary in there. >> start with her role models and her parents who were so important. >> thank you law for coming out on a saturday morning. [applause] at her two years at this pandemic is such a relief to see people in person so i'm really glad to be here in the celebration of people who love books and we are talking about my book today. jen'ss latest look which will by the way be available for sale in the graph. nancy pelosi really what i person comfortable with power. i went to a couple of different titles for my book which is now nancy pelosi and the lessons of power but the first title when i began writing the book was nancy

pelosi the arc of power and people thought that was too much like the art of power which is thomas jefferson. >> or "the artth of the deal." >> so we made it nancy pelosi in the test of power. we ended up with nancy pelosi and the lessons of power gives the thing about nancy pelosi she learned lessons about power from the day she was born. the day she was born newspaper photographer showed up at her mother's bedside in the hospital to take pictures which then appeared on the front page of some of the multiple baltimore papers. her dad was a member congress a prominent family. the family had five voice in a row and family had a girl so that's pretty notable. nancy pelosi has been in the

news column since her birth. she was the person who's father won the first of three terms to be mayor of all tomorrow. she was the one who held the bible on the stand for his swearing in. this is someone who grew up with a lot of role models for power. oneab was her remarkable father. some of you might have known his son who was tommy the younger mayor of baltimore who died just six months ago. the other remarkable role model for nancy pelosi was her mothery her mother was known as big nancy. which is a very apt nickname and it also meant nancy the girl who became nancy pelosi was always known as little nancy and they think she did not shed that next time -- nickname until she went away to college and maybe that's

why she went away to college. big nancy alessandro was this remarkably smart innovative entrepreneurial woman well ahead of her time. pelosi told me in one of the interviews i did with her for the buck if her mother were born today she would be president. and her mother wanted to go to law school. she tried to go to law school after having nancy pelosi so at that point she had six kids at home and that did not work out. they invented t things. she got patents for her inventions including a device to use to give you a beautiful complexion which is this metal piece with a hole in the top and an electric coil inside. according to the after they ran at the time you pour in the

secret oil into the metal tube and you plug it in and put your face over it and it will give you a beautiful complexion. i do not know if it would in fact give you a beautiful complexion but when i was doing the book one of my kids found one on e-bay and nancy vela sondra beautified pathe -- machine and bought it for $25. and i plugged it in and it still heated up the water. i didn't have the secret oil available. the other thing i think is important to know about the nancy was she was a huge risk-taker. she was not hesitant about taking big risks and she loves playing with the ponies. she had a special place where

she quite a bit of time and when her husband was mayor he would go to sabatino's restaurant in little italy to pay the bookie in the back of the room the debts that his wife had incurred. so if you want to know something about nancy pelosi's comfort with power and are comfort and willingness to attack goals that other people think cannot be reached just look at big nancy vela sondra. >> do you think little nancy felt the mother's frustration dthat she was not allowed to do were little little nancy just saw the possibilities clad when little nancy was born big nancy made a promise to god that before she was born if only she could have a girl up there all these boys she would make the girl a nun.

[laughter] and big nancy did h her best to make little nancy a nun and one point little nancy said she did not want to be a nun but she might be interested in being a priest. [laughter] b i think they have nancy gave nancy pelosi comfort with doing things and ignoring those who saidld you couldn't do it, you s a woman couldn't do it and you as an italian-american couldn't do it to i think it just made her fearless and she also she also learned from childhood how to manage and motivate supporters. the family had something called the favor file and you don't

actually need a dictionary to understand what a fight -- favor file lists. big nancy and little nancy would sit at a table in the front room of their home in little italy and constituents would line up like out to the sidewalk to go through and seek favors.th they might need some help with housing or maybe they had an immigration issue or maybe they had a child in jail and they wanted to help the mayor to give him or her outil of jail and big nancy would listen to the problem in the favor that was needed, write it down on a card and figure out what they could do to help. and if you got a favor granted that came with a certain expert tatian that you owe them something. hehe would vote for tony d'alesandro when he was running for office or maybe you go to a

rally for him or if it was a future person seeking a favor that you were not positioned to help with you would be expected to doo that. this is i think a pretty good description of what the speaker of the house does. >> she's effective on many levels deflecting criticism and being c focused. just corralling, i mean the house democratic caucus that thing is not easy to get your hands on. is that how she engenders that kind of loyalty? >> she says the way she learned how to be an effect if speaker of the house and leader of the sehouse democratic caucus is by having five children herself. because she said the skills you need to run the house the representatives are exactly the same as the skills you need to manage a house with a bunch of kids. you need to be comfortable with

chaos. you need to be willing to deal with ship and coalitions. [laughter] you need to be able to persuade people to do what you want them to do and convince them it was their idea. and it's interesting nancy pelosi has done a lot to recruit women to run for office and often and this is perhaps a little less true today than the past it was true. she would recruit women who had been t homemakers as opposed to having occur outside of the home.h often they would say i couldn't run for congress. you should find somebody else more qualified usually meaning some man and she would tell this story about how her own training as a mother was critical for her being an effective politician.

she was 46 the first time she ran for public office. >> she just took off like a rocket. >> she was 47 when she was first sworn in. she had worked as a political fund-raiser. she had worked for years in the senate office for another junior aide named steny hoyer. >> our congressman. theut she didn't have traditional experience. she didn't have a law degree. she had not worked in the traditional ways in public office where she told me she wasn't sure she was going to like congress and jr. has been agreed maybe she would go for five terms, 10 years and that's

what her father had done. he had a five-year term. i think an hour and a half of arriving to washington she knew she had arrived where she wanted to be. >> i think about you were describing her background and. hillaryn clinton saw and i feel like she never saw power. power was not around her when she was growingd up. around her growing up was her mom and what her mother had gone through as a young child that she had to help raise her sister and work at the home at a young age. and that was her path in her motivation. >> would difference you think that makes?l thank you to the most powerful women in the history of the country. they both have had tremendous success.

how was hillary clinton's use of power different from nancy pelosi? >> it was not her training. her background, she had the motivation to get into public service. she probably never would have gotten into politics had she not met bill clinton who put her, brought her along on a different path. the power sort of came secondary. it was not something -- it is not her may owe you. her may owe you is policy and power is not something -- pelosi, i feel like pelosi approaches a problem thinking about how she can correct -- how

she can corral people around and move them to support a certain outcome in hillary is the one who decides what the outcome is. and if the power came with the bigger and bigger job but it is not her current thing. >> i've covered seven presidents and 11 presidential campaigns. i have no other skills. thank god we keep holding elections so i have something to do. nancy pelosi is more comfortable with accumulating and exercising and maintaining power than any politician i've ever covered. it is natural to her and i think it's because she grew up in a

world, she grew up in a household where the use of local power was like the existence of running water. he it was part of everything the family was about to part of her mother and her father and yet she never taught of herself as a candidate for office until a woman told her she have to do it. >> she had been a very effective political fund-raiser in california and she had in fact chaired the state democratic party. she was doingd a good job runnig the democratic party. no one else thought of her as a candidateei and tell sally burtn who is a member of congress and her legendary husband phil burton who was the line of the house.

her husband died and she takes a seat and she gets sick and she calls the nancy pelosi who was the fund-raiser and said you should run. pelosi was like no, not a candidate. she told me if sally burton would have done that she never would have run for office. that's the story of so many women in politics >> and hillary too. she never saw herself as a candidate until her husband's political career. it became something. there's another way they are alike and hillary clinton and nancy pelosi in the day are hugely demonized. i've literally written two books about that. why are these two women demonized? >> honestly that something about her. when i joined the clinton

campaign i had been through a lot already. i had been through the clinton presidency of theor edwards campaign and barack obama and i said i can handle this, can handle hilbert lenten. all of a sudden when i got on the lesson turned the wheel this way the busnd went that way andi put on the i brakes and excelerator would go. everything that i knew how to use just went haywire. and it sounds now. i had not appreciated how important role models are and the fact if you add the nominee and with a the woman in the oval office we had an idea and i had an tiffany really late in the campaign might -- like a sober and i thought what we have been doing t trying to jam her into a male role.

the very ill-fitting suit for her. so a you have to do the job as a man has always done it. and i thought what if people think she's an authentic and i had no idea on what to do about it. we just don't know what that looks like and it's not as if everyone who didn't like her or didn't vote for her is sexist. we are all certain we are not sexist and we are all certain we are not racist. the way it reveals like. there's just something about her i don't trust. we would ask the question -- well i don't know she's always so sketchy and she's always

hiding something. and whitewater turned out to be a total nothing. it's just suspicion on suspicion and what's pelosi's she give you no sign that it others serve. she just boom she just keeps going. it's remarkable and she seems to appreciate and understand that it's not about her. was she always that way in politics? >> she d but when hillary was running for president nancy pelosi is running for head of the democratic caucus. it's a smaller constituency. she doesn't need to be an effective order and she's not.

she doesn't need to connect with tauzin's anointed to people. it's different kind of role. if you think about how nancy pelosi keeps her position. if you cross her you will pay a price. [laughter] and she rules with a favor file. members of congress want favors from her and they want a theyttee assignment or want to go on a trip. they want legislation to get a hearing to pass. if you behave in a way that she thinks wascr not appropriate or created her a lot of problems you aren't going to get off scott free. 10 interviews with r the book which i have been very

personal wealth because the speaker of the house has other things to do. >> i gives you a remarkable insight. >> at thinks she didn't like the ninth interview because i didn't want to start out with the stuff that she wasn't going to like. it was the ninth interview. i was asking questions that i knew she would like the least and that she might see as the most negative and i was asking one thing that she thought did deserve to be in the book but it was important and was irrelevant.er we engage in this conversation in which i became increasingly terrified. she is shorter than i am. she didn't raise her voice and she didn't yell at me and she did not but she suddenly got

ticker. pelosi is getting bigger and bigger and more alarming to me. she kept insisting to ask increasingly probing questions. she asked me to particular -- articulate in a very full way why i thought this was an episode that deserve to be in her biography. at the end of this interview whichav was not my favorite interview, she continued to think it shouldn't be in and i continue to say it should be in. that's a van der veen ended. it was about 3:00 in the afternoon and i left the speaker's office in view of the national mall. i went to my car, i drove home,

i poured a glass of wine. i crawled into bed and i watched about three hours worth of reruns. remember that pelosi, her career -- my career is not dependent upon pelosi but you can imagine what a member of congress must be like when pelosi is trying to get you to vote for the affordable care act and you don't want to do it. >> with obama the leadership would come in a lot and paul ryan was speaker and obama had mcconnell-reid write in and pelosi over. y they were at an impasse and republicans lately republican speakers at a very hard time

getting their caucu' to agree on anything and it was very ineffective. i talked to her and i said to you just look at these guys and thank these guys are a bunch of? >> what to she said? >> she's so guarded and i was a one time i got a giggle out of nancy pelosi. it's humor and, you know. >> republican leaders, senators of either party have a lot of contempt for her because senate has its own rules. the senate has been the place where house passed legislation goes to die. >> it's a interesting sound that people that you interviewed and what boehner saidt' what hillary said and some of theve other leaders.

>> boehner did say when i interviewed him for the book he thought she was the most effective speaker in american history and actually newt gingrich who is no friend of nancy pelosi and vice versa also said when he looks at pelosi he sees a fellow pirate which i think gingrich sees as high praise. boehner also said, and this is a pointcr of criticism for pelosi. he said there were times when he would try to moderate their rhetoric. hed would try to leave the door open for more cooperation and she was always full steam ahead and was in his view taking partisan views on things. and that's also something that

top aides to president george w. bush told me. remember when pelosi -- pelosi was first elected in the first woman in the history of our country and george w. bush would to deliver the state of the union address and he was very gracious in the beginning mentioning the history of the mom and then the mentioning her father and according to his top aidessh bushveld that pelosi ner reciprocated. he was making anet offer k let's try to act in the cooler manner than where the politics are heading today and that was something she was willing to do. >> it's interesting i wondered if she thinks if i relinquish any notion of teen partisan i relinquish the power.ou >> she would say boehner didn't

deliver. like what's the point of bipartisanship if you can't deliver to the people? she thinks the most damaging legislation she pushed through was not thee affordable care ac. it was the bank bailout in 2008 when we had the financial meltdown and nobody likedd bailinged out tanks. bailing out banks is not the most popular thing to do but the economists were saying if you don't do this we are heading to a depression but they made it deal but they would each deliver 50% of their caucus for this unpopular legislation in she delivered 50% of her caucus and a bit more and he did not. i don't know iff you remember hw the stock market just plunged in a way that was really serious and at that point they brought the legislation back up and pelosi delivered all the votes

they needed. boehner did not deliver 50% of his caucus because they couldn't because caucus was not under his control. if you want to play with me you got to deliver. >> i think about her with obama and during the trump here's and then in the biden administration. i had forgotten the magic where your like wow nancy has the votes. this is like a mantra. nancy always has thehe votes. but it started were she rescued the rescue package. >> she rescued george w. bush. sheor told me the president who made the mistake in american history which was v the iraq wa. she did not have a high view of george w. bush and even though

it cost her members to push this legislation but she did it because the alternative looks to graham. >> she took on a particularly iconic status during the trump here's what the orange coat and with a big caller at the white house for the cameras there. do you think that she had trump's number because she has seen him in baltimore and she has seen them in san francisco politics and encountered people like him before. >> donald trump's a very distinctivee figure. i'm not sure i know a lot of people who know him. >> he's like if you've been to new york you know trump. >> while i grew up in kansas.

[laughter] but she s had his number. >> how did she know it? >> she knew how to deal with aggressive men and boys. she had grown up with five older brothers. how do you think she managed to handle herself? it was good training. she had a view of trump was extremely negative from the g get-go. in fact she told me her plan had been to resign after the 2016 election. she was ready to leave congress so she had been reelected and said somebody else was going to be elected as the democratic leader in she would resign under special circumstances and she felt comfortabled doing this because she knew things would be in good hands with president hillary clinton. election night 2016 she starts

tonight believing as many of us did, hillary was going to win the election and she looked at the early returns for pennsylvania and talked to rob brady who is an old-time member of the house much like her dad who gave her some numbers from outside the philadelphia area to indicate it was a rob him and about point she knew that hillary is going to lose. she was at an event for big donors and she stopped reassuring people that things are going to be okay. by the end of the night she decided not to retire. she thought trump was a threat to the nation and she felt an obligation to stick around and she became the face of the democratic opposition.

i think it took him aim long tie to understand that. i interviewed him on air force two, air force one for "usa today" a couple of weeks before the midterms in 2016, i mean in 2018 and i said are you concerned that democrats may win control of the house and his aides steve bannon said they were very concerned because they thought it would lead to a unending investigations of the trump administration. president trump said he was not particular concerned about that because he got along with pelosi. pelosi wanted to do business. they hadn't been able to pass an infrastructure package and he thought they would have a better chance of passing in infrastructure bill with pelosi

with republicans. in control. >> that turned out to be true. >> i think because she wasn't on the impeachment train he she would protect him. she was reluctant on impeachment issue is no friend of donald trump. for two years she was incredibly effective at playing a hand against trump and when she got the majority she was very effective in playing a stronger hand with donald trump. >> we will take questions from the audience now. do we have a microphone? >> my niece brought her here. i just want to be totally transparent. >> i just wondered what your next project is going to be. >> thank you for asking. i'm working on a book for simon & schuster. it's another biography of the

powerful in and itching woman a biography of barbara walters. you would buy that book, right? >> yes. >> in fact i tested it this morning. we love our agents. >> people don't often do that. >> yeah. we do. >> arbor walters. that's fun. >> three characteristics of the three women do to a done one i'm working on barbara bush, nancy pelosi and a biography of barbara bush called the matriarch. now barbara walters. they are complicated and they their consequential and they had an impact and no good biography of them.

>> the item that you are talking to nancy pelosi about was that item included in your book? >> it was, yeah. [applause] >> what was that? >> i'm not going to poke the bear by telling you what it was. potential it will make me look so i will tell the story. when i was starting both books i didn't contact the subject of the book beforehand to see if they would cooperate which i think potentially could be very. both of them cooperate at. i did interviews with barbara bush and attend interviews with pelosi for this book and an 11th interview for the paperback which just came out.

the reason i did didn't ask them if they would cooperate is becauseth i thought if they said no i might out and i thought if they said yes that they might think they had control over what i wrote. if i came to them and i have signed a contract to do a biography of you and i would really appreciate you talking to me it is clear that i'm writing a work of journalism and not an authorized lack of a because an unauthorized biography she would have been able to make a call about what i could include and notoo include and that was truet the barbara bush book as well. there is something inin the barbara bush biography that the family was very opposed to. it's in their because it seemed important to me. >> can you talk a little bit abouth how pelosi dealt with the

challenge? what happened to that? do they have any kind of power? >> they do have power. if democrats lose control of the house in november which is now i think very likely and nothing is guaranteed that very likely the ones who are like did will be the most progressive members of theor democratic caucus and thee will be a bigger percentage of the caucus. pelosi told me she saw some of herself and aoc especially when she was younger, when she was standing up for the liberal positions and couldn't understand why politicians would settle for half a loaf. and the position she's in now her view had always been pragmatic that it's the mostst liberal thing you can get. don't give away the most liberal thing you can get in the pursuit

of the most liberal thing you cannot get. the best interview i did come these interviews that they set up well in advance. the speaker of the house is scheduled. one of the interviews i had after the democratic caucus that just turned into a brawl between her in the squad. they had decided on the immigration vote that she wanted them to vote with the democrats on. she wasnt all warmed up by the time she got to the interview with me and i was asking her about it and she got annoyed and said i thought this was an interview about the book are they said let me just ask you one final thing about this then. do you think the squad understands the process of passing legislation?

[laughter] which is a very good question as it turns out and she said no and she said you know and she's quoting a famous line that a former member of congress is to use. some people come to washington to pose for pictures and say look how pure i am. and some of us come to washington to get things done. i can tell you having nancy pelosi say you are posing for pictures is not a compliment. [laughter] >> good morning and thank you for being here. this is is about the last question. i want -- wonder how the speaker felt about her legacy in terms of the ideals of the american public in terms of antiracism and the things that we are

concerned with in terms of the social justice lens. how does she see her legacy in that piece? >> that's a great question. i'm not sure i have a good answer for it. in some way some of the big cultural trends in our country or some things as she fought for 450 years. whenhe she came, when she was first elected one of the biggest issue she initially had to deal with was hiv/aids because most politicians wouldn't even say the word s aids. she was coming from representing a district that was at the epicenterr of the epidemic of aids. and yet look at her attitude now not just on aids. same-sex marriage and on racial justice and some of these trends from the last couple of years.

i'm sure she sees those with gratitude and pride but it's not something i talk to her about. if you asked her what assure biggest legacy i think she would probably say the affordable care act. >> yeah. >> we think our position is in terms of expanding the court? >> she has been asked that question and she refuses to answer because i think she sees it is not something that's going to happen soso why time on i? >> thank you. >> good morning. thank you for coming. how would you explain or framed nancy pelosi's relationship with her faith? clearly her family was very active catholic spirit she had

said publicly when asked if she trump as she nobody but she was a catholic and she. for him. how does that influence what her priorities are and how she faces the choices she makes? >> she is a person of thing -- a person of faith.ai she regularly attends mass. her faith is very important to her. she prays every day. and i believe her when she says that. and her whole, one of the things she tells aspiring politicians is you need to know why you are running for office and she said for herself is for children to take care and protect children. there's a big social justice thread through pelosi's life and local priorities that were shaped first by the all girls

catholic school she went to in baltimore and then by trinity college. until she -- her entire schoolingc was at catholic institutions taught by nuns with only girls in her class. >> that's another similarity between hillary and pelosi that they went to all girlsle school. >> and only brothers. she only had brothers, she had four brothers i think. frankie, joey and jimmy and val. and hillary was the only girl as well. i think when you're the only girl you are a little tougher maybe and you absorb different

lessons. and she went toto an all-women's college.n' my daughter went to all-women's college to and found it interestingly confirmed that it would not give them confidence but it does seem to instill the foundation of confidence. >> i'm struck atrs how many womn leaders went to all women colleges. >> it does seem to instill some kind of foundation. >> we have three minutes left. >> i'm wondering about the man who helped her along the way. i worked for liam panetta with my congressman at the time. i grew up in a navy family and

we were in leon panetta is district in monterey. leon panetta george miller chuck schumer marty russo. there was john murtha a cabal of men and that sounds but you know what i t mean. i was like wow nancy pelosi's blue monday rise in leadership. i'mha never clear and did she he an ambition to be speaker when she got there or was it just like i can imagine no one else is going to do this job so i'm going to do it. >> she looked at the leadership and thought they were doing a good job. i don't think she came to to washington instead gee i want to climb the ladder.

and i don't think it was gender driven. i think c it was like i'm a democrat and we can do better than this and it was pretty early on there were rumors that she might challenge the speaker who lost his race, fully -- foley. they came to her and she dismissed it and they said we know that you women members of congress have good -- no need free to run for the leadership. let us know if airweave will take care of them. you can imagine how well received that message was. [laughter] >> the number one lesson of

power talking about the lessons of power nancy pelosi's one lesson of powers what she learned from her father which is no one will give you power. you have to take it. and that is what she did in running for leadership. steny hoyer of maryland congressman was in line to be the next whip and she ran a three-year campaign to defeat him to get onto that steppingstone that led eventually to the speakership. when people come to her aspiring politicians with tough races and they want this or they want that she said nobody is going to hand you power. you have to seize it. that has been the mantra of her life and it has served as leader pretty well. a closing comment about pelosi when i started the book this pitch i made to my publisher was

here is the most powerful woman in american history the first female speaker of the house and when i finished the book i thought she's in a history book is the first female speaker of the house but she's also in the history books as one of the most effective speakers in the history of the united states of america and that is pretty remarkable. it's been my privilege to spend time with her. >> thank you. aq everyone. a great crowd. [applause]

certainly johnson's secretary's new because they were tasked with train screaming -- transcribing many of those conversations in fact they were the ones to make sure the conversations were taped as johnson would signal to them for an open door between his office and theirs.

>> jim i wonder reported the number of people assigned to kennedy the day he died in the numbers assigned to me now and i want them right quick. and if i can ever go to the bathroom i won't go. i promise you i won't go anywhere. i'll stay right behind his aides. bob gates. good afternoon, evee

>> good afternoon everyone. my name is noel king and i'm delighted to be at the annapolis festival.