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2 weeks ago
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Nancy Pelosi has laughed off suggestions she forced Joe Biden to drop out of the election against Donald Trump.
The former House speaker was widely accused of being one of the Democrats most involved in convincing the 81-year-old president to step aside.
Pelosi was speaking about her efforts to get more women to run for office when Bill Maher interrupted her with a thinly veiled barb about Biden.
'Many times when I'm encouraging people to run, especially more women, to run for office,' she said on Maher's Real Time show.
Nancy Pelosi has laughed off suggestions she forced Joe Biden to drop out of the election against Donald Trump
'Nothing more wholesome in our political process than that, aren't we excited about...' she said, before Maher interjected.
'Yes, and sometimes you're discouraging people to run... we're not going to get into that,' he said to laughter from the studio audience.
'Well, people make their own decisions,' Pelosi replied.
Maher, not appearing to believe her for a second, said: 'Oh absolutely they do', followed by even louder laughter from the audience.
'But I want to say, from the bottom of my heart, thank you so much for what you didn't do.'
Maher then asked Pelosi about whether she wanted an open competition to replace Biden, instead of just anointing Kamala Harris
'When Joe stepped down, did you want it to be an open convention as opposed to going right to Kamala?' he said.
Pelosi replied: 'It was open. Anybody could have gotten in. She wrapped it up, you have to give her credit for that.'
Pelosi was speaking about her efforts to get more women to run for office when Bill Maher interrupted her with a thinly veiled barb about Biden
President Joe Biden dropped out of the race on July 21, after weeks of public and private hand-wringing by democrats following his disastrous June 27 debate performance
Maher, who for weeks at the time advocated replacing Biden with Harris to avoid a chaotic brokered convention, expressed his relief that was what happened.
'I do, totally, and the Democratic Party - that's the smartest thing they did,' he said.
'Because they just had a big internal fight [about whether Biden should run], they couldn't afford another one.
'They would have looked like what we always think, oh they're disorganized, but they got their you-know-what together.'
Maher and Pelosi also discussed immigration during her appearance on the show, including a bill in California to help undocumented immigrants buy houses.
Pelosi didn't have an opinion on the legislation itself as she wasn't aware of its details, but said she agreed generally with the American Dream being available to more people.
She instead remarked how the two partiers used to be much closer on the issue.
Pelosi referred to Ronald Reagan's final speech, where he declared that immigrants were one of the country's greatest strengths.
'While other countries cling to the stale past, here in America we breathe life into dreams. We create the future, and the world follows us into tomorrow,' he said.
'Thanks to each wave of new arrivals to this land of opportunity, we're a nation forever young, forever bursting with energy and new ideas, and always on the cutting edge, always leading the world to the next frontier.
'This quality is vital to our future as a nation. If we ever closed the door to new Americans, our leadership in the world would soon be lost.'
Pelosi told Maher to 'Google it, it's a fabulous speech' and said George HW Bush continued this pro-immigration policy.
Maher said the policy was for undocumented immigrants, which was why it was controversial.
'Well, what I would like to do is move them to documented,' Pelosi replied.
'One of the best things we can do for our economy is to pass comprehensive immigration reform.'
Ronald Regan's immigration speech
Since this is the last speech that I will give as President, I think it's fitting to leave one final thought, an observation about a country which I love. It was stated best in a letter I received not long ago. A man wrote me and said:
'You can go to live in France, but you cannot become a Frenchman. You can go to live in Germany or Turkey or Japan, but you cannot become a German, a Turk, or Japanese. But anyone, from any corner of the Earth, can come to live in America and become an American.'
Yes, the torch of Lady Liberty symbolizes our freedom and represents our heritage, the compact with our parents, our grandparents, and our ancestors. It is that lady who gives us our great and special place in the world.
For it's the great life force of each generation of new Americans that guarantees that America's triumph shall continue unsurpassed into the next century and beyond.
Other countries may seek to compete with us; but in one vital area, as a beacon of freedom and opportunity that draws the people of the world, no country on earth comes close.
This, I believe, is one of the most important sources of America's greatness. We lead the world because, unique among nations, we draw our people -- our strength -- from every country and every corner of the world. And by doing so we continuously renew and enrich our nation.
While other countries cling to the stale past, here in America we breathe life into dreams. We create the future, and the world follows us into tomorrow.
Thanks to each wave of new arrivals to this land of opportunity, we're a nation forever young, forever bursting with energy and new ideas, and always on the cutting edge, always leading the world to the next frontier.
This quality is vital to our future as a nation. If we ever closed the door to new Americans, our leadership in the world would soon be lost.
A number of years ago, an American student traveling in Europe took an East German ship across the Baltic Sea. One of the ship's crew members from East Germany, a man in his sixties, struck up a conversation with the American student.
After a while the student asked the man how he had learned such good English. And the man explained that he had once lived in America.
He said that for over a year he had worked as a farmer in Oklahoma and California, that he had planted tomatoes and picked ripe melons. It was, the man said, the happiest time of his life.
Well, the student, who had seen the awful conditions behind the Iron Curtain, blurted out the question, 'Well, why did you ever leave?' ... 'I had to,'' he said, 'the war ended.' The man had been in America as a German prisoner of war.
Now, I don't tell this story to make the case for former POW's. Instead, I tell this story just to remind you of the magical, intoxicating power of America. We may sometimes forget it, but others do not.
Even a man from a country at war with the United States, while held here as a prisoner, could fall in love with us. Those who become American citizens love this country even more.
And that's why the Statue of Liberty lifts her lamp to welcome them to the golden door.
It is bold men and women, yearning for freedom and opportunity, who leave their homelands and come to a new country to start their lives over.
They believe in the American dream. And over and over, they make it come true for themselves, for their children, and for others.
They give more than they receive. They labor and succeed. And often they are entrepreneurs. But their greatest contribution is more than economic, because they understand in a special way how glorious it is to be an American.
They renew our pride and gratitude in the United States of America, the greatest, freest nation in the world -- the last, best hope of man on Earth.
English (US)