WASHINGTON, (Reuters) – Former U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi said if President Joe Biden had ended his reelection bid sooner, the Democratic Party could have held a competitive nominating process to choose his replacement.
“Had the president gotten out sooner, there may have been other candidates in the race,” Pelosi said in an interview on Thursday published by the New York Times the next day. “The anticipation was that, if the president were to step aside, that there would be an open primary.”
Pelosi said she thought the Democratic candidate, Vice President Kamala Harris, “would have done well in that and been stronger going forward. But we don’t know that. That didn’t happen.”
She said that since Biden endorsed 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.”
Republican Donald Trump soundly defeated Harris in Tuesday’s election to recapture the White House.
“I don’t think that any review of the election should be predicated on weaknesses, but strengths of Kamala Harris. She gave people hope. She caused a great deal of excitement in all this,” Pelosi said in the New York Times interview, according to quotes provided to Reuters by her office.
On an open primary, Pelosi said: “Kamala, I think, still would’ve won, but she may have been stronger having taken her case to the public sooner,” according to her office.
Biden, 81, ended his reelection bid in July and immediately endorsed Harris after a poor debate performance against Trump, 78, sparked concerns that he could not beat the former president nor complete a second four-year term.
Pelosi reportedly was part of a behind-the-scenes effort to pressure Biden to abandon his campaign.
Pelosi left her leadership post in the House after Republicans won control of the chamber in the 2022 elections. She remained in the House, however, and was elected to a 20th term on Tuesday.