Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi will use their history to unite fractional Democrats

Mr Biden and Ms Pelosi, who both hope to start by adopting additional measures to tackle the coronavirus pandemic, must unite party members who have bickered over issues such as the expansion of government health insurance, how much to spend to fight against climate change and crime – justice policy.

The couple must also work with New York’s Democratic Senate Leader Chuck Schumer to win over enough Republicans to clear this chamber’s 60-vote threshold for most bills. Senate control – which could determine the success or failure of much of the Democratic agenda – depends on the outcome of two second-round races on Jan.5 in Georgia.

The last time a Democratic president took office, the party had a comfortable majority in the House and briefly held a supermajority in the Senate. This time, with two House races not called, the Democrats are only a few more seats than the 218 required for a House majority. Mr Biden has called on three House lawmakers to sit in his administration, which will temporarily reduce the majority further.

Ms Pelosi will have to hold most of her caucus together on Sunday as she seeks approval from the full House for another term as chair. She faced no opposition within her party to remain their leader in a November vote.

She said it would be easier to unite its members behind a common agenda with a Democrat in the White House – when the legislation they pass is more likely to become law – than under President Trump.

“It’s a very unifying thing,” Ms. Pelosi said in an interview, noting that about 100 Democratic lawmakers in the House have never served with a president of their party.

Mr. Biden, through a spokesperson, declined to be questioned. “The President-elect’s respect and admiration for President Pelosi goes back decades,” said Biden spokesman TJ Ducklo. “Their strong friendship is rooted in a shared dedication to public service and a dedication to their families and their faith.

Mr. Biden, 78, and Ms. Pelosi, 80, have known each other long before they took on two of the most important positions in American politics. Ms Pelosi recalls being invited to a party by Mr Biden in Rehoboth Beach, Del., In the late 1980s when she was a new member of Congress.

She knew the then Delaware senator through party politics, and at the meeting he introduced her to friends. The only problem: many have heard her first name and confused her with professional golfer Nancy Lopez.

“I didn’t want to disappoint them; I just smiled, ”recalls the speaker with a laugh.

Over the years, the two have formed a friendship that they refer to by first names, a rarity for Ms Pelosi. Both are Roman Catholics and cite their faith as a motivation for their service. Ms Pelosi said the two had simple rosaries in their pockets. The two traveled to Rome for the 2013 inauguration of Pope Francis.

When Mr. Biden, then a senator, championed the violence against women law in 1994, Ms. Pelosi served as the House Votes Whip. Ms Pelosi later oversaw foreign spending on the House Appropriations Committee while Mr Biden was Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and the two traveled to Europe together in 1997 with the chairman of the era, Bill Clinton.

In the Obama administration, Mr. Biden was frequently sent by the White House to discuss deals with the speaker, including the auto industry bailout and the Affordable Care Act, said John Lawrence, then chief. of Ms Pelosi’s cabinet.

“She felt that when she spoke to Biden, she was speaking to a peer and someone who understood the Congressional side of the White House-Congress relationship better than other people in the White House,” did he declare.

Ms Pelosi has occasionally criticized Mr Biden, particularly about his dealings with sexual harassment.

During the 1991 confirmation process of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, Ms Pelosi and other women lawmakers urged the Senate leadership, which included Mr Biden – then chairman of the Judiciary Committee – to reconsider the judge’s appointment Thomas in light of the sexual harassment allegations made by Anita Hill.

In April 2019, Ms Pelosi said allegations against Mr Biden of improper touching did not disqualify him from running for president, but that he needed to be more careful.

Former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Democrat from Nevada, said Mr Biden approached conversations casually and was never in a rush to strike a deal. Ms Pelosi is formal and is working on a schedule, he said. But the two trust each other, he says.

Rohit Kumar, former deputy chief of staff to Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.), Said the two Democrats knew how to negotiate bipartisan deals but Mr Biden might be more inclined to do so.

“Biden is more moderate than Pelosi,” said Mr. Kumar, who is now co-head of PwC’s national tax office. “He’s ready to make deals that she doesn’t want to do.”

Mr Kumar said that during a 2012 meeting on a series of impending tax increases and spending cuts known as the “fiscal cliff”, Ms Pelosi spoke at length about her opposition to efforts to weaken the ‘property tax.

Forty-eight hours later, Mr Kumar said, Mr Biden agreed to set the parameters for the inheritance tax at levels that have raised less money than Democrats wanted, although ‘he has not accepted calls from Republicans to repeal the tax. Since then, Democrats have tried unsuccessfully to increase inheritance tax rates and reduce the exemption.

Ms. Pelosi is known as a skillful vote-counter who seeks to find common ground among her members and keep her party united on tough votes. Mr Biden built his legislative career building relationships with Republicans and continued to contact them as vice president, much to the dismay of some Democrats.

Some Democrats say their leaders are too quick to strike deals with Republicans. In late December, as leaders on both sides negotiated a coronavirus relief package, Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D., NY) tweeted: “A major difference between the GOP and the Dems is that the GOP takes advantage of his right flank for concessions to generate excitement, while the Democrats lock their left flank in the basement because they believe it will make Republicans kinder to them.

An intraparty fight could erupt over expanding access to healthcare, which Pelosi says is one of her main goals. Progressives want to extend Medicare to all Americans. Mr. Biden and Ms. Pelosi have instead proposed creating a public option to compete with private insurers.

The duo’s first challenge will be the coronavirus pandemic that has killed more than 342,000 Americans, closed businesses and slowed economic growth. Mr Biden also said he hoped to provide a pathway to citizenship for the 11 million immigrants to the United States without permanent legal status, and to pursue policies to combat climate change.

“I have no doubt that she will be in the room all the time,” Phil Schiliro, the White House liaison to Congress under Mr. Obama, said of Ms. Pelosi. “There won’t be an important conversation about the president-elect not including him.”

Former Sen. Ted Kaufman (D., Del.), Mr Biden’s longtime assistant leading his presidential transition, said Democrats have always had a range of ideological views and that Mr Biden has united the party behind him in the November elections. .

“Democrats aren’t like Republicans, they don’t walk as a bloc, and Nancy has always been able to keep this coalition together in the House,” Kaufman said. “It’s the same coalition that helped the president-elect.”

—Richard Rubin contributed to this article.

Write to Natalie Andrews at [email protected] and Eliza Collins at [email protected].