Democratic Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi is at it again, making loony references of a vaguely geographical nature. Last month, she spoke out against the president’s audacity in having gone to Saudi Arabia first in his trip abroad, huffily emphasizing, “It wasn’t even alphabetical.”
This time, the setting was a press conference in which Pelosi was asked about Donald Trump’s tweet in reaction to reports that Democrats are expressing doubts about her continued leadership after their loss in Georgia. On Thursday, Trump tweeted:
I certainly hope the Democrats do not force Nancy P out. That would be very bad for the Republican Party – and please let Cryin' Chuck stay!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 22, 2017
Will this presidential election be the most important in American history?
When asked about this by a reporter, she said:
It’s not about me necessarily. They like to target my district. The city of St. Francis. The song of St. Francis is the anthem of our city…. I’m very proud to represent San Francisco in the Congress, and for a long time now … it was always about “Do you support gay marriage? You support this?” Yes, I do, and I’m proud to do so. So that’s what they play off. It would be interesting to see what they would say if I was from — uh [sustained pause] — some other place.
I’m relieved that she clarified which city she meant when she referred to the city of St. Francis. I naturally assumed at first that she meant Assisi, which to this day remains the city most associated with the saint, the order he founded, and his good works.
This is not incidentally the first time Pelosi has attempted — shamefully, in my view — to drag religion into her political views. In 2014, she argued that we should treat illegal immigrant children as we would the Baby Jesus. A year earlier, it was not Pelosi making an issue of religion and politics but the Catholic Church. A group of priests publicly called on the to either adhere to the basic teachings of Catholicism regarding abortion or publicly and formally renounce her faith.
She has to this day done neither.