“I think the country is more than ready.”
It’s Saturday morning and Nancy Pelosi is on the phone from California, sharing her thoughts on America’s readiness for a female president.
The speaker emerita of the House of Representatives knows this topic is generating angst among her fellow Democrats. She has heard the frustrated chatter since Kamala Harris became the second woman to lose to Donald Trump and his anti-woman, pro-bro politics. She has been asked repeatedly about Michelle Obama’s provocative assertion last month that the country “ain’t ready” to be led by a woman — a contention that Representative James Clyburn, a longtime member of Ms. Pelosi’s former leadership team, seconded on “Meet the Press” this month.
Ms. Pelosi is disappointed and a little surprised that the presidential glass ceiling remains intact; she says she long expected a woman to become president before one became speaker of the male-dominated House, a barrier she broke in 2007. But she is neither cynical nor despairing. She is confident — adamant, even — that her party just needs to stay laser-focused on elevating “the best person” to lead the nation, and that this person absolutely “could be a woman.”
As she sees it, there is much reason for optimism. She points to Hillary Clinton’s capturing the popular vote in 2016 and to her own improbable rise in Congress. Noting the progress being made down the ballot, she asserts, “The more women who are in those positions, the more clear it is to the public that one of them could be president.” And she delights in the rising generation of women who see their political potential as limitless. She recalls visiting her alma mater, Trinity Washington University, which now predominantly serves minority women, and having the students tell her, “We are so proud of you for being speaker of the House, but I’m going to be president!”
That kind of confidence is “the most beautiful thing,” Ms. Pelosi says, “and I think, generationally, it won’t be long before we have somebody.”
Of course, the question of what it will take for a woman to convince enough voters that she is “the best person” is what makes this debate so vexing. Despite all the research and polling and focus groups, it is impossible to determine precisely how fuzzy factors like unconscious bias interact with the dynamics of a race and the shortcomings of a flesh-and-blood candidate. Over the years, an array of impressive women have tried and failed to grab the brass ring — Ms. Clinton, Ms. Harris, Nikki Haley, Elizabeth Dole, Elizabeth Warren, Amy Klobuchar, Carly Fiorina — as countless voters offered up the bromide: I would be happy to support a woman for president, just not that woman. And while most voters think there should be more women in office, 40 percent also say they “know someone who wouldn’t personally vote for a woman for president,” according to a survey conducted in September by the Women & Politics Institute at American University.
With this issue bubbling up again, I decided to dig into the evolving expectations for women in high office, along with what we know about Americans’ taste in modern presidents. Now, there is no clear road map to victory, regardless of gender. But there are plenty of signposts as to the type of female leaders with the right stuff to make the leap to Madam President.
Sometimes it is easiest to start with the negatives. After decades playing in the top tier of politics, Ms. Pelosi has pointed thoughts about what female candidates should not do.
Most important, she should not center her campaign on identity. Diversity is great, Ms. Pelosi told me, but not as an electoral rallying point. “If I ran for speaker and said, ‘It’s time for us to have a woman speaker,’ they would’ve said, ‘Get out of here!’” she laughed.
Female candidates should also avoid getting defined by “soft issues.” “Don’t just talk about all the wonderful differences that women make in terms of child care or health care,” she advised. Women need to make clear “they’re there to strengthen our national security, to improve our economy, to make it fairer.” Women are in office “to do all the issues.”
To her point, the American University survey found that voters trust women more than men on “family issues,” while men were considered better at making “tough decisions” on national security and handling foreign adversaries. “Women have to prove their qualifications more than men do,” said Deborah Walsh, the director of the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers. Particularly for executive positions, she said, there is “this question of strength and toughness.”
“Part of the reason why women who have national security backgrounds do so well is there is an integrity around doing those kinds of jobs and a toughness,” said Anna Greenberg, a Democratic pollster. “It’s Abigail Spanberger and Mikie Sherrill and Elissa Slotkin — and there’s more!” she said. But she added that other types of experience can satisfy a similar purpose, such as serving in law enforcement or as a prosecutor. Ms. Harris “should have run from the beginning of 2020 on being a prosecutor,” said Ms. Greenberg. “I think that’s who she is. I think she was good at it.”
Such experience helps take the toughness question off the table without the candidate having to constantly talk about how tough she is. This frees up the candidates to better address the likability piece of the presidential equation, which can be particularly tricky for women.
“One of the challenges that women do face is this kind of tenuous spot that they have between being likable and being credible,” said Ms. Walsh. Voters expect both, but it’s tough to be approachable and relatable when you’re constantly laboring to prove you’re hypercompetent. “I think of someone like an Elizabeth Warren who had a plan for everything,” said Ms. Walsh. “They talked about her as kind of schoolmarmish because she was telling you about all her plans.”
Which brings us to a peculiar political truism: When it comes to the presidency, qualifications and experience are just a piece of the puzzle — and not that big a piece.
“Hillary Clinton was the best qualified person to be president at that time” by conventional measures, said Ms. Pelosi. “She was better qualified than her husband. She was better qualified than Barack Obama — and he says that. She was better qualified than George W. Bush.” But! “Nobody wants to know what you have done,” she said. “Nobody gets elected because they deserve it. They get elected for what they’re going to do.”
Ms. Pelosi recalled meetings with young African American voters after the 2016 election. “They said, ‘All we heard in the election about Hillary was, ‘She deserves it.’ But what does that mean to us? We want to know what it means for us and what our opportunities are for the future.’” You need to convey how your leadership will improve people’s lives, Ms. Pelosi said.
The conveying part is crucial, she stressed, observing that presidential contenders — and presidents — underestimate the P.R. part of the job at their peril. Ms. Pelosi credited Mr. Trump for being able to sell even the most outrageous nonsense, declaring him “a snake oil salesman par excellence.”
Ms. Pelosi shared a memory of the Democrats’ Iowa state party dinner in 2007, at which a host of White House hopefuls were auditioning for the party’s 2008 nomination. Her job was to introduce the speakers. She recalled that John Edwards, a former senator, was early in the lineup and was “fabulous. He’s a trial lawyer. He gets up there and just makes the case.” Ms. Pelosi recalled Ms. Clinton’s speech as a classic rundown of the challenges that she felt she was the most qualified to address. Then late in the evening came Mr. Obama. At which point, said Ms. Pelosi, “it’s all over.” He “just took us to another place.” His remarks weren’t about raising the minimum wage or other policy goals, she said. He went bigger, framing things in terms of “equality and respect and freedom.”
Her point? Americans want more from their presidents than a golden résumé or strong policy chops. Bill Clinton, Obama, Trump — all are masters at forging a connection, of making people feel seen, of inspiring voters for better or worse. Which is something many women in politics, especially at the highest level, have struggled with. “It’s hard to be a workhorse and a show horse,” said Ms. Pelosi.
Women have traditionally needed to be “perfect” to succeed in politics, said Lis Smith, a Democratic strategist. “But if all you’re doing in political life now is trying to avoid gaffes and mistakes, you’re missing the mood and the moment.” She said, “There is a caution inherent in being a woman candidate. But for a woman candidate to succeed, they need to throw that caution to the wind.”
This is especially true post-2016. “People want more authenticity,” said Ms. Smith. She points to Mr. Trump channeling the “primal rage that people had toward the establishment and the status quo.” This was “very authentic and real about who he is.”
The dynamics are already shifting down ballot. Since 2018 we’ve seen “greater latitude that women have been either given or taking around their authenticity,” said Ms. Walsh, from Rutgers. “Women started to tell their stories and it made them, frankly, more relatable. It made them more real and more accessible.”
The next generation of women “don’t just try to fit into a neat little box of what a perfect woman candidate looks like,” said Ms. Smith. “They cuss, they drink, they have out-there positions.”
It’s tough to find many political watchers who think there will be a serious female nominee for president in 2028. Among the Democrats, said Ms. Greenberg, “probably there’s too much PTSD, and people will want something that feels very safe.”
I ask Ms. Walsh if, with the anxiety on the Democratic side, it might be easier for a Republican woman to rise up. Short answer: Nope. Ms. Haley seemed like a promising contender, she said. “But I don’t know after the bruising she took.” Ms. Walsh posits that there will first need to be a real “shift in the party.”
For now, Ms. Walsh expressed frustration about the “Is America ready?” hand-wringing. “What happens is this becomes a story that can become a self-fulfilling prophecy,” she said. “If we just keep telling ourselves, ‘Well, I would support her, I think she’s great, but everyone tells me she’s not going to win because we’re not ready,’ then it’s a self-inflicted roadblock.” Remember, she said, “People said a Black man couldn’t win. And then he did. It is true until it isn’t.”
And even if the next woman falls short, we shouldn’t see it as a disaster, insisted Ms. Pelosi. “They pave the way. And it will happen.”
Michelle Cottle writes about national politics for Opinion. She has covered Washington and politics since the Clinton administration. @mcottle
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