The FRONTLINE Interviews

Jim Clyburn

U.S. Representative (D-S.C.)

Jim Clyburn is a U.S. representative (D-S.C.). He is the majority whip and the third-ranking Democrat in the House of Representatives.

The following interview was conducted by FRONTLINE’s Michael Kirk on Nov. 16, 2021. It has been edited for clarity and length.

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Pelosi’s Power

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Jim Clyburn

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Increased Partisanship

Washington changed in your first years there and certainly in terms of bipartisanship and division.… How were things becoming more and more divided and more and more partisan in those earliest years, before [Nancy Pelosi] becomes whip and then speaker?

Well, I did arrive in the 103rd Congress.And of course, that was as Newt Gingrich had sort of become the voice, if not the face, of the Republican Party.He seemed to have brought with him a Southern activism, and I'd been a bit used to that because my parents, most especially my father, were members of what we call the party of Lincoln.

And so I was quite familiar with what had happened in the South in the '50s, especially after the federal courts had ruled that the Democratic primary that had been declared a private club in places like South Carolina, and white-only private club, the courts overturned that, and people of color started participating in politics in a meaningful way.They'd already been active. I try to tell people all the time.In fact, they were basically—that's who the Republican Party was.It was basically Black people because all the white folks were in the white, private, white-only, private club.

When Black people started participating over time, white people started leaving.And around 1956, I suspect, after the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision, there was this vast exodus, and white people just took over the Republican Party and forced Black people out of it, by and large.Even I, when I went away to college—I went to college my first year in 1957—I viewed myself as a member of the Party of Lincoln.Though we didn't register by party, that's the thought.

So to watch Nancy, you know, react to Newt Gingrich, and watching Newt and what he was doing to [Jim] Wright (D-Texas), who was the speaker, he really built his reputation on tearing Wright down.

So I was used to that.And so I watched it knowing full well pretty much what was coming next.And I don't know what Nancy's kitchen cabinet may have been advising her, but I watched her prepare herself for leadership, first as whip, then as leader, and then eventually speaker.

But I watched that evolve, and I knew what was going on.I didn't get actively involved in her efforts, but there were people reacting to her, let's just say her left-wing leanings because [of] being from San Francisco.But I also knew that she was really from Maryland, so I used to caution people about that.And I think people are seeing that now in her, that she is pretty well balanced when it comes to political philosophy.

She's not from San Francisco in that classic San Francisco liberal way they like to tag her with.She grew up in Baltimore under a different kind of politics.What were they?What did she take out of Baltimore politics that you think she still holds dear now?

People politics, what they call service-oriented politics.I used to spend summers in Baltimore.In fact, I've been in the South, and being in South Carolina when you are in high school, in college and you're looking for summer employment, you weren't going to find it in South Carolina.So going north in the summers was a tradition.Many of us took what we called the "chickenbone special," where you got on the train with a boxed lunch or a bag, whatever it was, of fried chicken.It's more than just a joke; it's real.Some would drop off in Baltimore, some Philadelphia; some went up to New York, and sometimes around New Jersey.

Well, the first time I took this chickenbone special, I dropped off in Baltimore.And I have always been keenly interested in politics, so I watched the politics of Baltimore a little bit, so I knew about her dad, and never really, not with her in mind, just with my own interest in politics.But then after that, I started spending my summers in New Jersey, and I started to really studying the politics of New Jersey because Gov. [Richard] Hughes, who later became a Supreme Court, state Supreme Court justice in New Jersey.In fact, that's where I thought I was going to live, in New Jersey.In fact, I got married in New Jersey.My wife and I did that intentionally because we thought we were—that's where we were going to live.

We got married on June 24 and left New Jersey July 1—so that didn't last too long—and went back to South Carolina.

But I knew New Jersey politics; I knew a little bit about Maryland politics and a little bit about South Carolina.So I knew basically who and what Nancy Pelosi was at that time, and still is.And I think if you try to peg her as being left wing or whatever, that's an error that you'll regret.

She learns to play retail politics in the strictest sense of the word.And she doesn't really need to deal with Republicans in either of the two places where she lives.They're not strong in Maryland and certainly not in San Francisco.So she comes with an idea of counting votes and an idea that she can be sort of partisan about it because, why not, right?That's how you get things done, by driving your own caucus.

Well, you know, you—sometimes conscious, sometimes not so conscious—rivalries develop.And that was very clear to everybody, that there was a rivalry in our caucus between her and a fellow Marylander.And a lot of us looked at that, watched it, and some were amused by it.And so it finally came to a head when she and [Steny] Hoyer contested each other for leadership of the Democratic Party, and she prevailed in that leadership fight.

I sat at the table with him often, sometimes just the three of us, and I admired the way they worked together to get things done for our party.And, you know, that's as it should be.I don't know why—I remember when I first ran for Congress, it was a pretty competitive race, and I prevailed.But I learned my politics from Harry Truman.And I studied Truman and his relationship to the [Pendergast] machine in Missouri—"Missour-a."So I learned from him how to accept defeat and how to accept victory.

And so I noticed that Nancy's—I don't know whether she knows much about defeat, but she certainly wears victory very well.

Pelosi and Bush

What would you say her great strength was in the very beginning of her speakership? She's against President [George W.] Bush; she's against the war; she's pulling the Democrats along. ... Gets a lot of negative press. Rush Limbaugh and others come after her. How do you describe what she did and how she changed the Democrats during that time? And how important was it that she went against the sitting president himself?

Well, she did it in a professional way.I've been around her and George W. Bush a lot, and they were very cordial to each other.And there was even what I'll call a familial relationship.And that was never personal with her, and I think both of them recognized that.But she just knew how to navigate the personal and the professional and the political.All three of those P's are very important in politics, and she balanced those out very, very well.

So I think W, as we affectionately called him, understood that he's going to have these contests with Nancy.And I think the defining moment, in my opinion, came when George W. Bush attempted to privatize Social Security.Now, some may argue with that, but that was a fact.And I watched Nancy navigate through that.And she knew how to bring people in to the process.Walter Cronkite, I remember, was involved.He was somebody she knew would be very, very credible on that issue.And she handed it to George in a pretty good way. ...

Pelosi and Obama

Let's talk about another president.She and Barack Obama during the ACA had a very almost contentious relationship at times….Talk a little bit about how she reacted and what was going on between the two of them, Congressman.

Well, you know, I was amused at that a lot, because it's kind of interesting to watch.And I was never—I don't know if I'd ever been around when she may have had any real issues in discussions about him.I do remember two incidents that I think demonstrated to me that there was some contentiousness there.There were two different incidents.

But on more than one occasion, when these discussions were going on, she would, when referring to him, she would look at me, and she's, "your friend."Now, the first time I heard that, I didn't know quite what it meant.But then on more than one occasion she referred to Obama when speaking to me as "your friend."And I could detect from that that there was something going on that maybe was not that cordial, so to speak.

But another one was when we were putting together the Affordable Care Act and trying to get it to a good place.No, it was before the Affordable Care Act.It when we were doing the Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

The stimulus vote.

The stimulus thing, yeah.We were putting that together, and there's disagreement.Now, I have always, sort of learning my politics in the South, I try not to ride every horse in the circus.So what I try to do is try to prioritize things.And it's kind of interesting, even today, with everybody talking about broadband.Way back then, I was talking about broadband, and I remember some monies being put in.We were trying to, you know, stimulate the economy, and I was pushing for money for broadband.I had no idea back then that we needed maybe $100 billion to do what I was trying to do for, around—if I my memory serves, it was like $10 billion or something like that.I don't remember now exactly what the number was.

But I remember when they agreed on a number, and so I was advocating for an equal amount for rural and urban.And so I wanted half of that money to go into Department of Agriculture because that's where rural was—and it seemed like they put maybe $7 billion in the Department of Commerce and $4 billion in rural—I can't remember exactly what the number was.Or maybe it was 4 and 3.Whatever it was.

When we finished the bill in the House, I was pretty much satisfied that sufficient attention had been made to rural communities.So we sent the bill to the Senate.When the bill came back, we went into this ping-pong process.Rather than putting it on the floor, you know, a group of House members in the room and the group of senators in another room, you're going back and forth, the White House refereeing all of that.

But when the bill came back, all of the money had been put into Commerce and none for Ag.And I was just raising hell about that.And so one day I remember Nancy was on the phone.I didn't know who she was talking to.Then she turned to me and said, "Here, you talk to him.They won't listen to me."

So I took the phone, and it was President Obama.And I made my case with him.I told him why I thought this money just could not go to Commerce.Well, we had a settlement.They gave me back the money that we had for rural, but they—that's why I think it's maybe $11 billion; I can't remember the exact number.But it seemed like it was 4 and 3; and maybe this time they gave all 7 to Commerce.Then they finally agreed to give 4, 3 or 4, whatever we had originally, put it back in there, but still left all the other money to Commerce.

That, I remember that like it was yesterday.And I remember exactly where she was standing and when she handed me the phone, and that, it sort of said to me that there was some contentiousness between the two of them sometimes.

But I also know, even when we got down to the Affordable Care Act, there—I just remember one night in the Cabinet Room, we were meeting sometimes at 2:00 in the morning, trying to hammer out that bill, and I remember when some things Obama wanted to compromise on, she wouldn't.And I also remember at one point, we were close to not getting the bill done, and—but she refused to give up on it.

In fact, I was not in the room, so I don't know this to be a fact, but I know the rumor had it that Rahm Emanuel, who was chief of staff for Obama, wanted to, if not throw in the towel, wanted to, you know, a big reduction in the process, in the final product.She would have none of that.She decided to press forward.

And I think it might have been doing that that President Obama gained a lot of respect and admiration for Nancy.And I think by the time he got through the Affordable Care Act stuff, I think there was a lot of admiration on his part for Nancy Pelosi.

And you're right to remember the Rahm Emanuel story.We interviewed him last Friday.He was carving it up.And worse than that, the thing that really drove her crazy was that she felt undercut by him.He was calling members of the caucus, his former caucus and colleagues, and she said, "You can't throw me under the bus like that."They were friends, close colleagues, but she really felt, I think, threatened by it.Is that the story you heard?

Well, I didn't know about all the particulars, but I did know that she was very upset with him and disappointed with Obama.You see, Nancy's thing was—I'll never forget an old Southern senator said to me one time, "When you campaign, you tell people what you're going to do for them and then you, by God, you get elected, you do it.Then you've got go to back to them and tell them that you've done it."And quite frankly, Obama had campaigned on health care.He may not have called it the—universal access to health care; that's what the big deal was.And so she felt very strongly that that had to be delivered on.

Bill Clinton had campaigned on that, and of course, if you recall, we did not deliver on it.A lot of people think, though I don't think that was the only reason that we lost the House in '94, because we did not deliver on health care.And that may be true.

Obama took office in 2009.We did it.And we got our socks bit off of us in 2010 because of health care.But then we came back eight years later and campaigned on health care and won the House back.

So I learned a real lesson, that, yes, you go back to them, and you do what you said you were going to do, but, by gosh, you've got to go out and tell people what you've done.And so we didn't do that with the Affordable Care Act.We did it, but we never bothered to tell people exactly what we had done and what they could expect.And even when people were benefiting from it, they didn't know that they owed that to the Democrats.

So Nancy decided that she wasn't going to make that mistake again.

Republicans Campaign Against Pelosi

In 2010, the Republicans just beat the heck out of her.They made her the poster child.Seven million dollars they spend running ads against her.Limbaugh, all the talk radio people going against her.Why her, Congressman?Why Nancy Pelosi and not the president himself, for example?What do you think was going on there?What's in their minds as they take her down?

The same thing that's in their minds today.It was a culture war, and it was at the perceived San Francisco culture.I'll never forget, I was speaking one day to a group of faith leaders, you know, after the 2000—I guess it was the 2004 campaign.And Nancy created the Democrats' Faith Working Group and named me to chair it.And in that capacity, I was speaking one day to a group of faith leaders over at the Methodist Building, and it was in the height of all of this stuff.

And during the Q&A, one of the gentlemen laid into Nancy with his question.And I just listened to him for a minute.And then he asked an open-ended question—"Wouldn't you agree with that?" or something.And I looked at him, I said, "No, I wouldn't.And let me tell you why."And I just went into, "Because that's not who she is."And I started talking about, I says, "Nancy"—and I just used her first name, or maiden name—"D'Alesandro Pelosi learned her politics in Baltimore, Maryland."And I noticed a strange look came over his face.And when I finished he said, "Are you telling me that Nancy Pelosi is a D'Alesandro from Baltimore?"I said, "Yes, that's what I'm telling you."So he said, "Tommy D'Alesandro's daughter?"I said, "Yes."And he leaned back in his chair and never said another word.

Pelosi’s Roots

What does that mean, that she's Tommy D'Alesandro's daughter?What does that mean to people?

That meant to him, he had a great deal of admiration and respect for D'Alesandro's politics as mayor and as congressman, and he had no idea that that's where her roots were.He was accusing her of having her roots in San Francisco politics.And so—and it made all the difference in the world when he found out who she was.

What did it mean to her, her roots in Baltimore?What politics are you talking about?

People to people.People-to-people, service-oriented politics, results-oriented politics, not some high-flying ideology, but making sure that politics worked for those people who you asked to vote for you.

Division in the Democratic Party

Let's go to 2018.She regains the speakership.She's got a caucus that's super split. ...How does she react?She said at one point she was wearing a mouth guard at night, grinding her teeth, that it's really getting to her in 2018.What does she do to pull out of that tailspin, to pull the caucus back together?

Well, I don't know what she did.I want to know why all of a sudden my dentist around that time recommended that I start wearing a night guard.And I did for a while.I guess I probably need to get it back now.

But I suspect what we were doing at that time, the caucus, you know, there were some people who would rather that she had not come back to the speakership.Those ads—you mentioned how much money they spent—had taken hold.People were fearful that we could not get beyond that.She was not, and she convinced the majority of the caucus that she could get beyond that.And she prevailed.

I know Tim Ryan very well.I consider him to be a good friend.And when he decided to mount that challenge, I think Tim may have been looking for, to light a fire and hope it would burn.But it flamed out rather than burned.

… But I told Tim back then that I didn't quite understand what he was doing, but he knew I was sticking with Nancy in that contest. ...

How did she put that fire out, Congressman?

By winning.She just won, you know.She didn't put the fire out; it still simmers.She doused it with a win.

Let's talk about the Squad, the personal tension.Begins with AOC [Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.)] and continued.It almost seems like it's two very different views of power.Describe what you think is going on with those young women after they won and what was going on with them versus Speaker Pelosi?

I don't think any of them got any problem with Speaker Pelosi; I really don't.You know, you've had AOC, most especially, winning a race that nobody thought she could win; Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) winning the race that nobody thought she would win.So I think that that network that I'm quite familiar with—you've got [Cori] Bush beating an icon, a family icon anyway, out there in Missouri.You've got the three of them.And then you've got [Rashida] Tlaib winning up in Detroit, and of course Ilhan [Omar] winning out in Minnesota.

So if you look at—the question is, none of this is in isolation.There's a lot of coordination going on, and that's where—you understand that.Everybody's got a base.I have a base of supporters that, whatever you may say or do, you're not going to get me to drift far or at all from my base, and the same thing is going on with them.

So I don't think—I've never detected any animus between any of them and Nancy Pelosi.I've heard one or two comments that would indicate that such might be the case, but I've never seen any action that I recall as any real animus.

So they've got a base.They, you know, sometimes she finds herself in agreement with a lot of what they do.Their approaches may be different.And Nancy has to be concerned about the entire caucus.My congressional district—I probably couldn't get elected in the district that they run in, and they probably couldn't get elected in my district, but we're all Democrats.We have a—when we said we've got a broad tent, we've got a big, big tent, and there are a lot of caucuses that operate under that tent.I had dinner last night with—at the table with Sanford Bishop (D-Ga.). Sanford Bishop and I are very close.Sanford Bishop's a member of the Blue Dogs.I don't think I could get elected in Sanford Bishop's district, and I don't think he can get elected in mine.

The thing is a lot of people know that.It seems like these people were such newbies, such beginners in some ways, surprise victors, for good reason victors, they came, and it was like, you want to say, "I know what you've said in the past about them; you've just got to wait your turn.You've got to steep in it, learn how it works.It will come to you."Is that how Nancy felt about them?Is that how you felt about them?

I don't know.I think there's some people tend to use that term in a derogatory way.I don't.There's nothing derogatory about that.As I said, I have three daughters.There's 11 years between my oldest and my youngest.And so when I deal with them, especially when it comes to politics, I have to deal with them differently.They're almost in two different generations from my oldest to the youngest.You know, you've got 11 years.What, 25 years equal a generation?So that's a pretty wide gap.And I'm going to tell you, in the conversations I can tell the difference.

And so that happens in these caucuses.So I don't think you, when you say to somebody, "Learn the process, build a foundation, and then launch," I've seen it done both ways, and I can tell you, learning the process and building the foundation works much, much better when you launch, especially for leadership.

Pelosi and Trump

… As you witnessed the State of the Union speech tearing, what were you thinking?What was happening before your eyes between the speaker and President Trump?

Well, I became a meme from, I guess, that same night—I still see it every now and then—from my reaction to the speech.So her tearing up the speech I think was her having something that she could do to express her disagreement.I certainly did mine with facial expressions and head movement and movements of the head.

So there was nothing really going through my mind except that all of us were dismayed.You know, the night before that speech, I think it was that same speech, I spoke—I was being interviewed by one of the—I think it was CNN, and I said that night that I thought Trump had no plans to give up the presidency.I said that—I can't remember all the words I used, but I do know the Charleston <i>Post and Courier</i> ran a big story the next morning on what I had to say.And I got a lot of flak from a lot of people.When I was asked by Don Lemon, was I calling Trump Hitler, and I said, "No, he is more like Mussolini; Putin is Hitler," and I still maintain that.And I think people are now seeing it.

It's kind of interesting.I do remember when Trump came out of the hospital with his COVID-19 and ascended the staircase up to the Truman Balcony.I can't remember exactly who it was; I believe it might have been Joe Scarborough referring to that stance he took on the Truman Balcony as a Mussolini stance.Now, after Jan. 6, I think people are seeing what I was talking about.

You know, I don't call myself a historian, but I love to read history.I used to teach it at the high school level.And when you see patterns—I don't understand people who—they look at polling situation and see patterns developing and make predictions based upon that.I don't understand why anybody could not see in Trump's presidency exactly what's going on today.I could see it from the day he was elected that—so none of this that's going on today surprises me at all.

I'm disappointed in a lot of people.A lot of people who I thought were true patriots are demonstrating themselves to be, as Thomas Paine would call them, "sunshine patriots."

… I don't want to finish this conversation without going to Jan. 6.What did you learn about Nancy Pelosi that you didn't know before?There's that event.The next day she calls [Vice President Mike] Pence—must have discussed that with you—trying to get the 25th Amendment enacted; the day after that Gen. [Mark] Milley.Talk to me a little bit about what you saw, [what] you learned about Nancy Pelosi that maybe you hadn't known before, or what it was about her that you recognized.

Well, I didn't know about her actions with Pence or with Milley until I started reading about them.But she'd been advocating and talking about a 25th Amendment remedy for the country's ailments before. ...

I was with Nancy in the so-called undisclosed location.We arrived at that spot at the same time in different vehicles, but we arrived at the same time.

I will always remember the day.It was raining and—because she was like a couple seconds ahead of me, getting out of the truck.I got out.She was under the shade, and I got out in the rain.And we went in the room together.And I remember all the reaction—everybody trying to figure out—you're watching the TV and watching what was going on, and trying to get the National Guard involved.For some reason, we find out later the D.C. National Guard not responding.I remember saying something to Steny about getting the Maryland National Guard, and I talked to Nancy about calling Gov. [Ralph] Northam about getting the Virginia National Guard.

It was, what, four, five hours before there was any response from the National Guard.That wasn't accidental.That's not accidental.And I don't know why people don't deal with that.I don't know why the media won't deal with it.But there's just scanty mention of the fact that there is—that was not by accident.All of that, in my opinion, was a part of the planning that was taking place that we now see.

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