Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich has slammed current Speaker Nancy Pelosi as “the most consistently partisan, virtually dictatorial, Speaker in modern times.”
In an essay this week, Gingrich responds to a February 4 Washington Post column by Dana Milbank accusing him of bringing “hopeless gridlock” to the legislature by pioneering a “refusal to negotiate.”
Milbank is either “breathtakingly ignorant” or “willfully dishonest,” Gingrich asserts, since he tries to divert attention from “the viciously partisan machine the Pelosi Speakership has imposed” by ignoring the record and attempting to tar Gingrich with the same brush.
Gingrich proceeds to demonstrate that his legacy as Speaker included an astonishing number of bills passed with large bipartisan majorities, which stands in stark contrast to Ms. Pelosi’s consistently partisan approach.
In both her first and current speakerships, Pelosi “has consistently ignored Republicans and usually even ignored most Democrats,” Gingrich notes.
Pelosi has routinely passed key bills with no real scrutiny on a purely partisan basis, a tactic now typical of the Big Government Socialist Democrats, Gingrich argues, such as forcing through an extension to government funding on December 2, 2021 with a 220 (Dem) – 1 (Rep) vote.
Pelosi similarly passed the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act on July 1, 2021, with 219 Democrats and two Republicans, and forced through President Joe Biden’s American Rescue Plan with 219 Democrats and zero Republicans, Gingrich writes.
Again last year, Pelosi “rammed through an emergency appropriations bill with 213 Democrats and, again, zero Republicans,” he adds.
“The Pelosi Big Government Socialists consistently sacrifice bipartisanship,” he observes, “in favor of pushing through radical legislation designed to profoundly change America – even with the narrowest possible margins.”
The big difference, Gingrich asserts, is that Republicans sought to pass legislation that the American people wanted, and every initiative in the Contract with America had 70 percent or higher approval.
“Conversely, Pelosi, Biden, and the Big Government Socialists are trying to force radical ideas, destructive programs, and in some cases insanely dumb laws down the throats of the American people,” he observes.
“Speaker Pelosi knows an open legislative process would draw attention to just how weird her members are becoming – and would arouse a wave of opposition to most of what they are trying to do,” Gingrich insists.
Commentators ought to look at “the scale of partisanship and dictatorial control under Pelosi and be honest about who has made the House sick,” he concludes.