Donald Trump and Nancy Pelosi met each other back when he was a Democratic donor and she was trying to raise money for a House majority. The New York Times would like to turn this story of routine political gripping-and-grinning into a dramatic narrative arc:
A decade later, long after the two first made a gilded acquaintance at Trump Tower in Manhattan, they have emerged from the administration’s first 100 days as partisan foes with divergent policy aims but one common political goal: proving their deal-making clout in a city where each has a history of being underestimated.
Round one in that common political goal goes decisively to Pelosi. But the Times’ Matt Flegenheimer and Maggie Haberman seem to cherish some idea that, because Trump gave some money to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and wrote Pelosi a congratulatory note when she became speaker of the House, the two have a meaningful relationship that is playing out today. Pelosi won’t help Trump dismantle Democratic priorities, the article says, but!
But with an ideologically shape-shifting president — and a former speaker seeking relevance in a moment when the title of House minority leader often confers little — she seems to retain at least a measure of hope that the man she met in his previous political life might re-emerge.
“I could be helpful to him,” Ms. Pelosi offered without prompting during an interview last week in her office at the Capitol, saying that she knew how to address some Republicans’ concerns over the Affordable Care Act and would gladly help if they stopped pushing for a full repeal. “We’re not here to obstruct him.”
Um, yeah. It’s beyond a stretch, more of a fantasy, really, to recast the pro forma “we can work with him if he wants to compromise for real” sentiment (with perhaps a touch of “and we’d be happy to help drive wedges between Trump and congressional Republicans”) as “seeming to retain at least a measure of hope that the man she met in his previous political life might re-emerge.”
Pelosi-Trump—in real life, vs. in the New York Times—is not some kind of dramatic tale of boon companions torn asunder by time and fate. She was looking for donors, he wanted to feel close to power. Now he’s a historically unpopular, incompetent president and she is a House minority leader looking to hold her caucus together and protect the gains of the past eight years. There’s plenty of drama, but it’s not personal, and the Times’ need to create a personal story around the two highlights the weakness of the paper’s political coverage throughout 2015 and 2016 and continuing today.