President Barack Obama heaped praise on Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) Wednesday during a San Francisco fundraiser for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, making it clear that he had a strong interest in helping Democrats regain control of the House in order to give Pelosi the speakership again.
"My job is to make sure we move the country forward, and I think we can best do that if Nancy Pelosi is speaker of the House once again," Obama said, explaining his belief that she supported a number of broad second-term policy goals that have already been waylaid by partisan division in Congress.
Obama went on to lay out a laundry list of agenda items, from gun control, to early childhood education, to climate change and patching up the nation's cracking infrastructure, conceding that they weren't always politically popular.
And while Obama said he "would love nothing better than an effective, loyal opposition that is willing to meet us halfway and move the country forward," he suggested that the GOP's actual brand of combat left him willing to admit that it would be "whole lot easier to govern" with Pelosi at the helm.
"My hope is that we’re going to see more and more Republicans who say, you know what, I didn’t come here just to fight the president or demonize Nancy Pelosi, I came here to get some stuff done," the president said. "And they will be greeted with great enthusiasm by me and I think by Nancy, if we could get some more stuff done right now. But, realistically, I could get a whole lot more done if Nancy Pelosi is Speaker of the House."
Read more about Obama's DCCC fundraising swing here, and check out Obama's full transcript from his San Francisco appearance here.
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