U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi
U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi may be the savviest Democratic elected official of the last 10 years or more. Not only has Pelosi gotten many good Democratic bills passed in the House, she also gave Donald Trump a well-deserved toddler time out more than once. But one of the best things Speaker Pelosi has done is to communicate her points in an effective way. A great example is her phrase “vote no and take the dough” which Pelosi uses to describe Republicans who vote against Democratic-sponsored federal relief and funding, but who then brag, try to take credit, and even engage in ceremonies when such funding arrives in their state or district.
Speaker Pelosi’s first use of “vote no and take the dough” seems to be from last March, when, after every U.S. House and Senate Republican voted no on President Joe Biden‘s COVID relief package and the legislation passed with only Democratic votes, many of those same Republicans went and and bragged to their constituents about the benefits they were bringing in when the money was distributed. Likewise, with the recently passed Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act beginning to dole out many millions of dollars to local Congressional districts for flood relief and other crucial projects, Speaker Pelosi is keeping a list of House Republicans who voted against the legislation, but who are publicly celebrating the incoming funds. There’s a word for folks who do that, and that word is “hypocrite.”
Now, Biden White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki, and at least one White House reporter, have picked up Speaker Pelosi’s mantle. On Wednesday, during Secretary Psaki’s daily White House Press Briefing, one reporter noted that Florida Republican U.S. Senator Marco Rubio actually complained that Florida “was shortchanged on bridge funding” in the Infrastructure package. The reporter, recognizing Rubio’s hypocrisy, then asked:
Does the White House have any response to lawmakers who opposed the bill in the first place complaining that their share of the bill isn’t higher?
The ever-sharp Psaki didn’t miss a beat. She replied:
It’s pretty rich, isn’t it?
Psaki went on to say:
You know, I think Mitch Landrieu, when he was here, quoted, I think, a Nancy Pelosi quote, so I’m just going to quote it. You know, I — you know, now I can’t even remember it.
But the point is, even if you vote against it, you still want the money. We’ve seen that over the course of time. That’s speaks to how political a lot of these votes were, given this is funding that will help rebuild a lot of these communities.
And the President will certainly be making clear who was with him and who wasn’t with him.
We like to call out effective Democratic communication when we see it, and this is a great example. Kudos to Speaker Pelosi for coming up with a memorable phrase to describe Republican behavior, to the extent that a White House reporter picked up on the idea, and to Secretary Psaki for referencing and repeating it to the best of her recollection. “Vote no and take the dough” has now been added to our list of effective Political Phrases Used by Democrats, and hopefully it will be around for some time, as Republican hypocrisy is not likely to go away anytime soon.
Photo by Nancy Pelosi, used under Creative Commons license. https://is.gd/jwJufG
