Nancy Pelosi has announced she will not run for office again, choosing not to contest California’s District 11 House seat after 38 years in Congress. Pelosi’s decision brings the curtain down on one of the most storied political careers in U.S. history and will leave a huge vacuum in San Francisco’s Democratic politics (the 11th Congressional District encompasses most of the city of San Francisco).

The race to succeed her had already begun and may even have influenced her decision to step down. At age 85 she would have faced energetic, and younger, contenders who have already started campaigning to replace her in District 11. Saikat Chakrabarti, former Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez chief of staff, and State Sen. Scott Wiener are already in the race. Now that Pelosi has formally stood aside others are expected to enter.

She will leave behind an enormous legislative legacy and a reputation as a skilled and ferocious political operative. Pelosi was first elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in a special election on June 2, 1987, and has served ever since.

She was a key figure throughout the Obama and Biden administrations and played a crucial role in advancing legislation during both presidencies. After observing her role in helping get the Affordable Care Act passed, arguably her single biggest achievement, in 2010, then-President Obama said, “She’s the single most effective Speaker of the House in modern times.”

Pelosi first became Speaker of the House in January 2007 and regained the speakership in 2019 after the Democrats won control of the House in the 2018 midterms. In January 2019, after the Democrats’ midterm win, her daughter was asked how Pelosi, the incoming House Speaker, would approach negotiations with then-President Trump. “She’ll cut your head off and you won’t even know you’re bleeding,” Alexandra Pelosi said.

Pelosi’s career was marked by quiet ruthlessness. She often seemed to operate in the shadows, but her power was unmistakable. When President Joe Biden showed signs of wanting to cling to another presidential run after his disastrous debate performance last June, it was Pelosi who cut him down to size. Reporting on her role in unseating President Biden, POLITICO noted at the time, “We’ve covered Pelosi for a long time now and can tell you her fingerprints are all over the knife.”

In a similar vein, although Gov. Gavin Newsom will take the plaudits for the success of the passing of Prop 50, it was Pelosi who played a crucial and, again, behind-the-scenes role in ensuring its success. In an investigation into how the campaign unfolded, The New York Times revealed the details of a Prop 50 summit between Newsom and Pelosi in early August.

They met at the governor’s mansion in Sacramento to try and drum up financial support for the ballot initiative — at that stage the ballot measure was looking nothing like the slam dunk it proved to be for Democrats. According to the Times, the two sat together and “began dialing some of the nation’s wealthiest Democrats for dollars. Ms. Pelosi would begin with pleasantries, according to three people granted anonymity to discuss private fundraising calls made that day. Then she would hand the phone to Mr. Newsom to close the deal.”

Pelosi also played a key role in getting both congressional and state California Democratic representatives and officials onside. Assemblywoman Buffy Wicks told the Times: “She gave a rallying cry about what’s at stake and why we needed to do it. She is the queen bee for California.”

Her approach to Prop 50, allowing Newsom to lead, but helping shape the campaign, putting the building blocks in place and getting different factions on board, was classic Pelosi.

When she announced she was stepping down as Speaker in November 2022, The New York Times described her as “the dominant political operator, legislative tactician and face of House Democrats for two decades, and the first woman to serve as speaker.”

One of her foremost legacies will be the role she played in encouraging women to enter politics. In her speech on Jan. 4, 2007, when she was sworn in as the first female Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, she remarked: “For our daughters and our granddaughters, today we have broken the marble ceiling. For our daughters and our granddaughters now, the sky is the limit — anything is possible for them.”

Washington Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal, part of the progressive Democratic caucus in the House, in a statement marking Pelosi’s retirement as House Speaker in 2022, thanked her for breaking barriers along the way. “I know that my presence here, and the presence of so many other women and people of color in the Capitol, would not be possible without Speaker Pelosi’s example. She paved the way for all of us, and for a generation of girls to see themselves in the highest levels of leadership in this country.”

Laphonza Butler, president of EMILY’s List, the political organization that supports and works to elect Democratic, pro-choice women to office at all levels of government, also noted Pelosi’s influence as she stepped down as Speaker: “Speaker Pelosi has not only broken the glass ceiling, she’s built a ladder for countless women to follow her into elected office. Her leadership has transformed what’s possible for women in American politics.”

Pelosi’s decision to step down may also have been influenced by the horrific attack that took place on her husband when an intruder broke into the Pelosi family home in San Francisco in October 2022, seeking to kidnap the then-House Speaker. When he found only her husband Paul Pelosi, he attacked the 82-year-old man with a hammer, causing serious injuries including a skull fracture.

Pelosi’s wrath was felt not only by her opponents but members of her own party too. Famously, she took aim at the so-called squad (Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib and Ayanna Pressley) in 2019 when they voted against an emergency bill to provide humanitarian aid and funding to immigration authorities at the border. The four were the only House Democrats to vote against the final iteration of the bill. Weeks later in an interview with Maureen Dowd of the New York Times, she offered a withering putdown, “All these people have their public whatever and their Twitter world. But they didn’t have any following. They’re four people, and that’s how many votes they got.”

She had a fractious relationship with President Donald Trump. In January 2019, she barred him from delivering a State of the Union speech in the House chamber until that year’s government shutdown ended.

Pelosi said of the former president’s behavior after he stormed out of a meeting with Democrats trying to resolve the shutdown, “I’m a mother of five, grandmother of nine. I know a temper tantrum when I see one.” Famously, when he had finished delivering the following year’s State of the Union address, Pelosi, standing behind him on a podium, theatrically ripped the paper it was printed on in two.

Susan Page, USA Today D.C. Bureau Chief and author of Madam Speaker: Nancy Pelosi and the Lessons of Power, is someone who saw Pelosi up close over decades. In her biography, she wrote: “She understands power, how to build it, how to wield it, and when to walk away.”

Today, she walked away.

John Mulholland is managing editor of State Affairs California and is based in Sacramento. Have questions? Contact him at jmulholland@stateaffairs.com or on X @jnmulholland.