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WASHINGTON — When Joe Biden delivers his first speech as president to Congress on Wednesday, history will be made behind him.
For the first time during a joint address to Congress, the majority of politicians on the dais in the House of Representatives will be women, as Kamala Harris and Nancy Pelosi take their respective seats as vice president and House speaker.
Although the main event will be Biden celebrating his first 100 days in office and laying out his vision for the coming months, the moment will be almost as significant for the two Bay Area Democrats.
Harris, 56, an East Bay native and former San Francisco district attorney, is the first woman and first woman of color to hold the vice presidency and is widely seen as the Democrat most likely to succeed Biden when he leaves the presidency. Her first 100 days have brought her tough assignments already, including addressing migration to the U.S. from Central America and messaging the administration’s efforts to stem the coronavirus pandemic.
Pelosi, 81, who represents San Francisco, could be in her last term and is working to implement Biden’s ambitious policy agenda with one of the narrowest Democratic majorities in history. Her ability to craft legislation and hold together her at-times fractious caucus will determine what accomplishments her party can point to as it heads into midterm elections in which House control could tip either way.
The two women will also wield a symbolic power by virtue of their presence.
“These are two of the most powerful women in America, or two of the most powerful individuals in America,” said Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Oakland. “They’re of course from the Bay Area, which I take a lot of pride in saying. … And so it’s an emotional moment, but it’s also a reflective moment for the price so many people, so many women especially, paid to get to this point, and it’s long overdue.”
Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., told The Chronicle’s “It’s All Political” podcast that she feels a bond with Harris, like her a woman of South Asian descent who was first elected to Congress in 2016.
“To be in the position where finally we have Joe Biden as president, Kamala Harris as vice president, and then, of course, Nancy Pelosi, a woman who has broken many ceilings herself, behind the president, I think is very, very significant,” Jayapal said. “I’m so excited to be there for that moment.”
Biden is expected to focus on his American Families Plan, a $1.8 trillion follow-up to the $2 trillion infrastructure package that Pelosi and other Democrats hope to push through Congress. Biden’s new proposal is expected to have billions for Democratic priorities, including paid family leave and affordable child care, policies that could be especially transformative for working mothers.
A’shanti Gholar is the president of Emerge, a group that promotes Democratic women running for office. She said Harris’ and Pelosi’s presence is a sign of the progress women have made in politics and a powerful symbol for young girls. She also said that given the makeup of the Democratic electorate, it’s smart for the Biden-Harris administration to tackle family issues.
“We know Biden and Harris are there because women put them there,” Gholar said. “What we have seen over the first 100 days, for me it’s not shocking. … They are normalizing talking about these issues that impact women, communities and families.”
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Pelosi has set a goal of passing Biden’s legislation in the House by July 4, and Wednesday’s speech will set the stage for a lawmaking sprint to write a bill and send it to the Senate. Democrats are expected to use a procedural method to bypass the usual 60-vote threshold to advance legislation in the evenly divided 100-member Senate and pass the bill without Republican support if necessary, which would require Harris to cast the tie-breaking 51st vote.
Biden’s 6 p.m. PDT speech will lack some of the typical pomp and circumstance of a presidential address to Congress, as only 200 people will be allowed into the House chamber because of the pandemic. But Pelosi said that wouldn’t diminish the event.
“It will be its own wonderful character,” Pelosi told reporters in the Capitol on Tuesday. “We went from 1,600 people to 200 people. That is a different dynamic, but it has its own worth.”
Since retaking the speakership in 2018, Pelosi has demonstrated the power of the seat behind the president. In 2019, dressed all in white in a nod to women’s suffrage, Pelosi upstaged President Donald Trump with a sarcastic clap in his direction. In 2020, once again wearing white, Pelosi tore up her copy of the president’s speech once he had finished speaking, after he appeared to snub her handshake at the beginning of the night.
It will be a very different scene Wednesday, as she and Harris will lead the performative applause expected from members of the president’s party. Less symbolically, in the days following, they will have to get to work making Biden look good in policy.
Although Pelosi has hinted that this term will be her last, neither Lee nor Jayapal said they know her plans. But “she certainly has really embraced a legacy-making agenda in this Congress,” Jayapal said. “Things like the child tax credit, she really wants to get action on climate change. … She’s very committed to passing the $15 minimum wage.”
Gholar said Harris’ and Pelosi’s presence won’t just be a symbolic visual.
“It’s not performative. It’s not, ‘Oh, there’s these two women sitting behind the president because it’s a good look,’” Gholar said. “When we talk about women in politics and women in elected office, getting to those positions is hard. … They’re using their power in such a positive way, and that is redefining what it means to be a powerful woman. It means that you can sit behind this dais and be so influential in moving our country forward.”
San Francisco Chronicle senior politics writer Joe Garofoli contributed to this report.