Pelosi & Trump Have Not Had A Conversation In Over A Year, Opting To Use Middlemen Instead

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-California) and President Donald Trump have not spoken to each other in over a year, underscoring the increased partisanship and polarization that has taken hold on Capitol Hill.

“I don’t speak to the president. I speak to his representative,” Pelosi told CNN in October.

Last month, she noted that it is easier just to work with Trump’s representatives.

“Quite frankly, my experience with the president has been that it hasn’t been on the level,” she told MSNBC. “You know, he’ll say something and then it doesn’t really happen. So in the interest of time, we’ll work with who he sends over.”

The two have not had an extended conversation since Oct. 16, 2019, which ended with the two sides disagreeing over whether Trump called Pelosi a “third rate” or “third grade” politician, and Pelosi telling reporters that “we have to pray for his health.”

That October conversation focused on Trump’s decision to withdraw U.S. troops from northern Syria and ended with the president saying, “I hate ISIS more than you do,” while Pelosi accused him of being influenced by Russia.

The two politicians last were in the same room together in early February at the National Prayer Breakfast, where Trump not-so-subtly referenced Pelosi’s comment from October, declaring that he does not like people “who say ‘I pray for you’ when they know that’s not so.”

Trump has justified his habit of not speaking to Pelosi or Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-New York) as “taking the high road.”

“I know Pelosi, I know Schumer very well. They don’t want to make a deal because they think it’s good for politics if they don’t make a deal,” Trump said last month about negotiating coronavirus relief. “I’m taking the high road by not seeing them. That’s the high road.”

Rep. Dean Phillips (D-Minnesota) lamented about the lack of dialogue saying, “It’s a sad commentary on the circumstances of our governance.”

He continued: “The more that politics becomes kind of a brutal sport rather than a public service, the more trouble we’re going to be in. We’re seeing the evidence of that right now.”