Nancy Pelosi, the first woman to serve as Speaker of the US House of Representatives, has announced her retirement from Congress after a decades-long career.
The Democratic icon said in a video message on Thursday that she would not be running for re-election in 2026.
“I will not be seeking re-election to Congress. With a grateful heart, I look forward to my final year of service.”
Pelosi, 85, was first elected to Congress to represent San Francisco in 1987, before she was elected by her party to be speaker of the House in 2007, becoming the first woman to serve in the role.
In 2011, Democrats lost control of the lower chamber, and Pelosi returned to the speaker’s chair from 2019 to 2023.
Just before announcing her retirement, Pelosi played a key role in helping to pass California’s Proposition 50, which is a state redistricting effort aimed at flipping five House seats to Democrats during the midterms in 2026.
“As we go forward, my message to the city I love is this: San Francisco, know your power,” Pelosi said in her retirement message.
“We have made history, we have made progress.”
“We have always led the way, and now we must continue to do so by remaining full participants in our democracy, and fighting for the American ideals we hold dear.”
A storied career
Over the course of her career, Pelosi gained a reputation as defender of human rights and an early advocate of gay rights, especially at the time of the 1981 AIDS/HIV pandemic in her hometown of San Francisco.
Pelosi has said she views her greatest accomplishment as helping former President Barack Obama to win enactment of the 2010 Affordable Care Act, otherwise known as “Obamacare”.
Other landmark legislation Pelosi has been across includes the Dodd-Frank financial reforms in the aftermath of the 2008 global financial crisis and the repeal of the military’s Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy against LGBTQ service members.
A long-time critic of Donald Trump, Pelosi has been forthright in her resistance to his political agenda. She tried twice to remove Trump’s power, with House impeachments in late 2019 and early 2021, only to have Senate Republicans acquit him.
In the 2018 midterm elections, Pelosi helped recruit and propel dozens of women to office as Democrats in resistance to Trump’s first term, saying on the campaign trail that if House Democrats won, she would show the “power of the gavel”.
Adding to their public animosity, Trump was seen in 2020 refusing to shake her hand before his State of the Union address.
In what became iconic imagery, Pelosi then stood up in Congress, at the conclusion of Trump’s speech, to tear her printed copy to pieces. She later said she did so because every page of his speech contained a “lie”.
In 2022, increasing political partisanship in the US affected Pelosi’s family when a right-wing conspiracy theorist broke into her home and struck her husband Paul Pelosi over the head with a hammer, which he later recovered from.
Three years ago, Pelosi announced she was retiring from Democratic leadership, including two four-year stints as speaker. This move made way for Representative Hakeem Jeffries of New York to assume her former role as House Democratic leader.
“Nancy Pelosi is an iconic, legendary, transformational figure who has done so many things over so many years to make life better for so many people,” Jeffries said at a press conference on Monday about Pelosi’s 2026 intentions.