Obama: Pelosi Will Regain Speakership

President Barack Obama attended two fundraisers on Wednesday on San Francisco’s “Billionaires’ Row” and said it would be a “whole lot easier” to govern if House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) became House Speaker after 2014. 

Obama even said he expected Pelosi “is going to be once again the Speaker of the House.”

The President attended fundraisers for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) at the homes of Tom Steyer, who is pushing Obama to more aggressively back “climate change” bills, and Ann and Gordon Getty.

Democrats need to win 17 seats to take back the House in 2014, and Obama is prioritizing that goal, since the Republican-controlled House remains his primary legislative obstacle. While Democrats accomplished little while they held control of the House and a Senate supermajority from 2009-2010, the President may pursue a more aggressive legislative agenda with control of both houses now that he does not have to face his own reelection in 2016.

“My intention here is to try to get as much done with the Republican Party over the next two years as I can, because we can’t have perpetual campaigns,” Obama said, according to The Hill. “But I would be dishonest if I didn’t say that it would be a whole lot easier to govern if I had Nancy Pelosi as Speaker.”

Obama said he just wanted to “get stuff done” when it came to bills dealing with immigration and climate change.

According to The Hill, tickets cost between $5,000 and $32,400 for both of Wednesday’s Pacific Heights fundraisers. Obama will hold two events on Thursday in Atherton, California. At one event, 30 people will pay $32,400 each to have brunch with Obama. At the second event, attendees will pay between $1,000 and $20,000 to meet Obama. 

RNC Chair Reince Priebus accused Obama of hypocrisy. 

“On the campaign trail Obama’s favorite applause line was attacking the very people he’s now begging for campaign cash,” Priebus said. “Hypocrisy at its finest. Barack Obama has his priorities completely backward — prioritizing billionaires over the taxpayers who demand and deserve a budget and canceling White House tours while he spends $180,000 an hour flying Air Force One to fundraise on Billionaires Row.”