Nancy Pelosi has gone missing from Joe Biden's life.
After decades of friendship, their relationship broke down this summer as Pelosi pressured Biden to drop his re-election bid - and they have not spoken since.
"Not since then, no,” she told the Jonathan Freedland of the Guardian. "But I’m prayerful about it.”
The former House Speaker flexed her influence over the summer after Joe Biden's disastrous debate performance on CNN led to panic in the Democratic party.
Pelosi was seen as the driving figure behind the effort to push Biden out of the presidential race. At the time, Pelosi raised eyebrows by urging Biden to make a decision about dropping out, even after he sent a defiant message to Congress stating his intention to keep running.
Biden relented after weeks of pressure that left Biden and his family feeling shocked and betrayed. Pelosi showed no remorse in her Guardian interview, insisting she was protecting Biden's "consequential" legacy.
“I have the greatest respect for him. I think he’s one of the great consequential presidents of our country,” she said. “I think his legacy had to be protected. I didn’t see that happening in the course that it was on, the election was on," she said.
"My call was just to: ‘Let’s get on a better course.’ He will make the decision as to what that is. And he made that decision. But I think he has some unease because we’ve been friends for decades."
A famously cutthroat political operator, Pelosi explained that her desire to keep Donald Trump out of the White House drove her decision-making.
"I decided a while ago that Donald Trump will never set foot in the White House again as president of the United States or in any other capacity … So when you make a decision, you have to make every decision in favor of winning … and the most important decision of all is the candidate.”
Tensions have also lingered between Biden and Kamala Harris, despite his endorsement of her. Some have speculated that Biden is sabotaging Harris by overshadowing her at key moments of her campaign.
Pelosi, a Catholic who strongly supports abortion, said she fears punishment in the afterlife, but not for the reason some might expect.
The sworn Trump enemy said she thinks of Trump's name like a bad word that she dares not utter.
"I’m afraid, you know, when I grew up Catholic, as I am now, if you said a bad word, you could burn in hell if you didn’t have a chance to confess. So I don’t want to take any chances," she explained.
