Nancy Pelosi also recounted the confusion she felt when she was informed of her husband's brutal attack, from which he suffered a fractured skull.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was emotional as she gave her first television interview since her husband, Paul Pelosi, was brutally attacked with a hammer in their San Francisco home on Friday, October 28. Recalling learning about the incident, she said she was at first confused when she heard loud bangs on her apartment door in Washington, D.C. “I look up, I see it’s 5, they must be at the wrong apartment,” she recalled to CNN‘s Anderon Cooper. “So I run to the door, and I’m very scared. I see the Capitol Police and they say, ‘We have to come in to talk to you.'”
The 82-year-old politician said she was shocked to learn her husband, also 82, had been attacked. “I was very scared,” she remembered with tears in her eyes. “I’m thinking my children, my grandchildren. I never thought it would be Paul because, you know, I knew he wouldn’t be out and about, shall we say. And so they came in. At that time, we didn’t even know where he was.”
David DePape, 42, was quickly identified as the attacker. He intended to abduct Nancy and “break her kneecaps” if she “lied” to him about the information he wanted from her, according to court documents obtained by the Daily Mail. He referred to her as the “‘leader of the pack’ of lies told by the Democratic Party” when speaking to investigators. He also reportedly targeted the Democratic leader to “show other Members of Congress there were consequences to actions.”
Instead, David got hold of Paul and beat him with a hammer, fracturing his skull. He was cared for at the Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital by the intensive care unit and was discharged on Nov. 3, six days after the frightening assault. The surgery he had “was a success, but it’s only one part of the recovery to a drastic head injury.” Nancy said she was grateful when doctors “told us it had not pierced his brain, which can be deadly.”
“He’s so concerned about the traumatic effect on our children and our grandchildren, and we’re concerned about the traumatic effect on him,” she continued before admitting she hasn’t had a conversation with Paul about what was going through his mind during the attack. “We haven’t quite had that conversation because any revisiting of it is really traumatizing,” she explained.
“For me this is really the hard part because Paul was not the target and he’s the one who is paying the price,” Nancy also said, in the interview. “He was not looking for Paul, he was looking for me,” she added later. She also admitted to being very emotional when talking about the shocking situation. “I’ve been close to tears a number of times in this conversation,” she said.
When asked if she listened to the 911 call placed by Paul after the attack, Nancy said she hasn’t and is not sure if she will ever have to. “I don’t think so. I don’t know if I’ll have to. I just don’t know. That’s all a matter on the legal side of things,” she said. “Paul saved his own life with that call.”
Nancy went on to also admit she wasn’t happy about the way some Republicans reacted to the attack on Paul. “You see what the reaction is on the other side to this, to make a joke of it, and really that is traumatizing too,” she said. “In our democracy there is one party that is doubting the outcome of the election, feeding that flame, and mocking any violence that happens. That has to stop.”
David pleaded not guilty to a myriad of charges relating to the attack on Paul, including attempted murder, burglary, and assault, per the Daily Mail, and is being held without bail. He is facing up to 50 years in prison for federal charges, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of California. “DePape is charged with one count of assault of an immediate family member of a United States official with the intent to retaliate against the official on account of the performance of official duties, which carries a maximum sentence of 30 years in prison,” the office told Fox News in a statement. “DePape is also charged with one count of attempted kidnapping of a United States official on account of the performance of official duties, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.”
Nancy’s interview came on the eve of the 2022 midterm elections. She revealed that the outcome of the election and the horrific attack on her husband will determine if she retires from politics following a decades-long career. “Decision will be affected about what happened the last week or two,” she said.
As far as an update on her husband’s condition, Nancy said he’s doing “okay” but is in it for “the long haul” as he continues recover. “He knows he has to pace himself. He’s such a gentleman that he’s not complaining,” she said.
