By Alex Edelman/Bloomberg/Getty Images.

Every time she’s been asked about impeachment since becoming Speaker-elect, Nancy Pelosi has shrugged off the possibility of launching an effort to oust Donald Trump. “If there’s to be grounds for impeachment of President Trump—and I’m not seeking those grounds—that would have to be so clearly bipartisan in terms of acceptance of it before I think we should go down any impeachment path,” she told USA Today shortly after Democrats took back the House. She stayed mum after Michael Cohen’s explosive testimony two weeks ago, telling reporters she “[hadn’t] seen one word of it,” and laughed off billionaire Tom Steyer’s threat to primary impeachment-wary Democrats, calling the campaign a “waste of time and money.” For those who may have missed the heavy hint-dropping, Pelosi cemented her position in a wide-ranging interview with The Washington Post published Monday, telling the outlet, “I’m not for impeachment.” She went on:

This is news. I’m going to give you some news right now because I haven’t said this to any press person before. But since you asked, and I’ve been thinking about this: Impeachment is so divisive to the country that unless there’s something so compelling and overwhelming and bipartisan, I don’t think we should go down that path, because it divides the country. And he’s just not worth it.

This is Pelosi at her most candid—and her most calculated. If Pelosi were to come out in favor of impeachment, she would risk being perceived as overly partisan, and could blow up any political advantage Democrats may gain from the various investigations into the president. The majority of the country, after all, is not in favor of impeachment—a November poll found that only 33 percent of Americans want impeachment proceedings to begin, while 51 percent do not. Those numbers were slightly higher shortly after Cohen’s hearing, when a Monmouth poll found that 42 percent of Americans think Trump should be impeached. But they’re nowhere near a nationwide mandate. It’ll take much more to get a two-thirds supermajority in the Republican-controlled Senate to vote the president out of office.

By hedging her bets, Pelosi is boosting her own bipartisan credibility, while putting much of the onus on Robert Mueller. Should the special counsel turn up, as Pelosi put it, “something so compelling and overwhelming and bipartisan,” she will have room to change her mind—a decision that is more likely to be seen as compelled by the evidence, rather than a partisan “witch hunt.” Should Mueller fail to deliver a sufficient bombshell—a distinct possibility as the investigation winds down—Pelosi won’t have overpromised. Either way, Democratic leadership can focus on winning elections, which remains their best chance of evicting Trump from the West Wing without burning their own political capital.

None of which is to say Pelosi thinks Trump is fit to be president. “[He’s] ethically unfit. Intellectually unfit. Curiosity-wise unfit. No, I don’t think he’s fit to be president of the United States,” she clarified. “And that’s up to us to make the contrast to show that this president—while he may be appealing to you on your insecurity and therefore your xenophobia, whether it’s globalization or immigrants—is fighting clean air for your children to breathe, clean water for them to drink, food safety, every good thing that we should be doing that people can’t do for themselves.” Rather, she prefers to focus on her own caucus, and on those who are materially affected by the current administration. “I don’t usually talk about him this much. This is the most I’ve probably talked about him,” she said. “I hardly ever talk about him. You know, it’s not about him.”

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