Nancy Pelosi Gets Schooled By Banjo Player At Oxford Union Debate: ‘Populism Is Democracy’

Former House Speaker and Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) received a cold reception from her debate stage counterpart at Oxford, where she lectured an audience on the dangers of populism in the age of Trump.

Appearing opposite the California Democrat was Winston Marshall, best known as the former banjo player for Mumford & Sons who left the band in 2021 after facing fierce blowback for tweeting in support of a book by conservative journalist Andy Ngo. After Pelosi opined that “ethno-nationalist populism” presents a clear threat to American democracy, Marshall called her out for packaging tired terms like “racist,” “hillbilly,” and “deplorables” under a new banner.

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“Words have a tendency to change meaning … When I was a boy, ‘woman’ meant ‘someone who didn’t have a c***,’ he said according to the American Tribune. “Populism has become a word used synonymously with ‘racists.’ We’ve heard ‘ethno-nationalist,’ with ‘bigot,’ with ‘hillbilly,’ ‘redneck,’ with ‘deplorables.’”

Before former President Donald Trump came on the national stage, Democrats like former President Barack Obama were attempting to elevate Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) as examples of populists working for the people. Now that Trump has done the same, Marshall claimed, populism is an ugly word.

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“If you watch Obama’s speeches after that point, more and more recently, he uses the word “populist” interchangeably with “strong man,” with “authoritarian.” The word changes meaning, it becomes a negative, a pejorative, a slur,” he added. Indeed, it is the failure of elites like Rep. Pelosi that have left Americans more distrustful than ever of government and major institutions. “To me, populism is not a dirty word. Since the 2008 crash and specifically the trillion-dollar Wall Street bailout, we are in the populist age, and for good reason. The elites have failed,” he continued. “Elites use it to show their contempt for ordinary people.”

The two commentators debated Pelosi’s refusal to condemn violent protests who in June 2021 seized a Portland courthouse and refused to relinquish blocks of the downtown where supposed self-governance let crime run rampant.

“I’m sure Congresswoman Pelosi will agree that the entire month of June 2020, when the federal courthouse in Portland, Oregon was under siege and under insurrection by radical progressives, those too were dark days for America,” Marshall said. Pelosi fired back, “You are not, there is no equivalence there, so, but it is not like what happened on January 6th which was an insurrection incited by the President of the United States.”

“My point, though, is that all political movements are susceptible to violence, and indeed insurrection. And if we were arguing that fascism was a threat to democracy, I’d be on that side of the House,” he fired back. “Populism as you know, is the politics of the ordinary people against an elite, populism is not a threat to democracy. Populism is democracy, and why else have universal suffrage, if not to keep elites in check?” he asked.