Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Democrat of California, pointed the finger at President Biden for not dropping out of the race sooner during an election postmortem with The New York Times on Thursday.

Pelosi said host Lulu Garcia-Navarro on the Times’ “The Interview” podcast, “If the president had stepped down earlier, there might have been other candidates in the race.”

As the former speaker said, “It was expected that if the president stepped down, there would be open primaries.” Pelosi played a key role in ousting Biden after his infamous debate performance.

Instead, less than an hour after announcing his resignation on July 21, Biden endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris. Less than 36 hours later, she announced she had locked the applicationsecuring the commitment of support from a majority of DNC delegates.

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“And like I said, Kamala maybe would have done it, I think she would have done well (a primary) and would have been stronger in the future. But we don’t know. “It didn’t happen. We live with what happened,” Pelosi told the Times. “And because the president immediately endorsed Kamala Harris, it really made it almost impossible to hold a primary at that time. If it had happened much earlier, it would have been different.”

Fox News Digital has contacted Biden and the Harris campaign for comment.

Pelosi repeatedly insisted after Harris secured the nomination that there had been an open process but no one else had put their hat in the ring to seize this opportunity.

“Many of us who were concerned about the election wanted to have an open process. It was an open process, anyone could participate in it,” Pelosi said at a news conference. interview with the Wall Street Journal in August.

“(Harris) had the support of the president, and she, politically astute, took advantage of it and closed her doors – not closed, but won the nomination. But anyone else could have come in,” continued Pelosi.

She reiterated those comments on “The View” in September and added, “I was one of the first to support one of the leaders, right? Within 24 hours.”

‘ANYONE COULD HAVE COULD HAVE ENTERED:’ PELOSI INSISTS HARRIS WON DEMOCRATIC NOMINATION IN AN ‘OPEN PROCESS’

Former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and President Biden. (Getty Images)

Pressed again that month, Pelosi said she was pleased it had happened so quickly.

“No, I haven’t changed my mind. We had an open primary and (Kamala Harris) won it. Nobody else participated in the race,” Pelosi said. “Yes, people could have participated — there were people who were sort of preparing, but she just took off with it, and actually, it It was a blessing because there wasn’t much time. between that date and the elections and that kind of saved us some time. »

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Pelosi’s podcast “The Interview” will air Saturday.