Before Nancy Pelosi became one of the most powerful women on Capitol Hill, she was a stay-at-home mother of five, married to banker husband Paul Pelosi and running a Democratic Party Club out of her home in San Francisco. As she’s put it, she went from “housewife to House member to House Speaker.” That she managed to keep her marriage going in the middle of that transformation is perhaps a testament to her views on commitment.
“A successful marriage is a decision,” Nancy told The New York Times in 2014. “You decide it’s going to work. You can’t always be there, but you have to be there enough. And you have to make sure you are where you’re needed most. Sometimes it’s here, sometimes it’s there; sometimes it’s a tie and you have to prioritize. But it’s always a decision. My husband and I met in college. We couldn’t have thought of every possible thing back then. But here we are. We just had our 50th wedding anniversary. It’s worked.”
Keep reading to learn more about Pelosi’s husband Paul and the brutal attack that shook their family to the core.
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Who is Nancy Pelosi’s husband?
Nancy Pelosi is married to Paul Pelosi, owner of a real estate and venture capital investment firm. They’ve been together for more than six decades.
How long have Nancy and Paul Pelosi been married?
The couple tied the knot at the Cathedral of Mary Our Queen in Baltimore, Maryland, on Sept. 7, 1963, more than 61 years ago.
How did Nancy and Paul Pelosi meet?
In a meet-cute straight out of a rom-com, the lovebirds first exchanged glances in 1961, while enrolled in a summer school class at Georgetown called “The History of Africa, South of the Sahara.” Paul proposed at St. Joseph’s Church, just outside the U.S. Capitol. Little did he know, his bride-to-be would eventually become one of the most persuasive people in D.C.
Addressing her political stardom in 2009, Paul told The Washington Post: “I understand, of course, that since a woman has had such phenomenal success [people wonder], ‘Who is this guy she’s married to for 47 years and has five kids?’ I understand the curiosity about that. But it’s her celebrity. It’s her career. It’s her responsibility. I’m enormously supportive and proud about it but I see absolutely no percentage in trying to share the limelight.”
What company does Paul Pelosi own?
Paul is the founder of the San Francisco-based real estate and venture capital investment firm Financial Leasing Services. He’s had enormous success (and accumulated great wealth) investing in companies like Facebook, Google, Amazon, Apple and Microsoft.
How many biological children do Nancy Pelosi and her husband have?
Nancy and Paul Pelosi share five children: Nancy Corinne, Christine, Jacqueline, Paul Jr. and Alexandra.
Manny Ceneta/Getty Images
Did Nancy Pelosi’s husband get a DUI?
Yes. In 2022, Paul Pelosi pleaded guilty to driving under the influence. The accident, in which his Porsche struck a Jeep, happened near his Napa Valley vineyard. His blood alcohol level was 0.082 percent, while the legal limit in California is 0.08 percent.
He was sentenced to five days in jail and three years probation, and ordered to complete a DUI program and pay about $7,000 in fines.
What happened to Nancy Pelosi’s husband?
Paul Pelosi suffered a brutal attack in October 2022, when conspiracy theorist David DePape broke into the Pelosi family’s San Francisco home with zip ties and a hammer asking “Where’s Nancy?” (she was in Washington, D.C. at the time). Paul managed to call 911, and when police arrived, they found him and DePape struggling for control of the hammer. The officers ordered DePape to drop the weapon, but the assailant instead attacked Paul, fracturing his skull and causing injuries to his arm and hand. He spent six days in the hospital and suffered neurological damage.
“It’s a horrible thing,” Pelosi told The New Yorker of the incident. “The physical damage is one thing. There’s also the trauma of it all for our children, our grandchildren. It’s really sad. It happened in our home. In our home.”
During his federal trial, DePape said his intention had been to hold Nancy Pelosi hostage, question her on camera (while wearing a unicorn costume — no, really) and “break her kneecaps” if she didn’t admit to certain things he believed to be lies.
What was Paul Pelosi’s attacker David DePape charged with?
In October 2024, at the age of 44, DePape was sentenced by the state of California to life in prison without the possibility of parole. He was convicted of aggravated kidnapping, first degree residential burglary, false imprisonment of an elder by violence or menace, threatening the life of a family member of a public official and dissuading a witness by force or threat.
He’d previously been sentenced to 30 years in federal prison for assault and attempted kidnapping charges.
“He was never my target and I’m sorry he got hurt,” DePape said at his sentencing. “I reacted because my plan was basically ruined.”
Speaking to The New Yorker, Pelosi has said that she and her husband haven’t talked about the details of that night outside of what he testified to in court.
“I think he knows it would be very painful to me to hear what he went through,” she said. “The guy was after me—and he gets my husband? Really?”
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