What happened to Nancy Pelosi?

Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was hospitalized in Luxembourg Friday, where she was traveling with a congressional delegation. Pelosi, 84, tripped and fell down marble stairs at the Grand Ducal Palace, an anonymous source told The New York Times.

Pelosi’s office confirmed the incident, and said Pelosi was hospitalized but provided no further details about her condition, the nature of her injuries, or what may have caused her to fall. Pelosi, a Democrat reelected this year for her 20th term, was in Luxembourg with a congressional delegation to observe the 80th anniversary of the Battle of the Bulge in World War II.

“Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi sustained an injury during an official engagement and was admitted to the hospital for evaluation,” Pelosi spokesperson Ian Krager said in a statement. “Speaker Emerita Pelosi is currently receiving excellent treatment from doctors and medical professionals,” Krager said.

Pelosi, Speaker of the House for 20 years and the first woman ever to hold the role, retired as speaker two years ago when Republicans narrowly regained control in the 2022 midterm elections. The Steering and Policy Committee of the House Democratic Caucus officially named Pelosi “Speaker Emerita” that same year.

D.C. has “fallen”

Pelosi is the second prominent U.S. politician to fall recently, underscoring the advanced age of many American politicians. Three days earlier, Kentucky Republican Senator Mitch McConnell fell at the Capitol and sustained minor injuries.

McConnell, 82, long plagued with health issues, has fallen before, and has said he will step down as Senate Republican leader in 2025, when the next session convenes. McConnell’s current term ends in 2027, and he is expected to retire from politics, although McConnell has made no official statement.

Age was a major factor in the 2024 presidential election when Biden, 82, dropped out of the race primarily for mental and physical health concerns. Donald Trump, 78, is the oldest president-elect in U.S. history.

As of Friday morning, President-elect Trump, Biden, McConnell, current House Speaker Mike Johnson, or current Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer had not commented on Pelosi’s injuries.

Social media quickly made the story a partisan issue, and latched on to the news to highlight America’s growing gerontocracy and to call for term limits.

Typical comments included, “The Federal Manor, otherwise known as the US House and Senate definitely needs term limits!” And then the following,

The Pew Research Center says 87% of Americans on both sides of the political spectrum support congressional term limits. Adding term limits would require a difficult amendment to the U.S. Constitution, requiring a two-thirds vote in the U.S. House and U.S. Senate and a majority vote in 38 state legislatures.

Despite its popularity, Casey Burgat, director of the Legislative Affairs program at the Graduate School of Political Management at George Washington University, opposes the term-limit idea.

Burgat told NPR, ” … [W]hen you term-limit someone, you are effectively cutting out their incentive to invest in learning how to do the job, to delve into policy issues at the depth that they need to and to really dive into how the procedures work, which just takes years. Because, again, there’s no training ground for this. There’s no training program.”