Fashion Dare: Nancy Pelosi's Comeback Clogs

As a high school teacher of new immigrant teenagers at the start of Trump’s ICE-y second term, I need Nancy’s brand of fearlessness to face the looming threat against my students and their families.

By Jennifer Dines

On January 3rd, 2025, 84-year-old Fashion Icon and former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi made a comeback to Congress following hip surgery after a tumble down a marble staircase in Luxembourg. Pelosi no longer holds the position of Democratic party leader, but she remains (and ideally always will remain) one of Trump’s fiercest and most outspoken rivals. While her ferocity and determination has been unwavering, Nancy’s first-day-back footwear completely pivoted from her signature four-inch stilettos to a pair of Merrell Encore suede faux fur-lined clogs.

I became obsessed with these shoes when I first read about them in New York Magazine. [New York was on top of it, as usual, in covering those that quickly and I wish we had. But next time maybe! -Jane] I debated whether to buy them; after all, I owned nothing blue that would really match them, except a royal blue jogging suit my mother gave me for Christmas, and I wasn’t wearing that outside the house.

And, besides, I had my regular “uniform” of black leggings, black Nike Air Force 1s, black t-shirts, and a cropped black Mental Health Matters sweatshirt. It was a youthful look, it worked for me, and why fix something that’s not broken?

Descending down the stairs to the Used Book Seller with perfect balance, even while my daughter clings to my shoulder

Furthermore, I had never owned or even worn a clog. I associated them with the dolls of Dutch children on the It’s a Small World ride and the hippie professors at the graduate school program for elementary education I attended in the early 2000s in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

But I adore Nancy. She’s tough. She’s bold. She’s a self-described “street fighter” And we have some things in common. We’re both from Baltimore; Pelosi even attended the same all-girls Catholic high school as my mother and my aunt. Nancy and I both married Italian-American men from San Francisco. And we both unwind with junk food and the New York Times crossword puzzle.

Besides, I am a high school teacher of new immigrant teenagers. At the head of Trump’s ICE-y second term, I need Nancy’s brand of fearlessness and strength to face the looming threat against my students and their families.

So, I finally caved, ordering the shoes and then a few royal blue tops to go with them. If these shoes could power post-op Pelosi into her fourth decade of government service, might they do a little magic for me?