When Nancy Pelosi is sworn in as Speaker of the House on Thursday, she becomes not just the third most powerful US politician but also the leader of the Trump opposition. Both loved and loathed, her comeback story is an extraordinary tale of political survival.
After eight years in the political wilderness, Nancy Pelosi is back on top.
In 2007, the California Democrat made history as the first female speaker of the US House of Representatives, but it was short-lived.
This time, she's at the helm of a resurgent party with responsibility for initiating new laws through the lower chamber of Congress, not to mention guiding a slew of new investigations into the president.
And she's done so despite being written off multiple times and labelled a pedestrian public speaker prone to the occasional gaffe, having high disapproval ratings and becoming a lightning rod for Republicans.
Tying her name to embattled Democratic candidates had been an effective weapon for conservatives in the past but in the 2018 mid-term elections, it lost its punch.