Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) announced Friday morning that he will not run for re-election in 2016, after 30 years of service in the chamber.
“My friend [Majority Leader] Senator McConnell, don’t be too elated — I’m gonna be here for 22 months,” Reid said humorously to his Republican rival, in a video posted on YouTube. “And you know what I’m gonna be doing? The same thing I’ve done since I first came to the Senate.”
“We have to make sure that the Democrats take control of the Senate again. And I feel it is inappropriate of me to suck up all those resources on me, when I could be devoting those resources to the caucus. And that’s what I intend to do.”
Reid was first elected to the Senate in 1986, becoming Democratic Minority Leader in late 2004. He served as Majority Leader for eight years, after the party’s victories in the 2006 midterm elections, until the Democrats lost control of the chamber in 2014.
During his time as Majority Leader, Reid presided over some of the most important social legislation in decades — most notably the Affordable Care Act, as well as the Dodd-Frank financial reform, and shepherding many other crucial parts of President Barack Obama’s agenda through Congress.
