Harry Mason Reid entered the world on December 2, 1939, in the small desert town of Searchlight, Nevada. The son of a miner, he lived in a home constructed of discarded railroad ties with no toilet or hot water. These humble beginnings, along with stints playing football and boxing, imbued Reid with his trademark grit. He remarked in his memoir, The Good Fight, “When you come from Searchlight, you know you’re going to have to work twice as hard for things.” After graduating from public schools in 1961, Reid moved to Washington, D.C., to attend law school at The George Washington University. While a law student, he worked nights as a U.S. Capitol Police officer to support his family.
Reid moved back to Nevada in 1964 and entered private law practice until his election to the state assembly in 1968. He became the lieutenant governor two years later at age 30, then chairman of the Nevada Gaming Commission. He won election to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1982 and was elected to the Senate in 1986. Reid entered the leadership ranks of the Democratic Party in 1995 as co-chair of the Democratic Policy Committee. He was subsequently named Democratic whip in 1999, and then Democratic leader in 2005, serving as Senate majority leader from 2007 to 2015. He remained the party leader until his retirement from the Senate in 2017. Reid was, as noted by the New York Times, “unapologetically aggressive” in pursuing his legislative priorities. He promoted bills to protect the environment throughout his career but considered the passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2009, which ushered in the largest expansion of healthcare in 45 years, to be his greatest legislative achievement. “I have enjoyed Congress for 34 years,” Reid reflected during his final speech on the Senate floor on December 8, 2016. “As the leader of the Senate, I have had such joy and times of awe. Wow. What are we going to do now?”
