Harry Reid, the former US Senate majority leader and Nevada's longest-serving member of Congress, has died. He was 82.
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Reid died Tuesday, "peacefully" and surrounded by friends at home in suburban Henderson, "following a courageous, four-year battle with pancreatic cancer," according to family members and a statement from Landra Reid, his wife of 62 years.
"Harry was a devout family man and deeply loyal friend," she said. "We greatly appreciate the outpouring of support from so many over these past few years. We are especially grateful for the doctors and nurses that cared for him. Please know that meant the world to him," Landra Reid said.
Funeral arrangements will be announced in coming days, she said.
Harry Mason Reid, a combative former boxer-turned-lawyer, was widely acknowledged as one of toughest dealmakers in Congress, a conservative Democrat in an increasingly polarized chamber who vexed lawmakers of both parties with a brusque manner and this motto: "I would rather dance than fight, but I know how to fight."
Over a 34-year career in Washington, Reid thrived on behind-the-scenes wrangling and kept the Senate controlled by his party through two presidents − Republican George W. Bush and Democrat Barack Obama − a crippling recession and the Republican takeover of the House after the 2010 elections.
"If Harry said he would do something, he did it," US President Joe Biden said in a statement after the death of his longtime Senate colleague. "If he gave you his word, you could bank on it. That's how he got things done for the good of the country for decades."
