Harry Reid, the former Senate Majority Leader and the longest-serving Nevada legislator in Congress, has died at age 82.
The ex-boxer-turned-lawyer was widely recognized as one of the most combative negotiators in Congress, a conservative Democrat in an increasingly polarized chamber who irritated legislators from both parties abruptly and with this slogan:
"I'd rather dance than fight, but I know how to fight."
[Robert Moses, one of the historic leaders of the civil rights struggle in the 1960s, dies at 86]
Former Senator Harry Reid, who represented Nevada as a Democrat, in a November 2004 file photo.
SCOTT APPLEWHITE / AP
He had a political career that lasted 34 years, in which he managed to maintain control of the Senate for his party during two administrations, that of Republican George W. Bush and that of Democrat Barack Obama.
He retired in 2016 after an accident that left him blind in one eye.
Reid announced in 2018 that he had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and was receiving medical treatment.
With information from
The Associated Press
.