Jeremy L. Dillon
RW Monitor
3/27/2015
Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) announced this week that he will not seek re-election after his term expires in 2016. Reid, one of Yucca Mountain’s staunchest opponents, has served as senator for 28 years, and from 2009 to 2014 he served as the Senate’s majority leader. A long-time opponent to Yucca Mountain, Reid is widely believed to have played a large part in the project’s shutdown by the Obama Administration in 2010. The Department of Energy has maintained, despite Republican pressure, that Yucca Mountain remains “unworkable” for spent nuclear fuel and high-level waste storage due to the lack of consent for the repository in Nevada.
Reid, who recently suffered an exercising accident, cited larger party goals as reason for his decision not to seek re-election. “This accident has caused Landra and me to have a little down time,” Reid said in a statement. “I have had time to ponder and to think. We’ve got to be more concerned about the country, the Senate, the state of Nevada than about ourselves. And as a result of that I’m not going to run for re-election.” He added, “We have to make sure that the Democrats take control of the Senate again. And I feel it is inappropriate for me to soak up all those resources on me when I could be devoting those resources to the caucus, and that’s what I intend to do.”
