Mr. Reid encouraged Mr. Obama to run for president before the 2008 election even though Mr. Obama was a junior member of the Senate at the time. And after Mr. Obama won the White House, Mr. Reid was one of his most dependable and important allies, using every legislative weapon at his disposal to win approval of the economic stimulus bill and, most critically, the Affordable Care Act, which memorably passed the Senate in 2009 during a blizzard on Christmas Eve.
“The deals Harry made to get that law done didn’t always look pretty,” Mr. Obama said, adding: “Whenever I would object to a change he wanted to make, whether because of some policy concerns or worries about the optics, Harry would tell me with some exasperation in his voice, ‘Mr. President, you know a lot more than I do about health care policy, OK? But I know the Senate.’”
Mr. Biden, a former senator who is now struggling to pass his own sweeping domestic policy bill, grew animated while describing Mr. Reid’s negotiation tactics and congressional victories. “If Harry said he was going to do something, he did it,” he said, adding: “You could bank on it. That’s how he got so much done for the good of the country for so many decades.”
Source Article from https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/08/us/politics/harry-reid-memorial-service.html
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