[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 184 (Thursday, December 17, 2015)]
[Senate]
[Pages S8734-S8735]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




          RELATIONSHIP OF THE MAJORITY AND DEMOCRATIC LEADERS

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, before the Republican leader leaves the 
floor, I wish to say a few things.
  In the years I have served in public office, I brush aside most press 
and don't let it bother me, but once in a while something comes along 
that does. There was an article in one of the Hill newspapers this day 
that really troubled me: ``Bad blood: Reid-McConnell relationship hits 
new low.''
  I have a difficult job, and so does he. We both have done our 
respective jobs. We started out in leadership positions here doing 
different things, but where we first started working closely together 
was when we were both whips.
  No one knows our personal relationship except him and me. There are 
things he does that disappoint me; there are things I do that 
disappoint him. Our caucuses have different views on a lot of things.
  I just want the record to be spread that the Reid-McConnell 
relationship hasn't hit a new low. We have a personal relationship. 
Nobody knows how many times we visit with each other on the telephone 
and personally.
  I will always remember him and his wonderful wife. Within the last 
few years my wife was involved in a terrible automobile accident. The 
first people to step up and ask if there was anything they could do 
were Mitch and his wife. Shortly thereafter, my wife had a bruising 
battle with breast cancer. There is no one who can comfort a wife more 
than another wife. On January 1 of this year, I blinded myself in an 
exercise accident, and Mitch McConnell was there. His wife was there.
  So I want the record to reflect--people might write all these things 
they want to write, but Mitch McConnell and I are friends. People may 
think that is difficult with all the things we do here opposing each 
other, but that is the job we have.
  I want the record--I repeat--to be totally reflective of the fact 
that I have admiration for Mitch McConnell and the work that he has to 
do. Do I always agree with what he does? Of course not. I am sure the 
same applies to his feelings about me. But no one can judge what our 
personal relationship is except McConnell and Reid.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Will my friend yield for a comment?
  Mr. REID. Yes.
  Mr. McCONNELL. I am always frustrated, as I think the Democratic 
leader is, with the tendency to personalize political differences. 
Obviously we have differences on issues, but I want to second what my 
friend the Democratic leader said: There is nothing wrong with our 
personal relationship, whether it is watching Nats baseball or a lot of 
other things that we have discussed both personally and otherwise for 
literally years.
  I share the Senator's frustration, I would say to my friend, over an 
article like that. I think there is a tendency to think you can't have 
political arguments without developing personal animosity, and I don't 
have any toward my friend, and I know he doesn't have any toward me.

[[Page S8735]]

  I really appreciate the opportunity that he has given for both of us 
to kind of clear the air about the perceptions that could have been 
drawn by reading such an article.

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