Norton Thanks Reid For Supporting D.C. Equality

Press Release

Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) today released the following statement on Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid's (D-NV) retirement:

"We will hear from many quarters how much the nation is indebted to Senator Harry Reid. However, I represent the District of Columbia, and Senator Reid has rendered uniquely historic service to the citizens who live in the nation's capital. Senator Reid and I have worked together for many years to get the American citizens who live in the District of Columbia equal rights, including congressional voting rights and statehood, as well as to defend the District's right to self-government given by the Home Rule Act. He has always been accessible to me and our staffs communicate regularly. We will miss his strength and friendship and his principled insistence that democratic principles do not stop at the borders of the District of Columbia.

"In the 111th Congress, Senator Reid, when he was majority leader, brought the D.C. House Voting Rights Act bill to the Senate floor as one of the chamber's first bills that Congress and got it passed with bipartisan support. Last Congress, he gave our statehood bill unprecedented momentum when he announced at the unveiling of Frederick Douglass' statue, D.C.'s first statue in the Capitol, which he helped achieve, that he would cosponsor our statehood bill. It is rare for party leaders to cosponsor legislation. We believe that his bold action helped us to achieve a record number of cosponsors for the bill, and the Senate held its first-ever statehood hearing and the first congressional hearing on statehood in more than 20 years in 2014.

"As Majority Leader, Senator Reid and I also fought together to preserve D.C.'s right to self-government. While we have not one every fight, we have won almost all of them. I am particularly grateful for his successful efforts to keep the D.C. needle-exchange rider, which led to the dramatic increase in the HIV/AIDS rate among our residents, from being re-imposed in 2011, after the new House Republican majority passed an appropriations bill to re-impose the rider. He made sure the rider was not in the final bill.

"While I naturally focus on Senator Reid's enormous assistance to the District, I am grateful as well for his many achievements for our country, too numerous to recount. I should mention at least two. The Majority Leader's skills were essential to the final victory of the Affordable Care Act. In addition, as the Congressional Black Caucus Member who oversees judicial nominations, I am deeply grateful for Senator Reid's fearless reform of the Senate filibuster. His courageous action not only helped the District of Columbia achieve a full and distinguished federal bench, but has given the nation judges nationwide untinged by extremism and committed to fairness, ensuring the Senator's legislative legacy--and the President's--long after both have left office.

"Yet, we have not seen the last of Senator Reid and his contributions. The nation will need Senator Reid in his final two years more than ever and he will be indispensable to the District as Senate Republicans running for President have begun launching relentless attacks on the District, from Senator Ted Cruz, who has introduced disapproval resolutions to block two D.C. anti-discrimination bills from taking effect, to Senator Marco Rubio, who yesterday introduced legislation to wipe out almost all of D.C.'s gun safety laws and to prohibit D.C. from regulating guns in the future.

"We are deeply grateful to Senator Reid for his service to Nevada, the nation and especially to the 650,000 taxpaying American citizens in the District of Columbia."

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