The mafia didn't beat up Harry Reid, says Nevada man who started rumor

The mafia didn&#039;t beat up Harry Reid, says Nevada man who started rumor

(Image credit: Win McNamee/Getty Images)

last updated 27 April 2015

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) didn't suffer facial fractures at the hands of some mob goons, according to a man who claims to have concocted that tall tale.

Larry Pfeifer, a 50-year-old from Las Vegas, tells the Las Vegas Sun that after seeing a conservative site question Reid's version of events — the senator said he sustained the injuries in a freak workout accident — he wanted to ensnare some gullible sites with an unfounded rumor of his own. Sure enough, the plan worked.

The rumor spread quickly after Hinderaker published it April 3, landing Pfeifer on conservative talk show host Laura Ingraham's radio program six days later when Hinderaker was a guest host, and leading to a conversation between Pfeifer and Rush Limbaugh. Pfeifer said he tried to get on Limbaugh’s show, where he planned to admit he’d made up the story. [...] He said he decided to present the truth after Limbaugh rejected him as a guest but repeated the rumor April 15 on his talk-radio show. [Las Vegas Sun]

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Jon Terbush is an associate editor at TheWeek.com covering politics, sports, and other things he finds interesting. He has previously written for Talking Points Memo, Raw Story, and Business Insider.

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