Paying their respects
Biden, Obama, Harris, and other top Dems to attend Harry Reid's memorial
Former President Barack Obama is scheduled to deliver the eulogy at a memorial for former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid in Las Vegas Saturday, The Associated Press and Las Vegas Review-Journal reported.
Other prominent Democrats set to attend include President Biden, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), current Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), and Vice President Harris.
Elder M. Russell Ballard, a senior apostle in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, will also deliver an address. Reid and his wife, Landra, converted to Mormonism while in college.
Reid, who died Dec. 28, grew up in poverty in Searchlight, Nevada, a town that, according to his autobiography, had 13 brothels and no churches. He was an amateur boxer before entering politics. During the 1970s, he served in the Nevada State Assembly, as lieutenant governor of Nevada, and as chair of the Nevada Gaming Commission (NGC). While chair of the NGC, he was targeted for assassination by the mob. He also set up an FBI sting operation against a man who offered him a $12,000 bribe. Then, as agents burst into the room, Reid flew into a rage and began choking the man.
Reid won election to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1983 and went on to serve for 30 years as a U.S. senator, holding the position of majority leader from 2007 to 2015. During that time, he was instrumental in the passage of Obama's flagship Affordable Care Act.