John Shinkle/POLITICO Reid calls on Rubio to resign 'Why should the taxpayers of this country and people of Florida put up with having only one senator?' the Senate minority leader says in an interview.

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid tore into Sen. Marco Rubio on Thursday, calling on the Florida Republican and 2016 presidential contender to resign his Senate seat as he racks up no-shows on his voting record while campaigning for the White House.

“Why shouldn’t he [resign]? He hates the Senate,” Reid said in an interview with POLITICO on Thursday. “Why should the taxpayers of this country and people of Florida put up with having only one senator? Doesn’t seem fair to me.”


Rubio’s opponents — both Democrats and Republicans — have attacked the senator for his low-attendance record. The South Florida Sun-Sentinel, one of Rubio’s home-state newspapers, has called on Rubio to give up his seat, and Jeb Bush also seized on Rubio’s missed votes during Wednesday night’s Republican presidential debate — although the former Florida governor’s attacks were largely seen as having backfired.

In the interview, Reid dismissed Rubio as a “nonentity” in the institution he arrived in nearly five years ago — though Reid praised Rubio’s initial involvement in crafting a sweeping comprehensive immigration bill in 2013.

“For Marco Rubio here to dump on the Senate, this institution established by our founding fathers, he should be ashamed of himself,” Reid said. “And the people of Florida, why they put up with it, I don’t know. They damn sure aren’t getting their money’s worth.”

Rubio spokesman Alex Conant responded to Reid’s comments by saying: “I must have forgotten Harry Reid similarly calling on Barack Obama to resign the Senate when he missed even more votes to run for president.”

“It's obvious that Democrat leaders are very worried that Marco will beat Clinton next year,” Conant added.

But Reid defended President Barack Obama, arguing that while he was running for the presidency in 2008 and missing votes, “he never lost interest in the Senate.”

“He was always proud of being in the Senate, always, when he was running for president,” Reid said. “He told everybody how much he enjoyed the Senate.”

Not all Senate Democrats are taking up Reid’s call for Rubio to step down.

“I’ve stayed out of that. Rubio is my friend and so I’m not going to get into the back and forth,” said Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson of Florida.

