After watching Republicans rout his party in last year’s elections and hand his job to Mitch McConnell, Harry Reid is launching one final campaign to return Democrats to the Senate majority.

And no detail is too small to let slip.


So when Reid and his lieutenants assessed the increasingly messy situation in the Pennsylvania Senate race, they decided they needed to intervene. For months, former Rep. Joe Sestak had been running what they considered a lackluster campaign, forcing party leaders to woo other potential candidates. But with Sestak now appearing as the candidate most likely to win the Democratic nomination, Reid and party elders sought to right the ship.

At a private meeting in Washington last month, sources familiar with the session said, a clear message was delivered to Sestak: Make some key changes to the campaign — including hiring more staff and stepping up his fundraising — and the party establishment would seriously consider throwing its weight behind him.

Reid’s name isn’t on the ballot, of course. But at a time when another leader might gradually relinquish the reins of power to his or her successor — in this case, Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York — the 75-year-old Reid has embarked on a behind-the-scenes drive to relegate last year’s sweeping losses to a mere blip in the history books. A victory next November could put Reid’s legacy in a more positive light for Democrats after last year’s midterms, when Republicans contended that voters were sending a strong rebuke to Reid and President Barack Obama’s style of leadership in Washington.

After spending the first part of the year recovering from a gruesome eye injury, Reid has ramped up the past several weeks. His fingerprints are all over next year’s Senate map: recruitment calls to potential candidates in New Hampshire, Florida, Maryland and Wisconsin, fundraising trips to Canada and New York, and, not least, mobilizing his vaunted political machine to keep his own seat in the “D” column.

“Harry is going to be involved up to his neck, you better believe it,” said Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.), head of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. “He’s a political animal.”

The effort is part recruitment, part fundraising. Reid helped persuade former Sen. Russ Feingold to run in Wisconsin and his allies have called New Hampshire Gov. Maggie Hassan as part of the party’s full-court press to urge New Hampshire’s governor to run in the state’s marquee Senate race. His political machine has kicked into high gear to save his own seat in Nevada, where Republicans on Monday enlisted a top-tier recruit, Rep. Joe Heck, against Reid’s handpicked replacement, former state Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto.

“I’m going to do everything I can,” Reid said in a recent interview.

On the money front, after taking a break from the fundraising circuit for the first part of the year, Reid is working hard to fill his party’s war chest. Last week, he headlined a fundraiser for Cortez Masto in Las Vegas, along with one for the Nevada Democratic Party, which he has spent years building. In June and July, Reid lined up four trips for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and Senate Majority PAC, including swings to New York, Chicago and Montreal. And his top confidants have also helped out a number of Senate candidates, including a fundraiser for Missouri Democrat Jason Kander in Las Vegas in May.

Reid is one of the longest-serving party leaders in history, presiding during a period of momentous change and sweeping and controversial legislative accomplishments, namely the Affordable Care Act, the Wall Street collapse and bailout, the economic stimulus package and the Dodd-Frank financial services law. Yet, Republicans — and some Democrats — contend that his fierce partisanship, ironclad stewardship of the Senate and the gridlock through much of the last session contributed to the deep Democratic losses at the polls last year.

Reid allies privately say that winning back the majority in 2016 would help solidify his legacy and, not insignificantly, help erase the damage the 2014 midterms did to his standing.

But Reid insisted it’s not about him.

“For me, it’s not that important. For the country, it’s vitally important,” Reid said of regaining the Senate majority. “It’s been awful what Republicans have done to our country.”

The 2016 map presents Democrats with major opportunities. The party needs to gain four seats to take back the Senate if it keeps the White House; five if the GOP wins the presidency. There are 24 Republican seats in contention, including several in blue and purple states like Wisconsin, Illinois, Florida, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire and North Carolina. Democrats have to worry about potentially losing just two of their seats: Colorado and the Nevada seat Reid is vacating in January 2017.

Harry Reid is launching one final campaign to return Democrats to the Senate majority. | AP Photo

Reid lobbied Feingold to jump into the race for a rematch against Republican Ron Johnson, and the Democrat ultimately did. He wooed Rep. Patrick Murphy to seek the Florida Senate seat, and the party quickly fell in line, even as liberals like Rep. Alan Grayson are still toying with jumping into the Democratic primary.

Reid has encountered some turbulence, too.

Some progressive activists were angry after he endorsed Rep. Chris Van Hollen instead of Rep. Donna Edwards in Maryland’s Democratic Senate primary. And party leaders urged former North Carolina Sen. Kay Hagan to challenge Republican Richard Burr, but she declined, forcing the party to scramble for another candidate.

New Hampshire and Pennsylvania have been of particular concern to party leaders. Hassan remains the best — and perhaps only — shot at beating Republican Kelly Ayotte next year, but Hassan is mired in a protracted budget fight with the state Legislature and is not a sure bet to pull the trigger. Reid has privately urged her to run, sources said.

But on Wednesday, Reid’s office denied that the two had spoken about the matter.

“Sen. Reid has not talked to Gov. Hassan,” Reid’s spokesman Adam Jentleson said in an email.

In Pennsylvania, former Congressman Sestak’s unconventional candidacy has been a constant source of apprehension among some Washington and Keystone State Democrats. Reid and his likely successor as party leader, Schumer, reached out to other potential contenders, including a well-financed local official, Josh Shapiro.

But after Shapiro announced in late May he would not run for the seat, party leaders convened the meeting in Washington with Sestak to find a way forward. While Sestak could still face a challenge in the primary, party leaders urged the former congressman to make several hires, build an infrastructure and improve fundraising.

“It was very positive,” one top Democrat in Washington said of the gathering.

In Nevada, the political machine that powered him to improbable victories in the past — and helped Obama carry the state twice — is now engaging on behalf of Cortez Masto.

Although Reid does not have a close personal relationship with the former Nevada attorney general, she received a call from him the morning of his retirement announcement urging her to run for his seat. The move prompted the DSCC to get behind Cortez Masto and sent a message to other potential challengers — such as Rep. Dina Titus — to think long and hard before getting in.

Reid’s team — including his closest political adviser, Rebecca Lambe — is helping Cortez Masto prepare for a tough challenge from Heck.

“Joe is a nice guy,” Reid said when asked about Heck. “No problem, Catherine will beat him. I have no problem with that.”

Heck, in an interview shortly before he jumped into the Senate race, acknowledged he wouldn’t just be taking on Cortez Masto.

“Regardless of what race you’re in,” Heck said, “in Nevada you gotta be prepared to take on that machine.”