Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) is “sightless” in his right eye because of an injury he sustained earlier this year, he said in an interview that will air Sunday.
“I’m sightless in my right eye,” he told Univision host Jorge Ramos, who asked him whether that was something that scared him.
“No, I’m over that, because I can’t see out of my eye, and that’s the way it’s going to be until something comes along that’ll change it,” he said, noting he had gone through 11 hours of surgery.
{mosads}”I can’t see out of my right eye. And that’s OK, I can live with that.”
Reid made the statements in a wide-ranging interview with Ramos that will air Sunday on “Al Punto.” It comes on the heels of his recent decision not to run for reelection, bringing his career as one of the Senate’s most prominent tacticians to a close.
He also continued to defend his comments, made during the 2012 election, that former Republican nominee Mitt Romney had not paid taxes in 10 years. Reid has said he got the information from “someone who worked at Bain Capital,” the private equity firm where Romney built his business career.
He brushed off Romney’s statement that he paid his taxes and said the real issue was whether Romney was willing to release his tax returns.
“But that’s a phony answer,” Reid said. “Of course he paid taxes. What he didn’t do is let us see his tax returns.”
Reid also addressed the indictment of Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) on public corruption charges last week. Menendez stepped down from his position as the ranking member on the Foreign Relations Committee after he was indicted.
“He’ll get that back when he gets acquitted,” Reid said. “And I’m confident that he will be.”
“In America, a person is not guilty until proven guilty,” he said. “And it would be the wrong thing to do for him to step down.”