WASHINGTON (AP) - Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said Tuesday that he’s received threatening letters at his home, with nearly all of them citing Scripture. He did not say who the letters came from.
Reid, D-Nev., described them to reporters after being asked whether recent threats he’s received are related to Cliven Bundy, the Nevada rancher who has resisted federal attempts to collect overdue grazing fees and who Reid has criticized.
“It’s hard for me to comprehend how ugly, vile, vulgar and threatening people are, sending letters to my home and making other threats,” Reid said. “So I don’t know who’s mad at me.”
U.S. Capitol police have said they’re investigating the mailings.
Bundy owes more than $1 million in grazing fees and penalties for letting his cattle use government land over the past 20 years. Earlier this month, the federal Bureau of Land Management stopped trying to round up Bundy’s cattle after protests by hundreds of Bundy supporters, some of them armed.
Reid has called Bundy a “hateful racist” after the rancher suggested that African-Americans might have had it better as slaves picking cotton.
On Tuesday, Reid defended the Bureau of Land Management. He also said he’s spoken to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, FBI Director James Comey and others about Bundy, but he did not say specifically what was discussed.
“We can’t have someone who ultimately violates the law, who believes the United States is not a valid government, that it’s a foreign government and all the other weird things that he’s said,” Reid said.
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