Titus: In steering lands bills through Congress, Reid pulled a miracle

By Amber Phillips

Friday, Dec. 5, 2014 | 2 a.m.

Sen. Harry Reid proved once again that in the last few weeks of Congress, anything can happen.

This week, the Nevada Democrat cut a surprise deal with Republicans to get eight Nevada lands bills onto President Barack Obama's desk before Christmas.

The previously stalled bills passed the House of Representatives on Thursday. They would create a national monument at Tule Springs, expand a mine in Yerington and open thousands of acres in Las Vegas and north of the city for development while closing others for wilderness protection.

In one of his last acts as Senate majority leader, Reid attached the lands package to a must-pass defense spending bill that opponents wouldn't dare hold up.

Or would they? Lands bills aren't popular with many Republicans, who often oppose expanding wilderness. They'll face a significant hurdle in the Senate next week. Sen. Tom Coburn, a Republican from Oklahoma who is retiring after this year, said he would use any means necessary to try to stop the lands bills from being included.

Nevadans plan to fight back.

"If it turns out that's something they're going to dig in on, I'm just going to sit in his office" said Rep. Mark Amodei, a Northern Nevada Republican whose six lands bills were included in the package.

But on Thursday, Las Vegas Metro Chamber officials who were in Washington lobbying for the bills were hopeful they'd finally see the conclusion of years of work.

Reid, King of C-SPAN

Rep. Dina Titus, a Las Vegas Democrat, said everyone owes gratitude to the masterful Reid, who worked behind the scenes this week to make the lands bills happen.

"Sen. Reid just worked one of his miracles again," she said.

Reid achieved another distinction on his birthday week, though perhaps not one he'll brag about back home in Nevada.

C-SPAN crunched the numbers and found Reid is the senator most often on their cameras — 247 days this past year. The soft-spoken Reid famously avoids Sunday talk shows and TV appearances. But he is on TV every day when he opens the Senate, his role as majority leader.

Reid won't be in the spotlight as much next year, when Republicans take over and Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky opens the Senate.

And Amodei is king of beer?

OK, not quite. But beer makers certainly seem to like him: This week, the international beverage company Constellation Brands named him the most agreeable House Republican.

They'll be throwing him a party at the swanky downtown headquarters of Beer Institutes — yes, there's a beer lobby here in Washington, D.C. — that this reporter is desperately trying to get invited to.

Amodei does have reason to celebrate. As we mentioned earlier, six of his lands bills look like they could become law as part of the defense deal Reid cut. (They passed on their own earlier this year but have yet to be brought up in the Senate.)

Titus focuses on veteran services

Amid the flurry of last-minute lands deals, Titus introduced entirely new legislation: She and Rep. David McKinley, R-W.Va., want to give students studying under the GI bill more flexibility to pursue science and math courses.

The legislation won't see any action in these final weeks of Congress. But Titus, who sits on the Veterans Affairs committee, said she wanted to set the stage for next year to improve veterans' education, caretaker support and child care.

"For the past two years, the VA committee has dealt with two things primarily: the health care scandal and the backlogs," she said. "These next two years, I'd like to shift the focus a little to providing services."

Here she is speaking about the bill.

She also pushed for a House vote on a federal program backing terrorism risk insurance. Led by Sen. Dean Heller, the Senate approved a 10-year extension this summer, but legislation has stalled in the House. Titus said expanding it would provide security for Las Vegas' entertainment and tourism industries.

Heller hits NFL hard

Heller continued his trend of making news in committee hearings.

In a high-profile Senate hearing this week about domestic violence in professional sports, the Nevada Republican blasted the National Football League's Players Association for putting sports over societal problems.

"When you're worried about getting back on the field instead of stopping abuse, your priorities are out of order," he said.

He also shrugged off an ad from the influential Service Employees International Union that targeted him for being anti-immigration reform.

"This just proves you can't win," Heller said, adding: "I don't think there's been a stronger Republican in Nevada supporting good immigration policy than myself."

Heller isn't up for re-election until 2018 and voted for comprehensive immigration reform in the Senate last year, so the ad is a bit puzzling.

Horsford checks off his to-do list

The lands deal was also a huge accomplishment for Rep. Steven Horsford, a North Las Vegas Democrat who lost his re-election to represent the city and central Nevada.

Horsford had been pushing to make Tule Springs a national monument and expand a mine in Yerington since he took office in 2012.

Earlier in the week, some of Horsford's ideas for controlling police militarization were also wrapped up in Obama's plan to do the same. Last year, Horsford briefed Obama personally on his hopes for more accountability in community policing.

Horsford leaves office this month with three significant accomplishments that he can tout if he decides to challenge incoming Rep.-elect Cresent Hardy in 2016.

Heck speaks on Stolen Valor

Black Friday brought a bit of unexpected publicity for Rep. Joe Heck, a one-star brigadier general in the Army Reserve and Republican representing Henderson and Boulder City.

Heck is the author of the Stolen Valor Act, a bipartisan law passed last year that makes it illegal for people to attempt to benefit from impersonating a decorated member of the military.

This week, a video surfaced of an alleged Stolen Valor case of a Pennsylvania man in uniform getting Black Friday deals designated for members of the military. CBS and Fox News called on Heck to weigh in.

Cresent Hardy gets set for next year

And the newest member of Nevada's delegation, soon-to-be Rep. Cresent Hardy, got news that he would take office Jan. 6 with a chance to tackle issues that matter to him.

Hardy will sit on the Natural Resources Committee and the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee. The first will give him some jurisdiction over the vast amounts of federal land in his central Nevada district — Hardy's priority is giving that back to the state.

The second will allow Hardy, who used to run a construction business, to weigh in on building an interstate through Nevada. He'll join fellow Nevadan Titus on the Transportation committee. For this past year, Nevada has had no representative on the Natural Resources committee.