Infuriated with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s (D-Nev.) November decision to trigger the “nuclear option,” Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) approached the majority leader to tell him, “Harry, I’m going to kick the crap out of you,” before taking to the Senate floor to bash Reid’s flip-flop, according to a New York Times Magazine profile on McCain published Wednesday.
McCain told the Times Magazine that Reid responded, "John, I would expect nothing less."
In November, McCain took to the Senate floor to quote Reid, calling his use of the nuclear option a "black chapter in history of the Senate.” McCain criticized Reid for his 2008 remarks on an attempt by a Republican majority in the Senate to invoke the nuclear option, which requires no more than a 51-vote majority to approve most executive and judicial nominees.
McCain’s rogue rhetoric recently landed him in hot water when he compared President Barack Obama's handshake with Cuban President Raul Castro to a similar exchange between Adolf Hitler and Neville Chamberlain. McCain later admitted the remark was a "gross exaggeration."
"I'm sure it was an exaggeration, Candy," McCain told CNN’s Candy Crowley on Sunday. "If you want me to plead guilty here on CNN, guilty."
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