Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is ignoring those telling him to stop pushing an unsubstantiated rumor that Mitt Romney didn’t pay his taxes for ten years.
On Friday, Reid continued to push the issue by saying the Republican presidential candidate is “the most secretive presidential candidate since Richard Nixon.”
“Forget about president – Mitt Romney couldn’t get confirmed as a cabinet secretary,” Reid said Friday, calling on the Republican to release more of his income tax returns.
Reid has repeatedly attacked Romney this week over the issues of his personal tax filings. In interviews and speeches, Reid cited an anonymous investor from Bain Capital, Romney’s former company, to claim Romney didn’t pay taxes for 10 years.
But even Reid has said he doesn’t know if that rumor is rooted in fact. “Now, do I know that that’s true? Well, I’m not certain,” Reid said in one interview.
Romney’s campaign officials have said they’ve released plenty of financial information already, including filings for the last two years. Reid’s accusations, according to Romney adviser Eric Fehrnstrom, “are untrue, they are baseless, and there is nothing to back them up.”
On Thursday, Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell called on Reid to stop using “the Senate as a forum for his baseless accusations.”
“Frankly, it’s beneath the dignity of his office,” McConnell told The Daily Caller.
Yet in a statement released to reporters Friday, Reid gave no indication that he’s going to stop pushing the issue. He made the comments as Romney campaigned in Nevada.
“It’s hard to say which is more insulting to Americans’ intelligence, Mitt Romney’s tax plan or his refusal to show the American people what’s in his tax returns,” Reid said.