July 22, 2010

Washington, DC – Nevada Senator Harry Reid today made the following statement on the floor of the U.S. Senate on the passing of former Nevada Governor Kenny Guinn:

"I just learned a couple of minutes ago, one of my dear friends passed away.  He was an orphan, he was a stellar athlete.  He came to Las Vegas to be a school teacher but he had such a dynamic personality that soon they learned in that rapidly growing school district there, which is now the fourth or fifth largest in the country, they needed his kind of leadership.  So he went from being a teacher to running that huge school district in Las Vegas, Clark County School District.

"He had such a magnetic personality.  Kenny Guinn was built like an athlete.  He was handsome like a movie star.  And he left the school district after a number of years and became a bank president.  He became a big utility president at a major utility in Nevada.  Then he became president of a university.  I think he worked for $1 a year.  He did it to be nice.

"Somebody said to him, "What you should do is run for governor."  It was a slam dunk.  He was a very moderate republican.  He was elected governor twice very easily.  He did an extremely good job as governor.

"We don't know what happened to Kenny today.  But from reports we got, he was in an accident.  He was on his roof and fell.  He's dead now.  I feel so bad about this.  I talked to him a week or so ago about my campaign and his wonderful, beautiful, charming wife Dema.  I just feel so sad that Kenny is not with us anymore.  I join all Nevada in mourning the loss of truly a great man, one of Nevada's outstanding governors, a friend of mine who I'll always feel very strongly about."

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