Harry Reid has been gone from the Senate for several years but his opinions on politics still matter.
And recently, his evolving opinion on impeachment and President Donald Trump made headlines in the Washington Post.
The former senator had previously said it wouldn't be worth it to impeach the president. Now, he says the U.S. House of Representatives should investigate to see if impeachment should be undertaken.
He clarified his position during an interview with KNPR's State of Nevada.
"I think it would be a tremendous mistake right now to do nothing," he said. "I think it would be a tremendous mistake right now to do impeachment. But what I think we need to do is have a full inquiry as to whether there should be impeachment."
Reid believes there should be congressional hearings to go into details in Special Counsel Robert Mueller's report about Russian interference into the 2016 election and President Trump's efforts to obstruct justice in the investigation.
"Based upon that, then there would be a decision that would be much easier to be made as to whether or not there should be impeachment. But you need to get the facts first," he said.
Reid has been vocal about his feelings about President Trump and the Trump administration. But he warns fellow Democrats they shouldn't be overly confident that a Democrat will beat Trump in 2020.
"Is he beatable? The answer is yes," he said, "Does that mean he's going to be beaten? The answer is no. It doesn't necessarily mean he's going to be beaten. I think Democrats who are licking their lips and saying 'gee whiz, he's going to be easy to beat,' should not be that confident."
Reid is not ready to write off President Trump and he is also not ready to endorse someone from the large field of Democrats running for president.
"As a result of my doing quite a bit to get the caucus here, I'm always very cautious in throwing my support to anyone for president," he said.
Reid said he wouldn't endorse anyone until after Nevada's first-in-the-West caucus in February.
One thing Reid did throw his support behind that is now bearing a lot of fruit is the military's investigation of UFOs.
In 2007 while he was Senate majority leader, Reid, secured $22 million with bipartisan support for the study of military sightings of UFOs.
Read: Reid's letter to the deputy secretary of defense/Courtesy: KLAS-TV
Reid said the office produced so many reports and studies that it is almost like a book.
"That money was spent developing page after page of information," he said, "Where people in the past had seen things and not one person but hundreds of people as a result of that there's been a lot of activity since that."
Some 12 years later and within the last few weeks, the Navy openly says it wants airman to report UFO sightings. That's a big change from decades of fear by pilots and others who feared demotions or ridicule if they reported sightings.
Reid believes the policy change is good for the country.
He sees a national security threat to the area of research. He believes Russia and China are both investigating UFOs, which is one of the reasons he secured the money to start the U.S.'s program.
Beyond policy changes and pages of reports, Reid would like Congress to hold public hearings into what the military knows.
"They would be surprised how the American public would accept it," he said, "People from their individual states would accept it."
Sen. Harry Reid (ret.), D-Nev.
