Vote the presiding officer anyone wishing to vote or change their vote . If not, the ayes are 94. The nays are zero. The nomination is confirmed. The majority leader. Mr. Mcconnell could we have order in the senate. I ask unanimous consent that the cloture motion with respect to executive calendar number 550 be withdrawn. The presiding officer is there objection . Without objection. Mr. Mcconnell i further ask that following disposition of the davis nomination, the senate resume consideration of the vegan nomination and vote on the combination, confirmation. If confirmed, the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table and the president be immediately notified of the senates action. The presiding officer is there objection . Without objection. Mr. Mcconnell i ask unanimous consent that following the disposition of the biegun nomination, we resume consideration of the house message to accompany 1158. If cloture invoked on the motion to concur on the house amendment to Senate Amendment to h. R. 1158, the postcloture time be expired, the other pending motions and amendments be withdrawn, and the senate vote on adoption of the motion to concur in the house amendment to the Senate Amendment to h. R. 1158 with intervening action or debate. The presiding officer is there objection . Without objection. The clerk will report the next nomination. The clerk the judiciary, robert j. Colville of pennsylvania to be United States district judge for the Western District of pennsylvania. The presiding officer is there a sufficient second . There is. The clerk will call the roll. Vote vote the presiding officer are there any senators in the chamber wishing to vote or change their vote . If not, the yeas are 66, the nays are 27. The nomination is confirmed. The clerk will report the next nomination. The clerk the judiciary, louis j. Liman of new york to be United States district judge for the Southern District of new york. The presiding officer question is on the nomination. The yeas and nays. Is there a sufficient second . There appears to be. The clerk will call the roll. Vote vote the presiding officer any senators wishing to vote or change their vote . If not, the ayes are 64. The nays are 29. The nomination is confirmed. The clerk will report the next nomination. The clerk nomination, the judiciary. Grich grich of new york to be Gary Richard Brown of new york to be United States district judge for the Eastern District of new york. The presiding officer the question is on the nomination. All in favor say aye. All opposed, no. The ayes appear to have it. The ayes do have it. The nomination is confirmed. The clerk will report the next nomination. The clerk nomination, the judiciary. Stephanie Dawkins Davis of michigan to be United States district judge for the Eastern District of michigan. The presiding officer the question is on the nomination. All in favor say aye. All opposed, no. The ayes appear to have it. The ayes do have it. The nomination is confirmed. The clerk will report the next nomination. The clerk nomination, department of state. Stephen e. Biegun of michigan to be deputy secretary. The presiding officer the question is on the nomination. Is there a sufficient second . Second. Appears to be. The clerk will call the roll. Vote jood tsai 123450 vote vote the presiding officer any senator wishing to vote or change a vote . If not, the ayes are 90, the nays are 3. The nomination is confirmed. Under the previous order, the motions to reconsider are considered made and laid on the table and the president will be immediately notified of the senates action. The senate will resume legislative session. The clerk will report the motion to invoke cloture. The clerk cloture motion, we, the undersigned senators, in accordance with the provisions of rule 22, do hereby bring to a close debate on the motion to concur on the house amendment to the Senate Amendment to h. R. 1158, an act to authorize cyber teams, signed by 17 senators. The presiding officer order, please. The presiding officer by unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum call has been waived. The question is, is it the sense of the senate that debate on the motion to concur in the house amendment to the Senate Amendment to h. R. 1158, an act to authorize cyber Incident Response teams at the department of hope theland security, and for other purposes, shall be brought to a close. The yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule. The clerk will call the roll. Vote vote the presiding officer on this vote the jayce are 77. The yeas are 7. The nays are 15. Threefifths of the senators duly chosen and sworn having voted in the affirmative, the motion is agreed to. Under the previous order, the cloture having been invoked on the motion to concur, the other pending motions are withdrawn. The question occurs on the motion to concur. Is there a sufficient second . There appears to be. The clerk will call the roll. Vote vote the presiding officer on this vote is the yeas are 81, the nays are 11. The motion to concur is agreed to. Mr. Thune mr. President. The presiding officer the senator from south dakota. Mr. Thune mr. President , i ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed to immediate consideration of h. Con. Res. 81, which was received from the house. The presiding officer the clerk will report. The clerk h. Con. Res. 81, directing the clerk of the house of representatives to make a correction in the enrollment of h. R. 1158. The presiding officer is there objection to proceeding to the measure . Without objection, the senate will proceed. Mr. Thune mr. President , i ask unanimous consent that the resolution be agreed to and the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate. The presiding officer without objection. Mr. Thune i ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed to the immediate consideration of h. Con. Res. 82 received from the house. The clerk will report. The clerk h. Con. Res. 82, directing the clerk of the house of representatives to make a correction in the enrollment of h. R. 65. The presiding officer is there objection . Without objection, the senate will proceed. Mr. Thune mr. President , i ask unanimous consent the resolution be agreed to and the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate. The presiding officer without objection. Mr. Thune mr. President , i ask unanimous consent that the senate be in a period of morning business with senators permitted to speak therein for up to ten minutes each. The presiding officer without objection. Mr. Thune mr. President. The presiding officer the senator from south dakota. Mr. Thune mr. President , in 1906, two brothers named nikolie and his brother arrived at ellis island and they only new the words coffee. The immigration officials at ellis island thought that their name would be too difficult to spell and pronounce in this country so they asked them to change their name. Their name when they got to this country was gjglivik. His brother was named matthew. When the immigration officials asked them to change their name, they picked the name from the farm where they worked in norway which was called the thune farm. And so nikali became nick thune. They worked on the railroad and saved up enough money to open up a mer much dice merchandise company. The family sold it many years ago. In 1916, nick married an iowa girl. They had three sons. The middle son, harold, will turn 100 in a few days and that happens to be my dad. Like many of my colleagues, i send congratulatory notes to constituents for big birthdays and anniversaries. I never thought i would have the occasion to send one to my dad. Instead of writing to writing a letter, i thought i would come to the floor. My dad is a world war ii veteran. He shares the quality of so many in that generation humility, patriotism, quiet service. Dad was a navy pilot who flew hellcats off the u. S. S. Intrepid. He received the flying cross for shooting down four enemy planes in one engagement. As a side note to that, that commendation was issued to him by none other than admiral john mccain, senator john mccains grandfather. But my dad didnt and still doesnt talk about his own exploits. In fact, had it not been for my mom, im quite sure i never would have known about my dads record in world war ii. But i did have the opportunity to interview him for the library of Congress Veterans history project a few years back, and he shared some wonderful details about his service. But as usual, his focus was never on his own achievements but on those of his fellow pilots. I would also probably never have learned what an outstanding athlete my dad was had it not been for my mom. My dad grew up in the small town of myrtle, south dakota, during the great depression. They didnt have a lot, but there were a lot of Basketball Hoops around myrtle. They put them on barns, poles, garages, and my dad learned to play. In fact, he learned to play so well that he took his High School Basketball team to the state championship game where, although they lost narrowly, he was named the tournaments most valuable player. My dad had hoped to attend college in south dakota but there was a doctor in myrtle named Joseph Murphy who thought my dad was good enough to play at the university of minnesota, and he used his contacts to get my dad up to the Junior College in hopes that the minnesota gofers would gophers would notice him. He did, and he went on to the twin city and played three seasons for the gophers. He was highpoint man in Madison Square garden on his birthday, december 28 of 1940. And in another example of how things have changed through the years, my dad said that when his team came out to play, it was the second game that night at the garden, and he said he couldnt see the upper deck because of all the cigarette smoke. Some things i guess do change for the better. While at the university of minnesota, my dad met a girl who served sodas at a drugstore just off campus. They were married within a couple of years while my dad was in Flight Training for the navy, and they spent the next almost 69 years together. After the war, they came back to south dakota. My dad had been thinking about a career in the navy, but his dad asked him to come back and run the Family Hardware store. My dad said that his heart sank but he knew thats what he had to do, so he came home and went to work for his dad. The Hardware Store did okay for a while, but started to struggle so my dad eventually sold it, went back to school and got a teaching degree. Now, mr. President , all parents are teachers for their kids, but my parents were teachers several times over. Kids usually get a break from their parents when they are at school. My dad was a teacher at my high school. He was also a coach and the athletic director, and he drove the bus. And my mom was the school librarian, so i think its safe to say that my brothers and sister and i were pretty much always under the watchful eye of my parents. And i have to say that i never had my dad for a class in high school but my brother rich did. Rich was the valedictorian of his high school class, and the only b he got in high school was from my dad. That was my dad for you. He never showed any preference or gave any of his kids any better treatment than anybody else. In fact, some of us might argue that he gave us a harder time because we were his kids, but he believed very firmly that you had to earn your achievements. As a coach, my dad taught us about being a team player. He made it clear that being on a team was not about building your personal statistics but about making the players around you better. Its a lesson, mr. President , i have carried throughout my life and one that i try to live by every day. A few years ago, the Jones County School district in myrtle named the auditorium in myrtle after my dad in recognition of his service and achievements at the school. It was particularly special since my dad was one of the volunteers who originally built the auditorium back in the 1950s. My dad would tell me the story that he was more scared up on the scaffolding of that building than he had ever been flying off a carrier during world war ii. You might think that with my dad as a coach and athletic director, sports were the main focus around our house, and that certainly was a big part of our lives, but my mom was determined that we would grow up to be wellrounded people, and my dad always supported her in that. They worked hard to ensure that we grew up with a perspective on life that went beyond just the latest sporting event. Mom made us take piano lessons, and during the summers come in from outside and read for an hour every day. We complained at the time, but i know that all of us today are grateful to her and my father for their investments in that. Mom and dad made a good team. Mom was an optimist. Dad was a pessimist or as he would put it a realist, and they really balanced each other out well. We didnt have material riches growing up, but we were beyond rich in those things that money cant buy, but that lend purpose, joy, and meaning to life. And all of us thune kids are very, very grateful for that heritage. Mr. President , i cant close without talking about something that was life changing for my parents, and that was their strong faith in christ. My dad had always had real discernment and wisdom, in no small part because of his daily dependence upon god in his life. He has always prayed for wisdom, and god has blessed him with it. So as we celebrate my dads 100th birthday, i want to say thank you to him for the example of faith, integrity, character, and humility that you have given to me and to bob and to rich and to karen and to tim. Thank you for faithfully serving gods purpose for your generation and happy 100th birthday. Mr. President , i yield the floor. The presiding officer the senator from montana. Mr. Tester thank you, mr. President. We have had a fruitful day here today. We have passed a lot of bills. We have done it in a bipartisan way. I want to thank both leader mcconnell and leader schumer for their good work as well as chairman shelby and Ranking Member leahy for his good work on these bills. Today im going to do something that ive never done before. Im going to read an obituary about a man that i dont believe i have ever met, even though i was in the Veterans Home in Columbia Falls while he was there. This obittory was obituary was passed on to me by my friend who got it from a friend. Its incredibly powerful. Quite frankly, its about one man, but its actually about a generation of men and women who served in vietnam. This guys name was william ebeltoff, and the obituary goes like this. Not everyone who lost his life in vietnam died there. The saying is true for a chief warrant officer second class william c. Ebeltoff. He died december 19, 2019, at the Veterans Home in columbus, montana. He died 50 years after he lost in vietnam all that underpinned his life. He was 73 years old. Everyone called him bill. He was loved by the nursing staff who cared for him. He was loved by the fellow veterans with whom he lived, those he helped he entertained with funny german slang and a stint at the piano when he could. He was a virtuoso in playing waltzing matilda. His small family loved him dearly. He was preceded in death by his parents of dickinson, north dakota, whose devotion and care for their wardamaged son was strong and unfailing. He is survived by his brother, paul, and the one he loved as a sister he never had, pauls wife gail. It is difficult to write about bill. He lived three lives. Before, during, and after vietnam. Before vietnam, bill was a handsome man who wore clothing well, a man with white, straight teeth that showed in his ready smile, a state champion track shoe, a low handicap golfer, a man of quick, earthy wit with a fondness for children, old men, hunting, fast cars, and a cold schlitz. He told jokes well. During vietnam, he lived with horrors of which he would only seldom speak. He logged thousands of helicopter flight hours, performing basic resupply landings, medical evacuations, gunship runs. We knew him mostly through the medals of valor he received, and these were many. While attempting to resupply b company, warrant officer ebeltoffs copilot became wounded. Realizing the importance of the mission, he attempted completion of the mission. Due to his superior knowledge of the aircraft, the helicopter was kept under control during a period in which the pilot was wounded and the ship was under fire. Remaining under attack from automatic weapons fire, the supply mission was successfully completed. While unploding supplies, w. O. Ebeltoff received word there were five emergency medical evacuation cases located 200 meters to his rear. He repositioned his helicopter and pibd up the wounded personnel. While evacuating the wounded, the Commanding Officer of company b was injured. He again maneuvered his aircraft to enable evacuation of the injured officer. He then proceeded to evacuate all the injured personnel by the fastest possible means. Upon completion, the examination of the aircraft revealed that the craft had sustained nine enemy 30caliber hits. Bill got the medal, of course, but he would have been the last to say anything about it. The citation shows the type of man that he and many of his brothers in arms in vietnam wore. And still today i will be at battered hard and unfairly by the cruel winds of the times in which they fought. After being discharged a decorated hero, bill had a rough reentry into civilian life. It is not necessary to recount bills portion of what is an alltoocommon story for wartime veterans, particularly those of the vietnam era. It may be suspicious to say that after a run at business, a marriage and while grappling daily with his demons, his mental faculties escaped him, bill became a resident of the Veterans Home in Colum