{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.barrasso.senate.gov/senator-barrasso-pays-tribute-to-vice-president-dick-cheney/", "Senator Barrasso Pays Tribute to Vice President Dick Cheney", "2025-11-06", "2025", "2025-11", "Republican", "Senate", "WY", "John Barrasso", "B001261", "www.barrasso.senate.gov", "barrasso", "https://www.barrasso.senate.gov/newsroom/news-releases/", "scraper", "\u201cHe was, by any measure, one of the most consequential Vice Presidents our nation ever had. Dick helped guide the course of history in Wyoming, in America, and around the world. We will always remember Dick Cheney as a son of Wyoming.\u201d\n\nClick here to watch Sen. Barrasso\u2019s remarks\n\nWASHINGTON, D.C.\u2013 U.S. Senator John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), Senate Majority Whip, today spoke on the Senate Floor honoring the legacy of former Vice President Dick Cheney.\n\nSen. Barrasso\u2019s remarks as prepared:\n\n\u201cI come to the floor today to remember Vice President Dick Cheney.\n\n\u201cTributes are pouring in from Wyoming, from across the nation, and from around the world.\n\n\u201cDick Cheney\u2019s career was extraordinary.\n\n\u201cHe rose from modest beginnings to serve this nation in four different presidential administrations.\n\n\u201cHe was the youngest White House Chief of Staff in American history.\n\n\u201cHe represented Wyoming for ten years in the House of Representatives.\n\n\u201cHe served as Secretary of Defense for this nation at a moment of dramatic global change.\n\n\u201cHe was, by any measure, one of the most consequential Vice Presidents our nation ever had.\n\n\u201cDick helped guide the course of history in Wyoming, in America, and around the world.\n\n\u201cWe\u2019re always going to remember Dick Cheney as a son of Wyoming.\n\n\u201cHe was a political giant in my home state. He was plainspoken, he was direct, and he was steady in purpose.\n\n\u201cSenator Al Simpson once said that Dick was \u2018big-time, make-things-work kind of a guy.\u2019\n\n\u201cAnd, that\u2019s exactly right.\n\n\u201cDick grew up in Casper, Wyoming.\n\n\u201cHe was a football star at Natrona County High School and the field there \u2013 the High School field \u2013 still bears his name.\n\n\u201cHe worked as a powerline man in Rock Springs, Wyoming, earning $3 an hour.\n\n\u201cHe got his start in politics in the 1960s as an intern in the Wyoming State Senate.\n\n\u201cHe went on to Washington.\n\n\u201cHe served President Gerald Ford as the White House Chief of Staff.\n\n\u201cHe\u2019s still, as I say, the youngest person in history to hold that position.\n\n\u201cWhen Art Laffer sketched out the legendary Laffer Curve on a cocktail napkin, talking about economics, it was Dick Cheney\u2019s napkin!\n\n\u201cDick was at the center of our nation\u2019s history in so many ways.\n\n\u201cAfter the Ford Administration, Dick came home to Casper.\n\n\u201cHe ran for Congress.\n\n\u201cAnd, he won that seat six times in a row.\n\n\u201cIn Congress, he fought for lower taxes, he fought for Second Amendment rights,\n\nand for preserving our state\u2019s natural beauty.\n\n\u201cDick rose to become the Whip of the Republican Party in the House of Representatives.\n\n\u201cThat made him the second Republican Whip in Congress from Wyoming.\n\n\u201cSenator Al Simpson was chosen to be the Senate Republican Whip just a few years earlier.\n\n\u201cWhen George Herbert Walker Bush became president, he chose Congressman Dick Cheney to serve as Secretary of Defense.\n\n\u201cThe Senate confirmed him unanimously \u2013 92 to nothing. Don\u2019t see anything like that happening around this place today.\n\n\u201cIn four transformative years, he oversaw victory in Desert Storm, he guided America through the peaceful end of the Cold War, he helped shape America\u2019s role as the world\u2019s only superpower.\n\n\u201cA decade later, he became Vice President of the United States.\n\n\u201cHe liked to joke that he personally delivered Wyoming\u2019s three electoral votes. In an election decided by one vote in the Electoral College, those three votes from Wyoming mattered.\n\n\u201cAfter the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Dick\u2019s calm, steady leadership reassured Americans\n\nin one of our darkest hours.\n\n\u201cDick\u2019s values were the values of Wyoming, enshrined in the Cowboy Code.\n\n\u201cLive each day with courage, take pride in your work, and do what needs to be done.\n\n\u201cThat was Dick Cheney.\n\n\u201cAnd, that is how he lived.\n\n\u201cSome of our Founders questioned whether America ever needed a Vice President.\n\n\u201cBenjamin Franklin joked that the title for the Vice President, he said, would be \u2018Your Superfluous Excellency.\u2019\n\n\u201cHad Franklin met Dick Cheney, he would have changed his mind.\n\n\u201cVice President Cheney was anything but superfluous.\n\n\u201cHe shaped history. He steadied nations. He stood for a stronger, safer America and a freer world.\n\n\u201cAs Vice President, Dick held the title of President of the Senate.\n\n\u201cIn that capacity, he presided over our chamber. His eight tie-breaking votes on the floor of the Senate were cast at decisive moments in our history.\n\n\u201cIn 2001, he cast the tie-breaking vote on the budget resolution that paved the way for generational tax relief for American families.\n\n\u201cDick never treated this office as ceremonial. He was hands-on and deeply engaged in governing.\n\n\u201cA bust of Vice President Cheney now rests in the Senate Wing of the Capitol. It marks not only the office he held. It memorializes the values that he lived.\n\n\u201cA son of Wyoming. A defender of freedom. An American original.\n\n\u201cWe remember Dick Cheney as he lived \u2013 steady in purpose, firm in conviction, loyal to his country, and unafraid to do what he believed was right.\n\n\u201cMy prayers are with Lynne, with Liz and Mary, with their grandchildren as they celebrate the life of an incredible man.\n\n\u201cMay he rest in peace.\u201d\n\n###", 1, "2026-03-30T01:40:41Z", "2026-04-06T19:52:45Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://www.barrasso.senate.gov/senator-barrasso-pays-tribute-to-vice-president-dick-cheney/"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 1.5092762187123299, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}