{"id":117856,"date":"2021-04-14T08:13:43","date_gmt":"2021-04-14T15:13:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/69.46.6.243\/?p=117856"},"modified":"2021-04-14T08:13:43","modified_gmt":"2021-04-14T15:13:43","slug":"president-biden-at-a-congressional-tribute-for-u-s-capitol-police-officer-william-evans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/new.thepinetree.net\/?p=117856","title":{"rendered":"President Biden at a Congressional Tribute for U.S. Capitol Police Officer William Evans"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Washington, DC&#8230;Madam Speaker; Majority Leader Schumer; Minority Leader McCarthy; my friend, Minority \u2014 Minority Leader McConnell; members of Congress; Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, General Milley; Attorney General Garland; Mayor Bowser; all the Capitol Hill Police and all that are here to pay tribute to this Capitol policeman who fell in the line of duty; Acting Chief Pittman, and the men and women of the Capitol Police Force: I\u2019m sorry \u2014 the second time in two months we have such a ceremony.  <\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/1oXZdWvAFxk\" title=\"YouTube video player\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>And, you know, Mom, I didn\u2019t know Billy, but I knew Billy.  I grew up with Billys in Claymont and Scranton, Pennsylvania.  Billy was always the kid that you know if you got in a fight and you\u2019re outnumbered three to one, he\u2019d still jump in, knowing you\u2019d both get beaten.  <\/p>\n<p>He was the one who always kept his word.  If he said he\u2019d be there, he\u2019d be there.  He was the one who, just like the folks I grew up with, wasn\u2019t capable of saying no when you needed him.  <\/p>\n<p>You know, just like you, Officer Kenny Shaver was injured in the attack with Billy.  And never has there been more strain \u2014 and I\u2019ve been here a long time; I\u2019ve been here since 1972 as U.S. senator \u2014 \u201973 \u2014 has so much strain and responsibility been placed on the shoulders \u2014 the shoulders of Capitol Police.  And yet, you hear it, you see it, you watch them, and you watch them do their duty with pure courage and not complain.  <\/p>\n<p>You know, Sergeant Kyle King, I\u2019m sorry you had to make the call \u2014 that telephone call that every family dreads when they have a son or daughter, husband, wife, brother, sister in uniform.  Because every morning \u2014 every morning they pin that badge on, go to work, they expect to come home.  In the back of your minds, \u201cWe\u2019ll never get that call.\u201d  <\/p>\n<p>You knew Billy since grade school.  I think it was the fourth grade.  I got to deal with all the guys that I grew up and knew in fourth grade.  When one passes away, the other one has to give up because he has too much information about you, too much to leave behind.  But, you know, I\u2019m sure all those memories from North Adams and Clarksburg never changed who Billy was.  <\/p>\n<p>He was defined by his dignity, his decency, his loyalty, and his courage.   And, Mom, that\u2019s because of you and his Dad.  That\u2019s how it happened \u2014 not by accident.    <\/p>\n<p>Mrs. Evans, you have \u2014 I have some idea of what you\u2019re feeling like.  I buried two of my children.  And people have come up to you and are going to come up to you for some time and say, \u201cI know how you feel.\u201d  They\u2019re going to say that to sis.  They\u2019re going to say that to the kids.  They\u2019re going to say that to his former wife.  And after a while \u2014 you know everybody means well \u2014 you feel like saying, \u201cYou have no idea.\u201d  <\/p>\n<p>But the truth is that a time is going to come, I promise you \u2014 not believable now \u2014 when a memory, a fragrance, a scene, a circumstance, the way his son tilts his head the way he did when he was that age \u2014 it\u2019s going to bring back the memory.  And for the longest time, it\u2019s going to feel like, at that moment, that memory \u2014 it\u2019s going to feel like you got the phone call just that moment ago.  And there are going to be people celebrating Billy\u2019s life.  And as much as you appreciate it \u2014 all of you \u2014 it also is hard; you relive everything again.<\/p>\n<p>You know, I \u2014 I got a phone call when I first got here and lost my family \u2014 part of my family \u2014 from a person I never knew, never met: the former governor of New Jersey, who was literally 40 \u2014 45 years my senior.  And he told me he knew how I felt.  And I didn\u2019t say anything.  <\/p>\n<p>He said, \u201cI know what you\u2019re thinking.\u201d  He said, \u201cBut I did know.\u201d  He said, \u201cI used to come home \u2014 I was the Attorney General of New Jersey before I was Governor.  And I\u2019d come home for lunch because I lived just across the green from my office.  And one day, a woman who helped out at our home came running across the green saying, \u2018She\u2019s gone.  She\u2019s gone.\u2019\u201d  <\/p>\n<p>His wife had had an aneurysm.  And he said, \u201cYou know what I did?\u201d  He said, \u201cI kept \u2014 I kept a \u2014 I got graph paper, and four months out, I would put the month on it and then a horizontal line.  I\u2019d put the date and the month.  In the vertical line, I put the numbers 1 to 10.  Ten would be the happiest day of my life, and one would be like the moment I got the phone call.\u201d  <\/p>\n<p>And he said, \u201cAnd every night before I\u2019d go to bed, I\u2019d graph it.  I\u2019d put on a dot on that day where I was.\u201d  And he said, \u201cDon\u2019t look at it for three or four months.  He said, \u201cAnd you\u2019ll look at it and you\u2019ll see.\u201d  He\u2019d put it on a graph \u2014 graph.  \u201cThe downs are just as far down, but they get further and further and further apart.\u201d  <\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s how you\u2019re all going to know that you\u2019re going to make it \u2014 by holding each other together, and most importantly, by holding Logan and Abigail as tightly as you can.  Because as long as you have them, you\u2019ve got Billy.  As long as you have them.<\/p>\n<p>You know, my prayer for all of you is that a day will come when you have that memory, and I\u2019ve said, \u201cJust smile before you bring a tear to your eyes.\u201d  It\u2019s \u2014 I promise you it\u2019s going to come.  It just takes a while.  It takes a while.  <\/p>\n<p>But when it comes, you\u2019ll know, because he\u2019s still with you.  He\u2019s still in your heart.  <\/p>\n<p>Losing a son, daughter, brother, sister, mom, dad \u2014 it\u2019s like losing a piece of your soul.  But it\u2019s buried deep, but it comes back.  <\/p>\n<p>There\u2019s a great quote by R.G. Ingersoll.  It was read when my son, who was the chief law enforcement officer in the state of Delaware \u2014 the attorney general \u2014 came back from Iraq after a year and he \u2014 and he died.  And they read this poem from R.G. Ingersoll, who said, \u201cWhen will defies fear, when duty throws the gauntlet down to fate, when honor scorns compromise with death, this is heroism.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>Your son, your husband, your brother, your dad was a hero.  And he\u2019s part of you.  It\u2019s in your blood. <\/p>\n<p>My prayer for you is that moment when a smile comes before the tear, quicker than longer.  Thank you.  <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Washington, DC&#8230;Madam Speaker; Majority Leader Schumer; Minority Leader McCarthy; my friend, Minority \u2014 Minority Leader McConnell; members of Congress; Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, General Milley; Attorney General Garland; Mayor Bowser; all the Capitol Hill Police and all that are here to pay tribute to this Capitol policeman who fell in the line of duty; [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":117858,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_cbd_carousel_blocks":"[]","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[20,5,1,25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-117856","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-government","category-news","category-obituaries","last_archivepost"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/new.thepinetree.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Fullscreen-capture-4142021-80212-AM.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.thepinetree.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117856","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.thepinetree.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.thepinetree.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.thepinetree.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.thepinetree.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=117856"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.thepinetree.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117856\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.thepinetree.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/117858"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.thepinetree.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=117856"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.thepinetree.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=117856"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.thepinetree.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=117856"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}