I ask unanimous consent to complete my remarks. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

I am honored to come to the floor today to express my support for the President's nominee to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, Judge Ralph Erickson. Judge Erickson is a longtime North Dakotan and has been a tremendous…

We desperately need to expand rural broadband, which, along with Shelly Capito, we are working very hard in my office.

We are very, very interested in making sure that the historic commitment that the Federal Government has made to rural development...none of that would be possible if we had not electrified, if we have not--now looking at broadband, if we…

In fact, I have two tests on whether I think a rural area will survive. First is do we have rural water, which is absolutely critical going forward for many, many families, to make sure that the water is pure and clean.

The other test is can they stream Netflix, right, because if you cannot stream Netflix, if you cannot get access to broadband, it is going to be increasingly more difficult.

We think that biomass-derived products are tremendously important in the mix of how to help rural economy.

If the Chinese Government did everything possible economically, with sanctions, with trade, with relationships, would it effectively achieve a deterrence from further progression in North Korea to acquire a nuclear weapon?

I think that is the ultimate challenge here going forward, which is finding parallel purpose with the Chinese in achieving this result.

I think we are woefully short.

We cannot normalize this behavior. If we are going to prevent this behavior, we have to look at the conditions beginning with childhood trauma.

I have worked to try to improve conditions for Native children pretty much my entire public life.

I will start out with a story and it goes to what Ms. Matthews was talking about.

I am deeply concerned that we do not really have a handle on what we are doing in cybersecurity.

Thank you, Mr. President. To my great colleague and one of the nicest people here, Senator Udall, who always leads with his brain, we know that his heart isn't far behind, and he has been a tremendous leader, a tremendous advocate, and a…

To we get our arms around this problem, I will just tell a story.

I would also like to acknowledge Senator Heidi Heitkamp's efforts as an anti-trafficking ally.

It is high time that our courts stop enabling Backpage and others to hide behind the free speech curtain.