Louie Gohmert: “I thank my friend, a former judge as well. It is an honor to be here and to be part of this Special Order to honor our…”

“I thank my friend, a former judge as well. It is an honor to be here and to be part of this Special Order to honor our friend Sam Johnson. Sam and Shirley are public servants in every sense of the word. There were the 29 years in the Air Force. The United States service was what he was. It's what he did. There were the 7 years in Hanoi Hilton--one of the worst prisons ever concocted in the imagination of sick minds-- and he spent 42 months of that in solitary confinement. There are people running around the world saying that you can't put people in solitary confinement, but they were not around to help Sam Johnson during that horrible time in Hanoi. This is the 40th anniversary of his release, and America has been better for Sam Johnson's living and serving and for Shirley's being his partner even though, for 7 years, they were apart. I know, on the first day I was sworn in, I was sitting right over here on the aisle, talking to another Republican, and Sam came down the aisle. His body still shows the torture and the broken bones that never healed properly and the bones that grew around nerves that they were never able to fix. When he got even with me, I stood up and shook his hand and said, Sam, it is such an honor to serve with you in this body. Sam has always been a man of honesty and integrity, a man whose judgment I could trust. He said, Well, it's an honor serving with you--which was a stretch-- but then he said, But don't trust that fella next to you.…”