[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 109 (Thursday, June 22, 2023)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2209-S2210]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                 Remembering Karon Kaye Tinsley Goolsby

  Mr. CRUZ. Mr. President, I rise today to honor an extraordinary Texan 
and

[[Page S2210]]

an incredibly dear friend. Karon Kaye Tinsley Goolsby passed away on 
Monday, June 19, 2023.
  Kaye is someone who has been an incredible friend to me for two 
decades now. She lived in Katy, TX, and was married to the love of her 
life, Gary. Their son Greg was born in 1981. She loved her family. She 
loved her grandkids.
  Kaye was a grassroots organizer unlike any other. Kaye was incredibly 
active in the Texas Federation of Republican Women and in the National 
Federation of Republican Women.
  I still remember when I first met Kaye. It was 2004. It was at the 
Republican National Convention. I was a 33-year-old young lawyer. I was 
serving as the solicitor general in Texas, and I had hopes to run for 
office, but I didn't know a whole lot of people in politics. At that 
convention, I met Kaye.
  She lit up any room she was in. She had a personality that was 
incandescent. As Kaye would later observe, for some reason, this kid--
that would be me--just followed her everywhere she went. And at the end 
of the day, it wasn't complicated. Kaye knew everybody.
  When I followed Kaye from one grassroots activist to another to 
another, Kaye would turn around and introduce me to one after the 
other, after the other, after the other and say: Have you met Ted? Have 
you met Ted? Have you met Ted? She had the energy of an atom bomb. It 
was unstoppable.
  Kaye became one of my very closest friends and most trusted advisers. 
When I first launched a campaign for attorney general of Texas, I 
remember sitting in Kaye's car for about 3 hours trying to convince her 
to come support our campaign, that I needed her. She, quite rightly, 
said: Are you out of your mind? You don't have the support. You don't 
have the money. You don't have the name ID. How on Earth can you 
possibly win?
  My answer was: Kaye, with your support, we can do anything.
  After about 3 hours, her husband Gary, who is also a dear friend, 
told her: Kaye, just say yes. He is going to keep asking you until you 
do.
  She finally laughed and said yes.
  That race for attorney general never ended up materializing. The 
vacancy we thought existed ended up not happening.
  But 2 years later, I launched a campaign for U.S. Senate, and Kaye 
was my grassroots chairman. I will tell you, in that race, I was 
supposed to have no prayer. My opponent in that race was the incumbent 
Lieutenant Governor, who was personally worth $200 million, who had put 
$35 million of his own money in the race, and I had never been elected 
to anything. The last thing I was elected to was the student council. 
But we had a weapon unlike anything else: We had Kaye.
  You have to understand, Kaye would be on three cell phones at once, 
calling people relentlessly. She would greet them all the same way. She 
would go: Hey, sugar. And ``sugar''--she could drag that second 
syllable out for three sentences. And she would be talking to people 
all over the State.
  Early on in the Senate campaign, we rolled out a list of Republican 
women leaders in TFRW across the State who would endorse my campaign. 
We rolled out a list. It was like a cannon shot. It shocked everyone. 
That was 100 percent Kaye. That was Kaye on the phone with one after 
the other, after the other, saying: Trust me. This kid, he is going to 
do what he said.
  After that, a few weeks later, we rolled out a second endorsement 
list with over 80 leaders of the Republican Women's Club all over the 
State.
  In response to that release, my opponent in that race fired his 
campaign manager. That is how big a deal it was. He had assumed that 
all the Republican Women's Clubs across the State would be with him. 
But he did not understand that when you had Kaye working the phones, 
and working the phones, and working the phones--and I would travel 
around with Kaye from event to event to event, and she couldn't be 
stopped. She would take me to this person, to that person, to the next 
person. It was relentless.
  In 2016, when I ran for President, Kaye was my national grassroots 
chairman. Kaye and I spent hundreds of hours on the bus together in 
Iowa and out on the ground in New Hampshire and South Carolina and all 
over the country. And, I will tell you, Kaye would talk to Republican 
women in every State.
  Mr. President, you are from the great State of Hawaii. I guarantee 
you, Kaye was on the phone with Republican women in the State of 
Hawaii.
  She had an energy that was fiery. And, boy, she could get mad. Kaye 
has chewed me out probably more than my wife Heidi has. She would get 
mad at this or that or whatever you did, and she would tell you exactly 
what she thought.
  I remember, once, Kaye was really mad at me. I don't even remember 
for what. But I had to drive all the way out to her house in Katy, TX, 
and sit in her living room while she spent about an hour and a half 
explaining to me how I had screwed something up that she was mad at me 
for.
  She also made me eat some of her homemade brownies. Kaye had a lot of 
wonderful gifts, but cooking was not one of them. And the brownies were 
pretty terrible, but I told Kaye they were delicious and I appreciated 
it and I took my medicine.
  Kaye and I, as we were talking to Republican women's groups--I used 
to say all the time that ``Republican women are the heart and soul''--
and when I say that, Kaye, from the back of the room, would call out, 
``and the brains,'' and everyone would laugh, and I would say, ``and 
the brains of the Republican Party.''
  It started off as an ad-lib joke, but it became something we said all 
over the State and eventually all over the country.
  Kaye had kidney disease and liver disease. She spent the last several 
months waiting on the list for a transplant. Kaye was a tiny lady. She 
needed a small liver. Several times it looked like they were going to 
find a liver, a kidney.
  Just a few weeks ago, I got a text from Gary: It looks like we have 
got one. Surgery is tomorrow.
  That next morning, I woke up praying for Kaye, until I got a text a 
couple of hours later that said the surgery fell through; the 
transplant wasn't a match.
  I have never known someone like Kaye Goolsby. Kaye loved this 
country--loved it. She loved Texas. And she was so fierce and so full 
of life.
  When Kaye passed, I texted her husband, and I later put out on 
Twitter--I said the angels were weeping and so am I. But I will tell 
you this: I have no doubt that, right now up in Heaven, Kaye Goolsby is 
organizing and reorganizing everything. She is going to the angels 
saying: This isn't right. You need to change this. You need to move 
this over here. We can do better.
  After a long struggle with liver and kidney disease, Kaye has gone to 
be with the Lord. Those of us she left behind, we are hurting. We will 
miss her. I will still wonder, when my phone rings, if on the other end 
is going to be that lilting southern accent saying: ``Hey, sugar.'' But 
we are going to have to wait a little while to hear it again.
  This is one of my favorite pictures. You can see the joy. She could 
laugh. She brought that joy to everyone else. Her grandkids called her 
Kaye-Kaye. My daughters called her Kaye-Kaye too.
  To Kaye Goolsby, my dear, dear friend, the heart and soul and the 
brains, we love you, Kaye.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The senior Senator from Washington.