President Joe Biden on July 7 awarded the Medal of Freedom to 16 people, including Olympian Simone Biles, former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.), and New York nurse Sandra Lindsay.
The medal is the highest civilian award.
Biden called those receiving the medals “an extraordinary group of Americans.”
The president selected those honored.
He said Biles displayed “unmatched determination” while competing in the Olympics. Giffords, who was shot during a mass shooting in Tuscon in 2011, has helped bring about gun safety legislation like the bill passed by bipartisan majorities in both congressional chambers and “is one of the most courageous people I have ever known,” the president added. And Lindsay, the first person in the United States to get a COVID-19 vaccine outside of clinical trials, “poured her heart into helping patients” and keeping colleagues safe during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, he said….