Commending them on their selflessness, President Joe Biden honored nine first responders Wednesday with the Medal of Valor, the nation’s highest honor for bravery by a public safety officer. 

Those honored included two New York Police Department officers who were ambushed and killed responding to a 911 call. The rookie cop who took down the gunman also received a medal. 

A Houston police officer, Colorado police official, Ohio sheriff’s deputy and three FDNY firefighters were also honored.

“I don't know all of you, but I do know you,” Biden said during a White House ceremony. “From small towns and big cities, you’re cut from the same cloth. You run into danger when everyone else runs away from danger. You possess a selflessness that's literally impossible to explain. And your bravery is one that inspires people and inspires the community.”

NYPD officer Wilbert Mora and his police partner, Jason Rivera, were shot Jan. 21, 2022, while responding to a call about a family dispute in a Harlem apartment. Officer Sumit Sulan shot and killed the gunman, ending the deadly encounter moments after it began. Rivera died that night; Mora was pronounced dead four days later.

The fallen cops were no strangers to tensions between the NYPD and some of the communities they police; they'd both seen it growing up. Both sought to be catalysts of change when they became police officers, but neither got the chance they deserved, gunned down during a spate of shootings of police officers in 2022 in the city.

Rivera, 22, had been a police officer for barely a year. Mora, 27, was in his fourth year on the job. All three were promoted to detective — the fallen officers posthumously and Sulan in a ceremony where he was given detective shield No. 332 “symbolizing three brothers from the 32 (precinct)," New York Police Commissioner Keechant Sewell said when she awarded him the shield.

Mora’s mother and Rivera’s wife accepted their medals.

Biden opened his remarks by addressing Mora’s and Rivera’s families. 

“All of you who have lost someone know that no matter how much you take pride in the recognition and what they did when they were lost, it still brings back everything like it happened that moment,” said the president, whose wife and daughter were killed in a car crash and son died of cancer. 

“It takes a lot of courage to do what you're doing, and thank you,” he added.

Attorney General Merrick Garland, speaking before Biden, said to Mora’s and Rivera’s families: “We know it is impossible to understand the grief you endure or to fully comprehend your loss. You have our deepest condolences and our unending gratitude.”

Biden also honored three members of the Fire Department of New York: Lt. Justin Hespeler, who rescued a newborn baby from a burning house; firefighter Patrick Thornton, who, aboard an FDNY boat, saved a man trapped under a capsized vessel in the waters off the coast of Staten Island; and retired Lt. Jason Hickey, who saved a man from drowning in the Harlem River.

The other recipients were:

• Cpl. Jeffrey Farmer of the Littleton, Colorado Police Department. Farmer was responding to a call of shots fired possibly out of a car window, and chased the suspect to the door of an apartment where the man opened fire, hitting one of the officers. Farmer worked to fend off the shooter in order to save his fellow officer, who survived.

• Deputy Bobby Hau Pham of the Clermont County, Ohio Sheriff’s Office. Pham saved a drowning woman who had driven her car into a lake.

• Sgt. Kendrick Simpo of the Houston Police Department. Simpo was working a second job at the Houston area Galleria mall when he heard on the radio a heavily armed man was roaming the mall. Simpo tackled the suspect, who was carrying a rifle and 120 rounds of ammunition. No one was injured.t

The medals are awarded to people who display “extraordinary valor above and beyond the call of duty while acting to save or protect another person's life.”

Public safety leaders from across the country nominate candidates, and the Justice Department’s Medal of Valor Review Board issues recommendations.