FORT WORTH, Texas — Texas civil rights leader Opal Lee will receive the nation’s highest civilian honor, the Presidential Medal of Freedom. 

Lee, who has been nicknamed the “Grandmother of Juneteenth,” has been a staple of the Fort Worth community for years. 

The 97-year-old served as a teacher, social worker and community organizer in North Texas long before she made national headlines for her work advocating for Juneteenth to become a federal holiday, which commemorates when the final slaves in Galveston, Texas, learned of the ending of slavery. 

The medals will be given out during a ceremony at the White House on Friday.

This won’t be Lee’s first time visiting to White House. When President Joe Biden signed the Juneteenth National Independence Act into law in 2021, Lee was invited to the ceremony and was given the pen Biden used.

Back in 2021, Lee said that her time visiting the White House was “marvelous.” 

“The young people would say, ‘it’s off the chain,’” Lee said. 

Lee got a special shoutout from Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris ahead of the bill signing, recognizing her tireless work pushing for Juneteenth to become a federal holiday. She even got a standing ovation from those in attendance. 

“She walked for miles and miles — literally and figuratively — to bring attention to Juneteenth,” Biden said.

Lee will be joined by 18 other medal recipients ranging from scientists to politicians to athletes. 

The other recipients are:

• Clarence B. Jones - a civil rights activist and lawyer, who represented Martin Luther King, Jr. He also helped write King’s famous “I Have a Dream” speech. 
• Michael Bloomberg - a philanthropist and former mayor of New York City, who founded Bloomberg L.P.
• James Clyburn - a congressional representative from South Carolina and retired educator, who has been in Democratic leadership since 2003. He has represented southern and eastern South Carolina in Congress since 1993.  
• Al Gore - a former Democratic presidential candidate and vice president under President Bill Clinton. 
• John Kerry - a politician and diplomat, who served as secretary of state in President Barack Obama’s administration. He also served as a climate envoy for Biden. 
• Nancy Pelosi - the first and only woman elected speaker of the House and current representative from California. 
• Elizabeth Dole - a lawyer and politician, who served as a senator representing the state of North Carolina. She is also the wife of the late Kansas Sen. Bob Dole. 
• Medgar Evers - a civil rights activist, who served as the NAACP’s first field officer in Mississippi. He was assassinated in his driveway in 1963 at 37. 
• Michelle Yeoh - an award-winning actress from Malaysia, who is best known for her roles in Everything Everywhere All at Once and Crazy Rich Asians.
• Jim Thorpe - an Olympic gold medalist in the decathlon and pentathlon in the 1912 Summer Olympics. He was the first Native American to win a gold medal.
• Judy Shepard - a mother and LGBTQ+ rights activist, who founded the Matthew Shepard Foundation after her gay son, who was beaten to death in Laramie, Wyoming.  
• Frank Lautenberg - a former senator from New York and businessperson, who died in 2013. 
• Gregory Boyle - a Jesuit Catholic priest who founded the world’s largest gang intervention and rehabilitation program—Homeboy Industries. 
• Phil Donahue - a media personality who hosted the first TV talk show to feature audience participation.
• Katie Ledecky - an Olympian, and the most decorated female swimmer in history.
• Ellen Ochoa - a former astronaut and former director of the Johnson Space Center, who was the first Hispanic woman in space.
• Jane Rigby - an astrophysicist known for her work on the James Webb Space Telescope.
• Teresa Romero - the president of the United Farm Workers. She is the first Hispanic woman to lead the union.