Cheney, Zelensky among 2022 JFK Profile in Courage Award winners

Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky are among the five recipients to be presented with the John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award this year.

In a statement on Thursday, the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation said Cheney and Zelensky will receive their awards along with Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson (D), Arizona House Speaker Rusty Bowers (R), and Georgia Election Department employee Wandrea “Shaye” Moss. 

Zelensky is being awarded by the foundation for showing resilience, strength and courage in the face of Russia’s invasion into Ukraine in late February. Zelensky, a former actor and comedian, has become a wartime hero, leading his nation’s resistance from the capital Kyiv.

The foundation said Cheney is being recognized for showing resilience after she received numerous threats from her colleagues and others for being one of the few GOP lawmakers to denounce former President Trump’s false claims that the 2020 election was stolen, as well as being ousted from her leadership position with the House Republican Conference.

Cheney, one of the ten Republicans who voted to impeach Trump for his role in the Jan. 6 insurrection, is one of two GOP members of the House select committee investigating the events of the deadly riot. 

In a statement, Cheney expressed her gratitude for the honor, noting how fellow recipient Zelensky is teaching a new generation of Americans how to show “absolute and uncompromising courage” against tyranny.

“In America, we have also seen how fragile our democratic institutions can be, and we have learned that they do not defend themselves,” she said.

“We – each one of us – must do that.  If we do not stand for truth, the rule of law and our Constitution, if we set aside our founding principles for the politics of the moment, the miracle of our constitutional republic will slip away.”  

The JFK Profile in Courage Award, launched by the foundation in 1989, is awarded to public servants who have made courageous decisions of conscience without regard for the personal or professional consequences. 

Previous recipients of the award include former President Obama, former Rep. Gabby Giffords (D-Ariz.), the late Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). 

“I am very grateful for this honor yet cannot help but feel undeserving of it,” Bowers, who is being honored by the foundation for resisting pressure from Trump and his attorney Rudy Giuliani (R) to block Biden’s electoral victory in Arizona, said in a statement. 

“Honoring my oath and the people’s choices at the ballot box are not heroic acts—they are the least that Arizonans should expect from the people elected to serve them.”

The award ceremony is set to happen on May 22 at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library in Boston, Mass.