1 of 5 | President Donald Trump awards the Medal of Honor to Major James Capers Jr. during a ceremony in the East Room of the White House in Washington, D.C., on Thursday, June 18, 2026. Photo by Aaron Schwartz/UPI | License Photo
June 19 (UPI) -- President Donald Trump has awarded the Medal of Honor to three veterans, honoring their acts of heroism in battle in Vietnam and Afghanistan.
At a White House ceremony on Thursday, Trump awarded the nation's highest military honor to retired Marine Corps Maj. James Capers Jr. and retired Army Maj. Nicholas Dockery. He also awarded the medal posthumously to Marine Corps Col. John Ripley, who died in 2008, with the honor accepted by his son, Tom Ripley.
Trump opened his remarks by touting the stock market and lower oil prices, then appeared to joke that he wanted to award himself the nation's highest military honor but was told he could not. He then introduced Capers, saying he was the first Black Marine in history to receive a battlefield commission during wartime when he was promoted to second lieutenant during the Vietnam War.
Capers was awarded the medal for his "acts of gallantry and intrepidity above and beyond the call of duty" in the spring of 1967, when he led a four-day reconnaissance patrol that made contact on three separate occasions with a superior enemy force, and on the final day, was ambushed, the White House said in a release.
