President Biden will award the Presidential Citizens Medal, one of the nation’s highest civilian honors, to 20 people on Thursday afternoon, including former Representative Liz Cheney and two close personal advisers, Ted Kaufman and Christopher J. Dodd.
The recipients the president selected to be honored in his last medal ceremony have “performed exemplary deeds of service for their country or their fellow citizens,” the White House said in a statement on Thursday.
It is not unusual for a president’s personal esteem to influence the recipients of presidential medals, which are approved through a less formalized process than other awards like Medals of Honor or acts of clemency like pardons and commutations. Several of Mr. Biden’s selections are fellow lawmakers he has known and worked with for decades, and a few are from his home state, Delaware.
But the bestowing of presidential medals is also an opportunity for a president to showcase those who have fought for causes he championed. The selection of Ms. Cheney, a Wyoming Republican whose vocal opposition to Donald J. Trump cost her her political career, was a continuation of his push for bipartisanship and decency in politics at a time when Ms. Cheney’s own party has turned against her. Mr. Biden is said to have been considering a pre-emptive pardon to protect her from retribution by the next administration.
In a statement, the White House praised Ms. Cheney for working across the aisle.
“Throughout two decades in public service, including as a congresswoman for Wyoming and vice chair of the committee on the Jan. 6 attack, Liz Cheney has raised her voice — and reached across the aisle — to defend our nation and the ideals we stand for: Freedom. Dignity. And decency,” the White House said. “Her integrity and intrepidness remind us all what is possible if we work together.”
Mr. Biden’s choices also reflect the causes he has fought for while in office. Several are prominent advocates who over long careers worked to advance gay rights, women’s rights, desegregation and cancer research.