President’s Letter: Celebrating New Courage Project Honorees

Dear friends,

This week marks 249 years since the signing of the Declaration of Independence. It’s an opportunity to reflect on its promises of freedom and equality and to honor those who have stood up — through our darkest hours — to make those commitments real. On the last day of Pride Month, we particularly remember the queer trailblazers who asserted their rights to live and love.

In recognition of Independence Day, we are proud to join our partners in announcing the second slate of The Courage Project awardees. From faith leaders to veterans to business owners — our honorees carry forward the tradition of courage and exemplify core values of kindness, service, and decency. And by showing us how we can each be a force for good in our communities, they offer us hope for a brighter future.

This slate of honorees features 14 individuals and organizations, including:

• Prabhjot (Parry) Singh, a Sikh community leader who organizes interfaith gatherings at the Sikh Temple of Wisconsin, the site of a 2012 mass shooting. By hosting interfaith dialogues and community meals, he has helped to transform a place of tragedy into one of healing and understanding. Singh and his fellow individual honorees will receive “pay it forward” awards — enabling them to recommend a donation to a values-aligned nonprofit organization.

• Gladys Harrison, the manager of Big Mama’s Kitchen and Catering, in North Omaha, Nebraska. Gladys preserves her late mother’s soul food restaurant as a cultural institution, honoring her family’s legacy while sustaining a space for storytelling, connection, and Black heritage.

• Rutland County Pride Center, an organization that demonstrated solidarity by physically protecting participants during the NAACP-organized Juneteenth Strut in Rutland County, Vermont. The group’s actions ensured that Black, brown, queer, and allied community members could walk safely through their town despite facing aggression. In appreciation of its support, the Rutland Area NAACP nominated the Rutland County Pride Center for this award.

• PICO California, the state’s largest faith-based community organizing network, represents over 500 congregations and 650,000 Californians across 18 counties. Amid aggressive immigration raids and the deployment of the National Guard and Marines to Los Angeles, PICO co-organized an interfaith vigil at Grand Park this month, attended by 1,500 Angelenos — representing Catholic, Jewish, Muslim, and other faith communities — standing in solidarity with immigrant families.

• Isaac Garcia, a young Native American and Mexican community leader who, at age 11, founded the nonprofit Isaac’s Blessing Bags to support unhoused individuals in St. Paul, Minnesota by providing toiletries and other needed personal care items.

I’m so grateful to stand alongside United Way Worldwide and our charitable foundation partners to uplift these powerful acts of leadership. To learn more about all of today’s honorees, and to nominate a neighbor or organization who is demonstrating civic bravery in their community, visit thecourageproject.org.

In Solidarity,

Deepak Bhargava