Lieutenant Governor Winsome Earle-Sears, a Marine Corps veteran, spoke at the Commonwealth of Virginia’s 66th Memorial Day Ceremony Monday, honoring the sacrifices made by service members and their families.
“The people we are here to honor, to remember, they don’t sit among us. If we are to see them, then we must visit their graves, whether they’re here or in some other country, and some, their whereabouts are unknown to us, known only to God,” Earle-Sears said from the Virginia War Memorial.
“They died in service to our country,” she said. “So let me be clear, this is not a three-day weekend. This is Memorial Day. It is an honorable day.”
Earle-Sears quoted the words of several servicemen and their families reflecting on their service through the U.S.’ history.
“When America is troubled, when she is threatened with extermination, when she is threatened to be wiped off the face of the earth, she rallies her sons and daughters and others who came to her shores, who have tasted liberty and have sworn allegiance to America,” she said. “She rallies them and they protect and defend her and the Constitution from all comers, knowing that they may be giving up their lives.”
She concluded, “We say, as Captain John Paul Jones said in 1779, ‘I have not yet begun to fight,’ because you’ve heard it already: freedom is not free.”
Governor Glenn Youngkin spoke Monday at the ViVa! Vienna! festival, a charity fundraiser hosted by the Rotary Club.
“I want to thank all of the amazing efforts that went into making today come about,” Youngkin said. “It’s volunteerism at its best.”
He said, “What an honor it is to pay tribute on this Memorial Day to the brave men and women who paid the ultimate sacrifice for our nation, a sacrifice that can and will never be fully repaid.”
“So I stand here today on behalf of a grateful commonwealth and a grateful nation,” he said.
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Eric Burk is a reporter at The Virginia Star and The Star News Network. Email tips to [email protected].
