National Police Week 2026: Images, Video Capture Peace Officers Memorial Day Tributes

Vice President JD Vance honored fallen officers during the 45th Annual National Peace Officers’ Memorial Service, using the Police Week 2026 stage to emphasize sacrifice, faith and backing for law enforcement.

May 16, 2026

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Vice President JD Vance honored fallen officers during the 45th Annual National Peace Officers’ Memorial Service, highlighting fallen police officers from Ohio, Hawaii and Pennsylvania.
Vance recognized the officers for their line-of-duty sacrifices and emphasized the collective sacrifice represented by families of the fallen.
He also pointed to declining violent crime and officer deaths, crediting policy changes while pledging continued federal support and stronger penalties for violence against law enforcement.

By Sabrina Eaton

Source cleveland.com

WASHINGTON—Vice President JD Vance on Friday honored fallen Lorain police officer Phillip Wagner in a 45th Annual National Peace Officers’ Memorial Service speech to commemorate law enforcement officers throughout the country who were killed in the line of duty.

Wagner, 35, was shot and killed last July in what authorities described as an ambush attack while he and a fellow officer were eating lunch in their patrol cruisers at the Colorado Avenue Industrial Park. The gunman, Michael Parker, 28, was shot and killed by officers responding to the scene. Investigators found a cache of explosives in Parker’s car.

Vance described Wagner as “a family man, a Marine Corps veteran” with eight years of law enforcement experience who “left behind a beautiful wife and three children.”

“He did nothing other than do his job, and a coward opened fire on him,” Vance told the Fraternal Order of Police event. “This afternoon, we commemorate Officer Wagner’s devotion to his community and the duty he felt to protect it from those who would do it harm.”

Vance also singled out four other fallen officers for recognition at Friday’s ceremony: Officer Suzanne O, a five-year veteran of the Maui County Police Department who was killed last August while responding to reports of an armed suspect, and three detectives from Pennsylvania’s Northern York County Regional Police Department — Detective Mark Baker, Detective Isaiah Emenheiser and Detective Sergeant Cody Becker — who were killed last September while attempting to serve an arrest warrant.

“We cannot tell every single story of every single family and of every single instance of brave sacrifice,” said Vance, a Cincinnati Republican. “When I look at these white chairs here in the front rows, what I see is dozens of stories, dozens of brave people.”

Vance opened his remarks with a passage from the book of Isaiah — “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” — drawing a parallel between the prophet’s willingness to serve and the choice made by officers who go into danger.

“We gather this afternoon to honor men and women who heard the exact same call, men and women whose selflessness led them toward danger when others fled,” he said.

Vance praised what he described as public safety progress under the Trump administration. He said on-duty law enforcement deaths reached their lowest level in 80 years in 2025 and that the U.S. murder rate fell to its lowest point in 125 years — “the largest single drop in recorded history.”

Other crimes and law enforcement problems such as murders, robberies, rapes, traffic fatalities, overdoses, shooting deaths and aggravated assaults are also down since the administration took office, he said.

“We will fight for you just as you fight for us every single day,” Vance told police officers at the ceremony.

Vance credited several administration policies for the declines, including expanded funding for local law enforcement grants, border enforcement, the elimination of “cashless bail” through federal action and the Trump administration’s decision to drop previously filed Justice Department lawsuits against police departments.

“We stopped handcuffing the police and started handcuffing more violent criminals,” Vance declared. “We’re reminding the nation once more of who stands between order and chaos, that thin blue line still holds.”

He pledged that the Justice Department would “aggressively seek the death penalty for anybody who dares to kill a law enforcement officer in the United States of America” and said the department’s Public Safety Officers Benefits Program distributed more than $166 million in death and disability payments in 2025.

Closing his remarks, Vance returned to scripture: “Later in the book of Isaiah, the Lord speaks through his prophet, and he says, ‘You shall be called the repair of the breach, you shall be called the restorer of streets to dwell in.’

“Though we mourn their passing back into the arms of their creator, those of us who remain inherit a new responsibility,” Vance continued. “Our responsibility is simple: to follow in their footsteps and to devote our own lives to service.”

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