Who Gets Honored, Who Gets Used
The 37th annual PBS National Memorial Day Concert will air live on Sunday, May 24, from the West Lawn of the U.S. Capitol, with Gary Sinise set to honor 102-year-old Navy veteran Chuck Kohler, one of 11 remaining survivors of the Pearl Harbor attack 85 years ago. The event, staged under the shadow of the Capitol, turns remembrance into a televised ritual of state-approved grief, with the apparatus of public memory carefully arranged for a national audience.
Sinise said, "We're losing 1,000 World War II veterans every single day, so time is short," and added, "This is the nation's opportunity, on live TV, to honor their service. The opportunities that we have to bring them together are increasingly special." He also said, "This is not a political thing. It doesn't matter who is in the White House, the Senate or the House," and, "We're divided over many things, but everyone can recognize that we have a responsibility to recognize the men and women who put their lives on the line to defend us."
The concert is described as a nonpartisan event and has never hosted the sitting U.S. president. President Donald Trump will not attend this year. Sinise will co-host with West Wing star Mary McCormack after longtime co-host Joe Mantegna had to drop out this year "due to unforeseen circumstances," according to a May 21 statement. Mantegna said in the release, "I'm looking forward to joining the millions of Americans watching this Sunday's concert on PBS."
The Pageant of Sacrifice
The concert is being held during the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence and is described as being about giving thanks to people who sacrificed for their country. That framing keeps the focus on sacrifice for the nation while the people who actually bear the costs of war are turned into symbols for a broadcast.
The event will include musical acts by Mickey Guyton, Jamey Johnson, who served eight years in the Marine Corps Reserve, and Alan Jackson. Under the direction of concert-veteran conductor Jack Everly, the National Symphony Orchestra will perform pieces that include two written by Sinise's composer son, McCanna Anthony "Mac" Sinise, who died in 2024 of a rare bone cancer called chordoma. Sinise said, "That is very special," and, "I'm so proud to have two of my son's works played by the National Symphony Orchestra."
The annual pre-Memorial Day TV showcase features stars highlighting veteran stories from past conflicts, including the 1776 American Revolution. The Pitt star and executive producer Noah Wyle will bring militiaman Joseph Plumb Martin's story fighting under Gen. George Washington to life, and Oscar winner Melissa Leo will recount the actions of retired Lt. Gen. Patricia D. Horoho, who rushed into rescue mode during the Sept. 11 attack on the Pentagon. Vietnam War veterans and Gold Star families, representing more than 1 million men and women who have given their lives, will also receive special tributes. Commemorating the 85th anniversary of Pearl Harbor, Breaking Bad star Jonathan Banks will tell Kohler's story.
Memory Managed From Above
At age 16, Kohler convinced his dad to sign his enlistment form to enter the Navy on April 3, 1941. On Dec. 7, the first bomb from a Japanese pilot hit near the hangar where Kohler was writing a letter home, sending window glass into his head, neck and shoulders. Kohler and another sailor mounted a .50-caliber machine gun on a nearby American plane and emptied round after round of ammunition into the attacking aircraft. Kohler ultimately witnessed the surrender of a Japanese garrison in August 1945 after being deployed to the Marshall Islands Pacific campaign.
Visiting Pearl Harbor 68 years after the attack, Kohler vowed to continue the remembrance to the comrades he lost. Each Dec. 7, he lights a beacon at the top of California's Mount Diablo to keep their memory alive. Producer Michael Colbert, whose late father Jerry Colbert started the concert in 1989, said, "Chuck's in great shape and he'll be there," and, "It's so important that we never forget. Chuck was part of the Greatest Generation that saved the world. We're blessed to still have him with us."
The concert will also be streaming on YouTube and PBS.org, and will be available as Video on Demand from May 24 to June 7, 2026.
What Memorial Day Is Sold As
Memorial Day is often called the unofficial start of summer, but one Washington Post opinion piece says it is important to remember that Memorial Day truly represents a day set aside to honor the men and women who never made it home, those who gave their lives in service to the country so the rest of the country could live in freedom and security. The piece says Memorial Day weekend is often a time for cookouts, camping trips, parades and gatherings of family and friends, and says there is nothing wrong with celebrating and enjoying the freedoms Americans have. It adds that those freedoms are what so many Americans sacrificed to protect.
A Fox News opinion piece by Rob Maness says Memorial Day is not Veterans Day and is not about those who came home. Maness, a retired U.S. Air Force colonel, combat Veteran, 9/11 Pentagon survivor, and host of The Rob Maness Show, wrote that he enlisted in the Air Force as an explosive ordnance disposal technician in 1979 and served for more than three decades, from the flight line to the cockpit of the B-1 bomber, from squadron command to wing command, through nuclear operations and multiple combat deployments. He said he buried friends, stood at attention as Taps echoed across cemetery lawns, and watched as folded flags were placed into the trembling hands of widows and children.
He said some of the colleagues he lost fell in the skies over Iraq and Afghanistan, others were killed by improvised explosive devices, and a few were lost on Sept. 11, 2001, when American Airlines Flight 77 slammed into the Pentagon. He said he survived that day, while many of the men and women he worked side by side with did not, and that their names are etched on the Pentagon Memorial. He wrote that these were not faceless casualties of war, but airmen, pilots, NCOs, husbands, wives, fathers, mothers and friends who answered the call to defend the Republic and the Constitution.
Maness said Memorial Day is about those who did not come home, the empty seat at the dinner table, the missing voice in the squadron ready room, the child who will grow up only knowing their parent through stories and photographs, and the sacred debt owed to every Gold Star family. He wrote that the service and sacrifice of every American who died in uniform, from the Revolutionary War to the mountains of Afghanistan, deserve unapologetic gratitude, and said, "They did not die for political parties or fleeting causes. They died for the idea that this nation, imperfect as we are, remains the greatest force for freedom the world has ever known."
He also wrote, "To my fellow veterans: Take a moment this weekend to speak their names out loud. Tell your children and grandchildren who they were and why they mattered. To the families of the fallen: know that we remember. Your loss is our loss. Your grief is carried by every one of us who wore the uniform." He added, "And to the American people: honor them not just with parades and cookouts, but with the quiet resolve to live lives worthy of their sacrifice. Teach your children the value of duty. Stand up for the principles they defended. Support those who still serve and those who bear the invisible wounds of war."
He said, "This Memorial Day, I will once again visit memorials and gravesites. I will salute the fallen as I have for 46 years. And I will whisper a silent thank you to every colleague I lost, men and women who proved that freedom is never free." He concluded, "They gave everything. The least we can do is remember."