But in 2010, Dole unexpectedly found herself in a new role: caregiver to her husband, the late former Senate Majority Leader and decorated World War II veteran Bob Dole. In the 11 months he spent at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center recovering from knee surgery and repeated bouts of pneumonia, Elizabeth Dole’s eyes were opened to a community of those who silently served: the family members who managed care and met the needs of their veteran loved ones, at great personal cost and often with little support.

“As I spent time around the hospital, I visited with other loved ones quietly looking after their wounded warriors. They shared stories about the emotional shock of their veterans’ injuries, their confusion about the medical decisions now in their hands, their frustration with the bureaucracy of our health system, and, in too many cases, a hopelessness about the future,” Dole, now 89, told Military Times. “As I brought them together for dinners or other informal gatherings, they found a lot of solace and support in spending time together.”

Dole’s establishment of the Elizabeth Dole Foundation brought these caregivers’ service into the national conversation, with celebrity-backed awareness campaigns and programs to support caregivers financially, physically and emotionally.

One of these caregivers was Rachel Clark, who found the foundation in a desperate internet search after being forced to commit her veteran husband to a mental health ward, Dole recalled. Clark later became a Dole Caregiver Fellow, contributing to a community of support for caregivers across the nation.

“Over the last eight years, Rachel and I have grown close as she has made tremendous contributions by sharing her knowledge and experiences with our Foundation partners and national leaders,” Dole said.

This year saw the passage of the Dole Act, which increased home care coverage under the Department of Veterans Affairs and created mental health grants for caregivers, while building and improving an array of benefits to support veterans in need. The legislation aptly illustrates Dole’s legacy of effecting meaningful change through advocacy — from working with Mothers Against Drunk Drivers to pass seatbelt laws in 29 states to achieving tobacco industry reforms while in office.

“That bill is the perfect example of the types of resources and changes that must come from Washington,” Dole said of the Dole Act, crediting the bill’s champions in Congress from both sides of the aisle. “Certainly, not every problem can be solved inside the beltway, but some solutions can only come from the federal government.”

As the 2025 recipient of the Military Times Foundation’s Chairman’s Award, Dole demonstrates the power and impact of a lifetime committed to service.

“My parents and my faith both instilled in me the principle that ‘to lead, is to serve,’” Dole said. “I also grew up in the shadow of the World War II generation, which engendered a spirit of patriotism and the ideal of working together toward a greater good. I can’t necessarily say what drew me to each career decision I have made along the way, but I always knew that whatever I did, I wanted to give back. I wanted to make a positive difference in the lives of others and to help those in need.”

Just before 9 p.m. on Jan. 29, an Army UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter collided with American Airlines Flight 5342 outside Washington, D.C., sending both aircraft plummeting into the Potomac River and leading to the deaths of all 67 people onboard.

Jenish was finishing dinner when she got the call from the unit’s duty officer: a plane had crashed and all available personnel were needed on the water.

The Potomac was freezing, with four to six inches of ice in places, she recalled, and the Coast Guard search-and-rescue boats weren’t designed to operate in those conditions. But the need was urgent, and the Coast Guardsmen went to work, using everything from hammers to weights to break ice around the boat launch so they could enter the water and begin search and rescue. Meanwhile, Station Washington became an incident command post, directing traffic as the river filled with rescue personnel.

“As boats were coming in, I was just using your classic whiteboard, writing, ‘Okay, what boats do we have?’ And then just sending them out and trying to place them,” Jenish recalled, adding that about eight Coast Guard vessels were on the water at a given time. “In those initial six hours that night, my team, we were responsible for taking every Coast Guard asset that arrived and sending them out on the water.”

For their heroic search and recovery efforts, Jenish and her entire Station Washington team are being honored as the Coast Guard Service Members of the Year.

The other team members include: Lt. Craig Oravitz; Lt. Cmdr. Matthew McGarity; Chief Petty Officer Logan Kellogg; Chief Petty Officer Jason Seraphin; Chief Petty Officer Ryan Rawding; Petty Officer 1st Class Tyler McGuinness; Petty Officer 1st Class Daniel Russo; Petty Officer 1st Class Ryan Smith; Petty Officer 1st Class Anthony Wallace; Petty Officer 1st Class James Nugent; Petty Officer 2nd Class Brandon Williams; Petty Officer 3rd Class Fabian Monorrez; Petty Officer 3rd Class Austin Vicars; Petty Officer 3rd Class Ian Frigiola; Petty Officer 3rd Class Danielle Zins; Seaman Nathan Cruz; and Seaman Colten McGalliard.

This was the first mass casualty response effort for Jenish and for the young Coast Guardsmen under her command. The tragedy and heartbreak of the event became real, she said, when she got word from the duty officer, about an hour into the operation, that a SAR team had recovered the first victim.

“I had to take a pause, because it just hit me, hearing that my youngest crew members are pulling up a body,” she recalled. “I think my mamma heart just broke for them.”

It would take days for Station Washington, working with an array of local response units, to recover all the people lost in the crash. For another three weeks, the Coast Guard maintained a safety perimeter on the Potomac, keeping boaters out of the wreckage sites and allowing crash investigators to work unhindered.

The unit came together after the mission was complete to process the tragedy with chaplains and a priority on mental health and recovery. But a week later, Jenish said, they were out on the water again, manning their assigned safety zones. Being recognized as service members of the year, she said, will help the unit come together once more.

“What they did that night was extraordinary — willing to take on that warranted risk, and willing to put out that heart, courage and dedication without being told to,” Jenish said. “I don’t know if closure is the right word, but I think this will certainly [play a] big part in their healing journey.”

Moore, 25, began his military career in 2018 in the Air Force as an all-source intelligence analyst supporting remotely piloted aircraft operations. He calls the job his first small introduction to space, as satellite communications supported the work of his team.

But when the Space Force was born as the sixth military branch at the end of 2019, Moore knew he wanted to be in the first tranche of airmen to transfer over and build the new service.

“I knew I joined the military to get a different experience, so I wanted to jump into something new,” he recalled. And the new role delivered: “Standing up, we were working out of trailers, doing all these crazy operations on a dirt lot. So it was like being deployed every day. And that’s what the Space Force provided me.”

Moore was assigned to an electromagnetic warfare unit and completed a six-month deployment to Europe in his new role. When he returned, he had an opportunity to fulfill another dream: to be a military training instructor – a role he’d been inspired by as a high schooler in a summer Air Force Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps program.

He put in an application, and in 2024 he learned he’d be headed to the Army Drill Sergeant Academy in Columbia, South Carolina. He’d be the first Space Force Guardian – and the first member of any joint service – to graduate.

Moore didn’t just graduate, though; he dominated the course, finishing at the top of his class with a 99% average grade across all training objectives.

Designated the class platoon first sergeant, he supervised 75 other troops from various services. He even got pulled into an equipment inventory project while in training with the Army, helping the service verify 137,000 items worth a total of $5 million and earning praise from leadership of U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command.

Moore said he put a lot of pressure on himself to show up ready, as he knew he’d need to learn another service’s structure and culture as well as the training material.

“Having zero personal Army experience was definitely daunting, so I made my best effort to absolutely prepare beforehand,” he said.

Back at the Space Force Moore is putting the knowledge he gained at the drill school to work, as one of the leads of a project to rewrite the entire curriculum for Space Force basic military training.

While the Space Force has up to this point closely followed Air Force training, Moore is now working to infuse more of the new service’s unique culture, principles and operational needs into the program.

He’s also seeking to be open about his personal struggles along the way. In early 2025, he said, he experienced a mental health crisis that forced him to seek help and reevaluate the pressure he placed on himself to achieve and excel.

“While I did see results from working so hard and doing all these different things, I now realize that you know you can do those things and also have boundaries and take care of yourself,” he said. “And I think it was an extremely important and valuable lesson for me to learn … and it allows me to be a more effective leader.”

“It just hits heavier when you know the Master Arm hot switch is on,” Nava recalled.

As the swarms of one-way attack drones came into view within just minutes of takeoff, the planes, flying at low altitudes, were tasked with taking them out before they could reach their targets.

The No. 2 aircraft got the first shot at an incoming drone, but missed. That cued up Nava’s aircraft and her role of double-checking the Strike Eagle’s targeting pod and giving the all-clear to shoot. The drone went down: a confirmed kill.

“It’s nerve-wracking, and then once you see it hit, it’s the biggest relief that you can have before you move on to the next target and rinse and repeat,” she said.

Nava, 29, is Military Times’ Airman of the Year. A first-generation American whose parents came to the U.S. from Venezuela, she fell in love with aviation while a cadet at the Air Force Academy. Nava had volunteered for the Middle East deployment that would put her unit in the action against Iranian drones.

The April 13 mission made her, along with pilot Capt. Claire “Atomic” Eddins, the Air Force’s first all-female crew of aces – signifying five air-to-air kills.

Beyond her achievements in combat, Nava has worked to improve the service for other female airmen, coordinating a “Flying While Pregnant Roadshow” while stationed in the UK and representing her unit at a convention focused on improving uniforms and equipment for women aviators.

During the counter-drone mission, an unprecedented Iranian assault and the largest air-to-air engagement for the Air Force in more than half a century, Nava also took on risk, delaying a refueling to remain in position as other aircraft expended their missiles and had to depart the area. They reached a “combat bingo” fuel state, meaning they’d have to land at a friendly foreign base near their location if they couldn’t secure an aerial refueling, which they ultimately did.

By the time they headed back to home station, the crew had expended all their missiles and taken out five Iranian drones. Their status as newly minted aces didn’t set in, Nava said, until the next day when they reviewed the plane’s targeting history.

“It was a win for everybody,” Nava said, adding that the Air Force hadn’t seen new aces in decades prior to the Iran showdown, with male and female aircrews alike were celebrating the achievement.

Now, Nava teaches future combat systems officers at Naval Air Station Pensacola, Florida.

Being named Airman of the Year, Nava said, “speaks to the village that raised me,” adding that her village includes her parents and the Air Force itself.

“It’s an honor … and I hope I do it justice.”

El Haroun, 38, ultimately followed his American wife into the Navy, becoming a boatswain’s mate and embracing the exacting work of a boatswain’s mate, ensuring that ships run smoothly and safely.

“We do a lot of dangerous evolutions,” he said. “We have to pay a lot of attention to detail in everything we do.”

That focus would serve him well when he deployed to the Red Sea in late 2023 with the destroyer Mason, as the Middle East was still roiling in the wake of the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks on Israel. As the leader of a team of five boatswain’s mates and 19 deck seamen, El Haroun put extra effort into preparation, arranging for the ship to carry extra repair parts so the crew could fix any equipment quickly, without outside resources. Throughout the deployment, he said, the ship had no major equipment casualties.

El Haroun’s duties took a turn on Nov. 24, 2023, when the Mason was tasked with responding to an emergency: Five pirates from Somalia were attempting to hijack a commercial vessel, the chemical tanker M/V Central Park in the Gulf of Aden, and holding its 22 crew members hostage. El Haroun was assigned to the Visit, Board, Search and Seizure, or VBSS, team before receiving a special job from the captain: to use his fluent Arabic to communicate with the pirates via megaphone.

The boatswain’s mate used not only his language skills but his cultural understanding to seize the upper hand, shouting and posturing aggressively in a show of dominance. As the VBSS team took the pirates into custody and transported them back to the Mason, El Haroun made sure he was their only point of contact, addressing them exclusively and facing them out to sea so they couldn’t threaten or intimidate crew members. He kept up the commanding posture and bravado even as the team spotted incoming missiles in the Gulf of Aden overhead.

For El Haroun, the mission demonstrated that his language background was not a weakness, but a unique strength.

“This is one of the reasons I really love the Navy,” he said. “They really don’t care where you’re coming from, they don’t care about your background. Just come be part of the team; do what you’re supposed to do, and you will succeed.”

El Haroun continues to be passionate about preserving the culture and traditions of the boatswain’s mate rating. He shares with more junior sailors the lessons he’s learned about remaining mentally ready under fire and in unfamiliar situations, and he recently made a series of how-to videos he plans to publish to YouTube about how to make by hand the elaborate traditional boatswain’s mates braided lanyards that he loves to wear and make for others.

Sessa, 33, from Butler, Pennsylvania, was named Military Times’ Marine of the Year for his distinguished leadership and performance during 2024 air strikes on Houthi rebel targets in Yemen from the Red Sea in what would be the first strike mission for his airframe. It’s the latest in a series of prestigious recognitions; Sessa was also named Marine Corps Aviator of the Year by the Corps in April.

Out of flight training, Sessa had been selected to fly the F-35C, the Navy’s carrier-capable variant of the Joint Strike Fighter. The rare assignment for a Marine officer allowed Sessa, early in his career, to participate in one of the aircraft’s first operational deployments as the Navy incorporated F-35Cs into its carrier air wings.

“It was fun to be at the leading edge of that,” he recalled.

In nearly a decade as a Marine Corps aviator, Sessa had served as a flight instructor in Kingsville, Texas, and completed a routine deployment with the F-35C to the Western Pacific. His second deployment in 2024 was initially expected to be another WestPac cruise, but the Hamas attacks on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, kicked off a wave of conflict in the Middle East, and Sessa’s squadron, VFMA-314, got word that they’d be headed to U.S. 5th Fleet instead.

Sessa, who served as the first Marine Corps F-35C weapons and tactics instructor, or WTI, during the deployment, had participated in defensive sorties earlier in the deployment. But in early November, he was briefed on a new mission: to strike Houthi weapons storage facilities in Yemen, a response to rebel attacks on commercial vessels in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden. It would be the F-35C’s first-ever strike mission.

Another WTI was mission commander for the first night of sorties on Nov. 9; Sessa commanded the second and final night of strikes on Nov. 10. Thanks to aggressive preparation and planning that took advantage of the F-35C’s stealthy profile and significant internal fuel capacity for long-range missions, the strikes went off without a hitch, Sessa recalled. Locked on the mission, Sessa and fellow squadron members saved their celebrations until they were safely back on the flight deck of the aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln. And they didn’t celebrate alone.

“Watching the ordnance Marines all bending down to look up into the weapon bays to see that all the bombs were gone, and then the excitement there – all, you know, oh my gosh – that was honestly one of the most exciting parts of the mission,” Sessa said. “Because that’s their Super Bowl.”

Sessa, now an F-35 instructor pilot in Yuma, Arizona, emphasized that his squadron, which was also honored as Marine Fighter Attack Squadron of the Year, deserved a full share of the credit for the airstrikes, as did the enablers who contributed to the readiness of aircraft and weapons.

“Everyone was prepared to go execute,” he said. “They all just contributed to squadron success.”

Quay, 29, a standardization instructor with 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, was on deployment and conducting a routine training flight over the Mediterranean Sea on Nov. 10, 2023, when his MH-47 Chinook crew received word of a downed MH-60M Black Hawk helicopter in the region.

The Black Hawk had been conducting an aerial refueling when an in-flight emergency caused the crash.

Chief Warrant Officer 3 Stephen R. Dwyer, 38, of Clarksville, Tennessee, Chief Warrant Officer 2 Shane M. Barnes, 34, of Sacramento, California, Staff Sgt. Tanner W. Grone, 25, of Gorham, New Hampshire, Sgt. Andrew P. Southard, 27, of Apache Junction, Arizona, and Sgt. Cade M. Wolfe, 24, of Mankato, Minnesota, would ultimately perish in the crash.

But all Quay knew at the time was that fellow soldiers might need rescuing. The crew prepped the Chinook for overwater rescue, setting up a strop harness and hoist system and clearing the cabin to make space for anyone they might haul up. Quay had only ever taken these steps before during training.

After about 10 minutes of flight, the chopper was over the crash site. In the dark, the crew could see debris bobbing in the water and the red glow of chem lights that had been activated by soldiers in the Black Hawk. At first, no people were visible on the water. Then, Quay said, he spotted an arm waving a chem light. It was Grone, a Black Hawk repairer also with 160 SOAR.

The Chinook crew first attempted to send down the harness so they could pull Grone into the chopper, but they quickly realized he was too badly hurt to grab it.

“At that time, the best game plan was going to be to send me down the hoist to get into the water,” Quay recalled.

Quay was a competent recreational swimmer, but his reason for volunteering came down to duty.

“It was either, send someone else to do it, or I could do it,” he said. “And I felt like, since I was in charge of all the crew members, it was my job to do it.”

When Quay hit the water, it was chilly. He swam to Grone and first attempted to put the rescue harness around him, but quickly realized that wouldn’t work. The injured soldier was now unconscious. So Quay unhooked from the hoist and pulled Grone onto his chest, swimming with him toward an inflatable boat the Chinook crew had dropped into the water.

The helicopter rotor wash pushed the boat farther away from the crash site, and Quay had to swim about 100 meters while holding the injured soldier to reach it.

Unable to climb into the boat with Grone, Quay held onto the side, keeping Grone’s head above water for about 45 minutes while they waited for overwater rescue to arrive.

It wasn’t until the two soldiers had been brought to a medical facility that Quay realized how cold he’d gotten during that long night in the water. His body temperature had dropped to 92.8 degrees, and he required urgent treatment for hypothermia.

But his thoughts stayed with Grone, the soldier he risked his life to save. Weeks later, he met Grone’s parents and family members and learned more about the young soldier and the people who loved him.

Quay said he planned to take Grone’s mother, Erica Grone, to the award ceremony where he’ll be honored as the Military Times Soldier of the Year.

“At the end of the day, all of us would have done the same thing for one another,” Quay said. “And me getting on stage and accepting the award in their honor means that at least we’re doing something right there.”

For four days, beginning on Aug. 8, Casper directed his crew of Coast Guardsmen in their lone 45-foot boat as they assisted in the rescue of 40 people. For his actions, he has been named Military Times’ 2024 Coast Guardsman of the Year.

Though Casper and his station mates knew the area well, this was different from the rescue missions they’d run in the past. Roads were cut off and residents were forced toward the harbor. Those same winds that fueled the fire, choked the air with smoke and cut down visibility.

Petty Officer 2nd Class Teddy Kirkbride had served at the station for nearly six years. He was on duty that first day with Casper.

From the moment the Casper had arrived in January 2022, he began raising the standards, Kirkbride said. He pushed those at the station to exceed the standards and emphasized attention to detail, never missing an opportunity to improve performance through rigorous training.

One day Kirkbride had shown up to work in a dirty uniform, paint stains on his pants. Instead of chewing him out, Casper pulled the petty officer aside, explaining that if each day he made a small improvement, such as ensuring his uniform was ready for duty, he’d see tremendous changes over time.

A fellow crewmate on duty that day echoed Kirkbride’s comment.

“We always know if he can jump on the boat with us or into the training with us, you know you’re always going to get the highest level of training, that we’re always going to learn something,” Petty Officer 3rd Class Kalei Guth said.

Yet, despite the training, they were nervous, heading into a smoke-filled harbor, not knowing what to expect. Incoming reports said as many as 100 people might be in the water.

Then Kirkbride heard Casper on a call with higher command, telling them they needed a safety waiver due to the conditions, but that his team was ready.

“We’ve got the best crew members at Maui, the best engineer and two of the best coxswains standing by,” Casper said.

“Just hearing him say that, regardless of whether we actually were the best, saying that to the commander at the command center, it helped me — helped my confidence going out there and doing the hard thing,” Kirkbride said.

The crew made it to the harbor, weaving through unmoored boats, dead bodies and smoke so thick they had to wait for breaks to see through.

Over the next six hours, the crew would hear from Casper, checking in on them, advising them and running interference from the cascade of radio traffic flooding the airwaves.

They hauled people off stranded boats, they threw lines to a jetty wall that survivors used to pull themselves to the boat, they picked up people who swam out to meet them to escape the smoke and flames.

Casper recalled the rest of the station’s personnel. A Coast Guard station works much like a fire station, alternating crews to work multiple days on and off. The crew out on the first rescue mission had been at the end of its two-day cycle.

At the same time, Casper called for further assistance, from the Coast Guard helicopter crews, Navy resources and others. But with the high winds and smoke nobody could get to them. It was this lone 45-foot response boat and its Maui crew on the water.

Casper reached out to the civilian charter boats for help. Four responded and made it to the station. He put together a plan where the response boat would run six-hour shifts, alternating the crews that traveled into the harbor. The charter boats would serve as drop-off points for the response boat to unload passengers.

By the time the response boat had returned from its first trip, it had a dozen survivors on board. The crew changed out at the station and headed back to the harbor, back to where they were needed most.

Through the haze, the new crew saw what looked like flashlights. But they couldn’t pull the boat to the light, they were too close to the reef. So, they retrieved a small dingy and two surfboards. The crew piloted the dingy into the shallow water and then two crewmembers took the surfboards to the shore to pick up two children, a 5- and 8-year-old girl.

“I’ve never been more proud to be part of a group of men and women in my life,” Casper said. “It’s really an honor to be a part of that.”

By sunrise the next day, the station crew had run nonstop shifts to the harbor and saved 17 people.

They were far from done. The teams continued for the next three days nonstop. They would assist with rescuing 40 people during the four-day response.

Casper was the calm voice amid the storm, connecting the crew with those in need throughout those harrowing days.

All told, the fires claimed an estimated 100 lives and caused nearly $6 billion in damage, devastating Maui.

Since then, Casper was meritoriously promoted to chief petty officer and members of the station have been recommended for awards for their service.

“It’s hard to be recognized when you’re doing your job … when the community you live in is still grieving and mourning 100 lives lost here, that’s challenging. People here have lost everything and lost family members, friends,” Casper said.

For the past 23 years, Service Members of the Year awards have honored one outstanding military (active duty, Guard or Reserve) member from each branch of service. They are selected based on exemplary military service that goes beyond the call of duty. The honorees and their families are being flown to Washington, D.C., for a visit to the nation’s capital and a special awards ceremony attended by congressional, military and community leaders. The awards ceremony will take place on April 24, 2024. To watch the livestream of the event, register here.

See all of Military Times’ 2024 Service Members of the Year honorees.