On Juneteenth, Recommit to Absolute Respect, Unconditional Love

CHI Juneteenth Statement 2026   

On June 19, 1865, more than two years after the Emancipation Proclamation was signed, federal troops finally reached Galveston, Texas, and the last enslaved people in the Confederacy learned they were free. This day is more than a historical milestone. It is a living reminder of how long justice can take to arrive, and how fiercely we must continue to fight for it. 

At Covenant House, our mission calls us to serve young people facing homelessness with absolute respect and unconditional love. And while their stories are as diverse as their dreams, far too many of our youth, especially Black youth, are navigating not just housing insecurity but the enduring legacy of systemic injustice. For them, freedom is not simply a concept from the past. It is an urgent demand of the present.

In the United States, young people who are Black or African American are 83% more likely to experience homelessness than their white peers. So let it be said plainly what this day asks of us.  What we owe our young people is what we practice. Last year, across our federation, Covenant House provided 896,000 nights of housing, served 1.9 million meals, and welcomed nearly 63,000 young people into programs built on a single promise: absolute respect and unconditional love. Sixty-six percent of the youth in our care are Black or African American. The promise we make is, in large part, a promise to them. 

But the promise doesn’t just live in the numbers. It lives in the case manager who learns a young person's name and story before opening their file. It lives in the staff member who tells a young Black man, by the simple way they treat him, that his worth was never in question. It lives in building one place where a young person can finally stop bracing and exhale. That is a kind of freedom we can offer today.

This Juneteenth, Covenant House is not looking only backward to that day in 1865. We honor the people who waited on freedom then by refusing to make today's young people wait any longer than they must. We recommit to their dignity, to their belonging, and to the unglamorous, determined work of opening doors. 

That is how we honor Juneteenth. Not with reflection alone, but with resolve.

With respect and determination, 

Courtney Underwood
Chief of People and Culture
Covenant House International