With 16 days left in a political career that spanned a half-century, President Biden on Saturday conferred one of the nation’s highest honors on core members of the political, financial and celebrity establishment of which he has long been a part.
President-elect Donald J. Trump will replace Mr. Biden on Jan. 20, determined to continue his assault on what he has long called “the swamp.” In 2016, Mr. Trump vowed to wage war against establishment members in both parties who he said had “reaped the rewards of government while the people have borne the cost.”
But on Saturday, Mr. Biden awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom to 18 people, including some of the brightest lights of the old guard that Mr. Trump wants to tear down. In doing so, the 82-year-old president is sending an unmistakable message of support for a democratic order he has said is threatened by Mr. Trump’s re-election.
“Let’s remember, our sacred effort continues, and to keep going, as my mother would say, we have to keep the faith,” he told the crowd in the East Room of the White House at the end of the ceremony.
Among those receiving the award were Hillary Clinton, the former first lady, senator and secretary of state whom Mr. Trump threatened to jail and who received a standing ovation on Saturday; Robert F. Kennedy, the assassinated senator whose son has embraced Mr. Trump; and George Romney, the late father of former Senator Mitt Romney, the Republican from Utah who repeatedly rejected Mr. Trump’s actions and philosophy. The younger Mr. Romney accepted the award on Saturday. Mr. Kennedy’s medal was accepted by his daughter, Kathleen Kennedy.
As many presidents have done with the Medal of Freedom, Mr. Biden also honored some of his party’s most prolific fund-raisers, including the man who looms largest of all among Democratic donors — George Soros, the liberal activist billionaire whom Republicans have cast as the party’s evil puppet master.
They also included the media executive and cultural figure Anna Wintour, who put the first lady, Jill Biden, on the cover of Vogue twice in the last four years while spurning Melania Trump during her husband’s presidency. Ms. Wintour is one of the leading fund-raisers in the fashion industry, having hosted events for Mr. Biden’s re-election campaign in London and Paris last year.
Mr. Biden also recognized artists, musicians, sports figures, philanthropists and others who have contributed to society, including the singer Bono, the actor Michael J. Fox, the basketball legend Magic Johnson and the investor David M. Rubenstein.
The 19th person picked to receive the award — the soccer megastar Lionel Messi — did not attend the ceremony or send a representative to accept on his behalf because of a scheduling conflict, according to the White House.
“As cultural icons, dignified statesmen, humanitarians, rock stars, sports stars, you feed the hungry, you give hope to those that are hurting, and you craft the signs and sounds of our movements and our memories,” Mr. Biden said.
All modern presidents have awarded the medal to those whom they found deserving, often as they are leaving the political scene for good and sometimes with an ideological tilt. It is seen by historians as a final use of the presidential megaphone to say to Americans: This is whom we should admire and emulate.
After Mr. Trump won in 2016, President Barack Obama gave the medal to the N.B.A. star Michael Jordan, the actors Tom Hanks and Robert De Niro and others. Earlier, Mr. Obama had given the award to Mr. Biden, who had served as his vice president.
Four years later, as Mr. Trump was leaving office, he gave the medal to two professional golfers, an Olympic athlete and Representatives Devin Nunes of California and Jim Jordan of Ohio, two of his fiercest Republican loyalists in Congress.
But Mr. Biden’s use of the presidential prerogative appeared to be more even pointed than that of some of his predecessors.
His decision to give the medal posthumously to Mr. Kennedy could be read as a rebuke to Mr. Kennedy’s son, a member of perhaps the country’s most famous Democratic family. The decision by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to endorse Mr. Trump during the campaign — despite denunciations from most of his relatives — helped lead to Mr. Trump’s choice of him to head the Department of Health and Human Services.
The White House noted that the elder Mr. Romney, a Republican, had been the chairman and president of American Motors Corporation and had later served as governor of Michigan and as secretary of housing and urban development. But he was also the father of the younger Mr. Romney, the only Republican to vote twice to convict Mr. Trump after his two impeachments.
The award for Mr. Romney echoes Mr. Biden’s decision this week to award the Presidential Citizens Medal, one of the nation’s highest civilian honors, to Representative Liz Cheney, who led the effort to hold Mr. Trump accountable for his actions during the assault on the Capitol in 2021.
Both awards from a Democratic president to prominent Republicans offered to give Mr. Biden the kind of public relations jolt that has mostly been reserved for Mr. Trump since the election.
The same could not be said for Mr. Soros. By awarding the medal to him, Mr. Biden is acknowledging how important the investor and philanthropist has been to the Democratic Party. That is something that many members of Mr. Biden’s party have been wary of doing, fearing that Mr. Trump and other Republicans would seize on it as evidence of the conspiratorial control they say he has.
But Mr. Biden seems willing to ignore that concern. After weeks in which Mr. Trump has showcased Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, as a member of his inner circle, Mr. Biden appeared to want to say: We have our billionaires, too.
Mr. Soros has spent hundreds of millions of dollars on progressive politics since the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision, which unleashed a torrent of money into politics from businesses and the wealthy people who run them. Mr. Soros and his family crucially stood by Mr. Biden immediately after Mr. Biden’s disastrous debate performance last year.
The White House description of Mr. Soros at the ceremony was more staid, focusing on his creation of the Open Society Foundation.
“He settled in America as he became an investor and philanthropist supporting key pillars of open societies: rights and justice, equity and equality, freedom now and in the future,” an announcer said. “His inspiring generosity reminds us all of our capacity and our obligation to stand up to the abuse of power and to be guardians of Democracy and all people yearning to be free.”
Mr. Soros did not attend the ceremony; the medal was accepted by his son, Alex Soros.
Other major benefactors included Tim Gill, a software entrepreneur, who has been among the most important donors in the gay community, working to push L.G.B.T.Q. rights first in his home state of Colorado and then nationally. He gave $355,000 to the Biden Victory Fund during the 2020 race.
Theodore Schleifer contributed reporting.