The El Paso Parks and Recreation Department, in partnership with the local nonprofit Black El Paso Voice, hosted its fourth annual Juneteenth Celebration on June 13, at Nations Tobin Park.
The free event drew a diverse, multicultural crowd and served as the kickoff for a month-long series of city-wide celebrations honoring African American culture and history.
The festivities commemorate the historic day of June 19, 1865, when federal troops arrived in Galveston, Texas, to ensure the freedom of all remaining enslaved people in the United States, two years after the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation.
The evening featured the reading of an official municipal proclamation by El Paso City Representative from District 8, Chris Canales, , declaring June 19, 2026, as Juneteenth National Independence Day in the city.
El Paso City Representative Chris Canales reads a proclamation declaring June 19, 2026, as Juneteenth National Independence Day in El Paso during the city’s fourth annual Juneteenth Celebration at Nations Tobin Park on June 13. (Iziah Moreno)
“Acknowledge that the Fourth of July freed the land. Juneteenth freed the people,” Canales said as he read from the proclamation signed by Mayor Renard Johnson. “And that a complete celebration of American freedom must include the full story of every person it took to build this nation.”
Monica Tucker, the founder of Black El Paso Voice, said receiving the proclamation from the city represents a growing, consistent relationship with municipal leadership.
“We’ve seen it before, but it just shows that the consistency and the relationship that you have with the city has only grown [over the years],” Tucker said. “It’s important because the city and the residents in the city noticed that the theme is special and it’s cheerful.”
Tucker said the meaning of Juneteenth goes far beyond El Paso, pointing out that the event is so important to the region that people even travel across the border to Mexico to take part in the celebration there.
“We’re here multiculturally, because of what our ancestors are,” Tucker said. “It’s a bigger celebration in Mexico. So, people from here travel to Mexico celebrate [Juneteenth] too.”
When asked what the holiday means to her personally, Tucker echoed the words of the city’s proclamation.
“It means freedom. This year’s theme is exactly what it means to me and that’s Fourth of July freed the land, but Juneteenth freed the people,” Tucker said. “No one is free unless all are free.”
Tucker shared a message for the next generation, emphasizing that celebrating history is the best way to keep hard-won rights alive and well in the community.
Community members attend the fourth annual Juneteenth Celebration at Nations Tobin Park on June 13. The event marked the beginning of a month-long series of celebrations honoring African American history and culture in El Paso.
“Once we stop celebrating and acknowledging our freedom, we become chained again to what’s happening now in the country, unfortunately, which is [that] we’re bound in the mind,” Tucker said. “We’re chained in my mind on feeling like we can only go so far because of what we look like.”
The emphasis on passing history down to the next generation was shared by local parents in attendance.
“I would hope that they take away from this and carry on [by remembering] the history of Juneteenth and how it came to be,” attendee Makalani Waldo said. “Also, unity and coming together as one.”
Local civic organizations worked behind the scenes to support the gathering, including the El Paso Holy Royal Arch Chapter No. 90, which provided free hot dogs and drinks to attendees.
Billy Michaels, a member of the chapter, said that the festival has grown tremendously over the years.
“I think it’s a great opportunity for the African American community to really come together in a safe place and recognize the trials and tribulations that they went through over those years,” Michaels said. “Every year it’s gotten bigger and bigger and bigger. I’m looking for a bigger crowd next year.”
Mayor Johnson noted the profound personal and historic significance of the day as El Paso’s first Black mayor.
“Recognizing Juneteenth and celebrating it here in El Paso is certainly something that I look forward to,” Johnson said. “Being the first Black mayor here in El Paso, it means a lot in a celebration like this. It talks to what we’ve done, and so I’m so proud of El Paso.”
Families and community members participate in the fourth annual Juneteenth Celebration at Nations Tobin Park on June 13. Organizers said the event aims to preserve and pass down the history and meaning of Juneteenth to future generations.
For Johnson, hosting the festival at Nations Tobin Park was also a homecoming, having grown up in Northeast El Paso and being Andress High School alumnus.
Johnson also delivered regards from City Manager Dionne Mack, noting that the city is currently led by both its first Black mayor and its first Black city manager.
The multicultural turnout at the park reflected the event’s core mission of community unity, drawing praise from local faith leaders in attendance.
“It means a lot because you have all different type of walks [of life],” Pastor Shelton Kelley of the St. Peter Missionary Baptist Church said. “You have African Americans, you have Hispanics you have Caucasians, and we’re all coming together to celebrate the independence of the actual nation. Even though it was the independence of Black people that’s what Juneteenth is about, but it was really the independence of everyone because the whole nation was finally free.”
For the hundreds of El Pasoans who attended the event, the day was more than just a weekend festival. By bringing together city leaders, history makers and young children, the event aimed to pass the torch to a new generation, ensuring that the story of Juneteenth will remain a permanent, vibrant part of El Paso’s identity.
Adrian Gonzalez Jr. is a contributor for The Prospector and may be reached at [email protected]