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Lexington, Massachusetts marked the Revolutionary War battlefield known as the Battle Green with a naturalization ceremony where 49 people took the Oath of Allegiance to become U.S. citizens on April 22, 2026, as described by the Associated Press and the Lexington Observer. The ceremony drew participants to a site tied to the founding-era battle “on that same patch of grass,” where reenactors have long staged the annual events for the “shot heard round the world.”
Steve Cole, who plays Captain John Parker at the Lexington Minute Men reenactment, spoke to the group on the Green. Wearing a blue wool coat with white tassels on the shoulders and a tricorn hat, Cole told the crowd, “No matter where you come from,” and added, “here you belong.”
Cole linked the setting to the Revolutionary-era fight that helped birth the nation and said he could not think of a more meaningful place to hold the ceremony. He told LexObserver that “Captain Parker would be very proud,” and said he was hoping his wife would be at next year’s ceremony with a flag in hand.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Paul G. Levenson administered the oath and set the terms of what it meant. He told the new citizens, “You do not take an oath of allegiance to any person, to any political party, or even to any state or local government,” and said, “Your oath is to the Constitution.”
The ceremony marked the second time naturalization had been held on the Battle Green. Organizers held the first one the previous year, tied to the 250th anniversary celebrations of the Revolutionary War battle, according to the report distributed by AP.
The countries represented among the 49 new citizens spanned nearly the full alphabet in the names read aloud during the ceremony. Their origins included Algeria, Argentina, Belarus, Colombia, El Salvador, Honduras, Israel, Jamaica, South Korea, Nepal, the Philippines, Russia, Turkey, and Vietnam, as well as two each from China, the Dominican Republic, Spain and Taiwan. The list also included three each from Brazil, France, Germany, Guatemala, and the United Kingdom, plus five from India and seven from Canada.
Among those sworn in was Oscar Morales, 27, of Waltham, who wore a black suit jacket and stood with friends from high school and college. Morales said his father brought him to the United States from Guatemala when he was a teenager, that he studied at UMass Boston, and that he now tends bar; he said, “I’m very grateful and lucky to be a citizen of the U.S.”
Another new citizen, Xuemei, said she loved the ceremony and the speeches, calling it “an important moment.” Xuemei, who declined to give her last name, said she came to the United States from northern China for graduate school and now teaches sociology at Bentley University.
Filipe dos Santos, from Malden by way of Brazil, said he was a year into his service in the U.S. Army and described the naturalization moment as a step tied to the Constitution and voting. “To be part of the Constitution, to be able to vote — it’s really amazing,” he said.
The report said Lexington’s demographics have shifted since the Revolution, when the town’s population was mostly of English descent and included a mix of free and enslaved Black residents who fought in the battle. It said that today about a third of Lexington residents are Asian American, and it noted that communities include sizable Chinese, Indian and Korean groups, alongside the possibility of at least one Chinese American among the Minute Men reenactment participants.
Vineeta Kumar, who the report said was elected last year as the first person of color on Lexington’s Select Board and who was also identified as a naturalized citizen from India, offered remarks during the ceremony. Kumar said that as people gather on the historic Battle Green, they are reminded the nation was born from “extraordinary courage” and a belief in “the promise of liberty, justice, and equal opportunity for all,” adding, “Today you become part of that living legacy.”