Donald Trump’s and Zohran Mamdani’s Very Different 9/11 Messages - Newsweek

President Donald Trump and New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani offered different messages on Friday commemorating the 25th anniversary of September 11, 2001.

It has been a quarter of a century since the terror attacks in New York City and Washington, D.C., which killed nearly 3,000 people in the World Trade Center and in countless ways changed the trajectory of the nation. Friday's anniversary is a somber day when political leaders put aside partisan differences to honor the victims.

Mamdani, who serves as the Democratic mayor of the city where the largest attacks occurred, attended the memorial in downtown Manhattan where the twin towers once stood. Trump, meanwhile, attended a ceremony at the Pentagon, which was also attacked on 9/11, resulting in the deaths of 184 people. This marked the second consecutive year the president has opted to attend the ceremony there instead of New York City.

Vice President JD Vance attended the ceremony in New York.

Mamdani addressed the anniversary in a video posted Friday morning on X.

“September 11 was a horrific act of terror, a day of immeasurable loss—2,753 parents and children, husbands and wives, friends and colleagues, 2,753 universes gone in an instant,” he said. “And in the years since, thousands more have died from illnesses caused by the toxic air they breathed and the months they spent working on the pile.”

He said he remembers 9/11 as “the darkest day in our city’s history,” and also noted that the city remembers “what so many New Yorkers did in that darkness.”

“We remember the thousands upon thousands of New Yorkers who lined up for hours to donate blood. We remember the people who opened their homes to those who could not get home. We remember the workers who carried their colleagues down hundreds of stairs, then turned around and went back up to find someone else who needed help,” he said.

There is a “sacred obligation to those who were stolen from us to care for one another as they cared for strangers, to live lives worthy of the sacrifices they made, and to build a city worthy of their courage,” the mayor said. “A city where we run toward one another. That is how we remember.”

In a separate post, Mamdani praised New York firefighters who responded to the attack.

“During the horrific terror attacks on September 11, 2001, 343 members of the FDNY answered that call. They climbed the stairs of the World Trade Center knowing the danger ahead and never hesitated to put their lives on the line for their fellow New Yorkers,” he wrote.

The Democratic mayor's comments came as multiple Republican lawmakers, including former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, have said Mamdani should not attend the ceremony.

Some, such as former Republican Governor George Pataki, have said they have concerns about people Mamdani has not explicitly distanced himself from.

Pataki told City & State New York earlier in September, “With respect to the mayor, I think anyone who doesn’t intentionally distance themselves from [left-wing streamer] Hasan Piker, who has said that America deserved the attacks of September 11th, should not be there." Mamdani condemned Piker's comments about 9/11 during the mayoral debate last year, and Piker has since disavowed them.

An online petition against the mayor’s presence gained more than 100,000 signatures. That petition cites the mayor's associations with individuals, including Piker and other politicians and figures, that organizers describe as controversial, as reasons he should not attend.

Despite the pushback from some Republicans, Democratic leaders, as well as Mamdani’s GOP rival in the 2025 mayoral race, Curtis Sliwa, have supported his presence at the 25th anniversary remembrance, and the mayor repeatedly said he would attend on Friday.

New York City mayors have traditionally attended the annual September 11 remembrance ceremonies at Ground Zero.

Trump, meanwhile, delivered remarks from the Pentagon on Friday, paying tribute to the victims as well as the military and first responders.

“In 25 years, a generation has passed since the terror attacks of September 11, 2001, yet time has not dimmed the horror of that day when our country came face-to-face with true evil,” he said.

Throughout his speech, the president paid tribute to many of those impacted by the September 11 attacks.

“Today, we renew the sacred oath that we first swore in their names a quarter of a century ago. We will never, ever forget. That's why we fight today. We don't have a choice that can only be victory. We fight hard. We fight to win. We will always remember the victims and the families of September 11, 2001,” Trump said.

The country must also remember “how America responded to that wickedness,” he said.

“On days like 9/11, we learn what a country is truly made of. We're learning right now what we're made of, and we have to be strong, and we have to be smart. And Americans are made of a goodness and spirit that can transcend any earthly force. And that's what we're doing better than anyone else has ever been able to do it,” he said.

Trump also offered praise for American troops who served in the military, as well as first responders and law enforcement.

“In the generation since 9/11, American sons and daughters have traveled to the darkest corners of the earth and done battle with a shadowy enemy so that our children might once again know carefree days and cloudless skies,” he said.

He also praised servicemembers working in Iran.

“We salute the servicemembers working right now to ensure the world’s number one sponsor of terror, the Islamic Republic of Iran, will never, ever have a nuclear weapon,” Trump said.

He said the U.S. should work to be "the kind of nation the world saw in those days after."

"We can be a nation whose heroes are not fanatics for an abstract cause. They don't even know really what they're doing. But the kind who race into buildings and give their lives on a Tuesday morning for strangers they've never met. People they didn't know gave their lives, and we can fill the lives of our children with light and with love that will sustain them against any trial," he said.

He added the country is now "stronger than it has ever been."

"Because of that spirit, when future generations come here in 25, 100, 250 years from now, they will stand in a nation that is free and unyielding in the face of evil, and they will still honor the heroes of September 11, 2001, who no age will erase from the memory of time," Trump said. "It will never, ever be forgotten."

On September 11, 2001, Trump was at his Trump Tower apartment in Midtown Manhattan and gave interviews to the media as the attacks unfolded. He discussed the attacks with local station WWOR-TV just hours after the towers were struck.

“I have a window that looks directly at the World Trade Center, and I saw this huge explosion. I was with a group of people, and I really couldn’t even believe it,” he said. “Worse than that, for years I’ve looked directly at the building. I’d see the Empire State Building in the foreground and the World Trade Center in the background. Now I’m looking at absolutely nothing. It’s just gone. It’s just hard to believe.”

He also discussed the height of Trump Tower in the interview.

"Forty Wall Street actually was the second-tallest building in downtown Manhattan, and it was actually before the World Trade Center the tallest, and then when they built the World Trade Center it became known as the second tallest, and now it's the tallest," Trump said. “I just spoke to my people, and they said it’s the most unbelievable sight. It’s probably seven or eight blocks away from the World Trade Center and yet Wall Street is littered with two feet of stone and brick and mortar and steel.”

Two days later, Trump appeared near Ground Zero, where he surveyed the destruction and spoke to reporters and television crews. A Washington Post report from September 13, 2001, described him arriving at the site and observing the ongoing recovery effort.

In interviews at the time, Trump described the devastation as unlike anything he had ever witnessed and said workers associated with his company were assisting in the area. He also spoke about participating in the rebuilding effort that would eventually follow.

Contact Newsweek editors for this story: Jason Lemon and Anthony Murray.