September 11th is the most solemn day on the U.S. calendar. The terrorist attacks that left nearly 3,000 people dead 25 years ago are still fresh in the minds of many, and no occasion calls for a greater show of reverence and respect, especially from
the nation’s commander-in-chief.
Unfortunately, America’s current commander-in-chief, Donald Trump, has a tough time showing reverence and respect for anything other than himself. It’s been especially true with regard to 9/11, as the president reminded everyone on Tuesday during an event intended to honor first responders and victims of the attacks.
“I took the whole crew down there right after this happened,” he claimed, the latest turn in his years-long effort to cast himself as some sort of hero in the aftermath of the tragedy. “Everyone went down with me. We went down as a big group of people. There wasn’t too much we could do.”
There is no evidence that Trump visited Ground Zero in the immediate aftermath of the attacks, nor is there evidence that, as Trump also claimed on Tuesday, two firemen lifted him up and carried him out of harm’s way when they believed the “creaking” United States Steel Building was on the verge of collapse.
Trump also referenced the “Man in the Red Bandana,” Welles Crowther, who worked in the World Trade Center and saved several people before he died when the South Tower collapsed. Trump posthumously awarded Crowther the Presidential Medal of Freedom, and though he touted Crowther’s actions on 9/11, couldn’t help making it about himself. “He’s become more famous than me,” Trump said. “I don’t like it. I’m very unhappy. He’s become much more famous than me.”
Trump’s self-centered commemoration follows The New York Times reporting last month that the president initially intended to honor the 25th anniversary of 9/11 at Ground Zero, but changed his plans because politicians are barred from giving speeches at the site. Trump called the story “made up,” and described one of the reporters who wrote it, Maggie Haberman, as an “unattractive person both inside and out,” referring to her as “Maggot.”
Trump’s relationship with 9/11 has always been strange, to say the least. Showing respect for those who lost their lives shouldn’t be a high bar for any public figure to clear, especially a born-and-bred New Yorker whose identity is closely tied to the city. But Trump has never really been able to do this, instead routinely making bizarre, self-aggrandizing comments about the tragedy, or using it to score cheap political points.
The most telling example of Trump’s self-centeredness regarding the tragedy came the morning of the attack. While on the phone with Secaucus, New Jersey’s WWOR, Trump was asked whether his building at 40 Wall Street has sustained any damage as a result of the attacks. He proceeded to brag about how now that the World Trade Center had fallen, he owned the tallest building in downtown Manhattan. “40 Wall Street actually was the second-tallest building in downtown Manhattan,” Trump said. “Before the World Trade Center it was the tallest. Then when they built the World Trade Center it became known as the second-tallest, and now it’s the tallest.”
To answer the question posed by WWOR’s Rolland Smith, the Trump building at 40 Wall Street did not sustain any damage from the attacks. This didn’t stop Trump from applying for and accepting federal recovery money after it was made available for the area’s small businesses.
“For many months, I allowed people to stay in the building, use the building and store things in the building,” Trump explained after he was pressed to return the money. “I was happy to do it and to this day I am still being thanked for the many people I helped. The value of what I did was far greater than the money talked about.”
A few years later, while speaking before Congress in 2005, Trump defended the use of asbestos in building materials by claiming that if the World Trade Center had been constructed using the toxic substance, they’d still be standing.
In 2013, he famously tweeted that he “would like to extend my best wishes to all, even the haters and losers, on this special date, September 11th.”
Trump’s relationship with 9/11 was brought into sharper focus during his 2016 presidential campaign, including in 2015 when he falsely claimed that he watched “thousands and thousands of people” on rooftops in New Jersey “cheering as that building was coming down.” Trump was using the claim to justify his calls to surveil mosques, noting that New Jersey has a “large Arab population.” A few weeks later, he called for all Muslim immigrants to be banned from entering the United States.
A few months later, Trump said during a debate that the “World Trade Center came down because Bill Clinton didn’t kill Osama bin Laden when he had the chance to kill him,” adding that “George Bush had the chance, also, and he didn’t listen to the advice of his CIA.” When the audience booed, Trump claimed that he “lost hundreds of friends” in the attacks. A few months later, during a campaign event in Buffalo, he lied about putting himself in harm’s way to help clear rubble.
Trump didn’t stop making 9/11 about himself after he took office.
During an interview with Bloomberg in 2018, Trump griped about how George W. Bush speaking through a bullhorn at Ground Zero prevented his own popularity among Republicans from being the highest ever. “The advantage we have is — I am actually a very popular president, which people don’t like to say, you know,” Trump said. “In fact, I guess the Republican poll came out, there’s one at 92 and one at 93 and one at 90, and they’re the highest numbers that have ever been, with the exception of a tiny period of time with a bullhorn. But that period lasted for about a week.”
He continued to center himself and Melania in commemorations, and never let the tragedy’s anniversary distract him from carrying out his typical torrent of attacks against his perceived enemies. He also continued to claim he played a role in the recovery. “Many of those affected were firefighters, police officers and other first responders,” he claimed in 2019. “And I was down there also, but I’m not considering myself a first responder. But I was down there. I spent a lot of time down there with you.”
Again, there is no evidence Trump spent time at Ground Zero in the immediate aftermath of the attack. “I spent many months there myself, and I never witnessed him,” Richard Alles, a retired deputy chief with the New York Fire Department, told The New York Times following Trump’s comments. “He was a private citizen at the time. I don’t know what kind of role he could have possibly played.”
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