9/11 Families Gather at World Trade Center and Pentagon to Mark 25th Anniversary
Memorials across the United States honour the 2,977 victims of the September 11 attacks, as political leaders mark the anniversary amid a heated midterm election campaign.
Families of the victims of the September 11 attacks are gathering at the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the deadliest terrorist attack on American soil. Memorial ceremonies are being held across the United States to honour the 2,977 people killed when hijacked airliners struck the twin towers, the Pentagon and a field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania.
The anniversary has brought Americans together in remembrance, but it is also unfolding against the backdrop of a bitterly contested midterm election campaign. President Donald Trump used a rally in Dallas to repeat his pledge to pay every American adult $5,000 if Republicans retain control of Congress in November. He argued the country could afford the payment because of what he described as unprecedented national prosperity, saying the United States was taking in trillions of dollars.
Trump's promise, which he has labelled a dividend, was notably absent from the speeches of many other Republican officials, including Vice-President JD Vance. In a shorter address than his nearly two-hour speech earlier in the week, Trump urged voters to treat the midterm elections as a referendum on his presidency, telling them to pretend he was on the ballot. He also led the crowd in an improvised pledge, asking Republicans to commit to voting at all costs and telling those gathered that they would go to hell if they did not vote.
Vance, speaking earlier, appealed to Republicans who may disagree with parts of the administration's agenda not to abandon the party in November. He invoked the memory of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, who was killed a year ago, to argue that voters should not throw the baby out with the bathwater over a policy issue here or there. The remark appeared to be a nod to dissent over the Iran war, which he did not name directly. Vance's speech was widely seen as an audition for a possible 2028 presidential run, as he spent much of his time on stage outlining the threats of the so-called far left, listing the administration's achievements and criticising Joe Biden's tenure in office.
Outside the arena in Dallas, dozens of demonstrators gathered to protest Trump's policy agenda. Police said two people were taken into custody, one after an alleged assault involving a counter-protester and another for blocking a roadway. The protests underscored the tense political atmosphere in which this year's 9/11 commemorations are taking place, with the anniversary serving both as a moment of national mourning and as a backdrop to the intensifying midterm campaign.
