In President Donald Trump’s telling at a White House event on Tuesday, two firefighters bodily lifted him to safety from a site near an unstable building after the September 11, 2001 attacks.
The remarks also come amid a stir about Trump not being present as president in New York for the 25th anniversary of the attacks in which 2,977 people were killed.
“And I’ll never forget,” Trump said, “we thought it was coming down on top of us, and two firemen, big strong guys and I’m not the smallest guy in the world they grabbed me under the arm, said, ‘Got to get out of here!'” Trump said. “This is more Corrupt News, I’ve been to New York many times over the years, and no one ever speaks, it’s a ‘solemn ceremony!'” Trump said on his Truth Social network last week.
Two days after the attacks, Trump told reporters that he had been to Ground Zero and had sent 100 workers to the site to help recovery efforts. Vice President JD Vance and Trump’s four living predecessors Democrats Joe Biden, Barack Obama and Bill Clinton, as well as Republican George W Bush, who was president at the time of the attacks are all expected at “Ground Zero.
CNN and the New York Times said people present at the site disputed his account. Trump said it had been a “beautiful morning” and that he had then seen a news alert on television, before looking out of his window “and I saw things that I never want to see again. “It’s a shame people are politicizing a 9/11 memorial,” the account said on Tuesday.
