US President Donald Trump on Friday renewed the “sacred oath” to remember the victims of the September 11, 2001 , terrorist attacks, saying the United States will never be the same after the events that reshaped the country a quarter of a century ago.
“No one can ever prepare for a day like 9/11 — but we can always choose to be the kind of nation the world saw in those days after. Council member Marissa Valeri recalled her personal experience of September 11, saying she was working on Capitol Hill when she learned that a family friend was aboard the plane that struck the Pentagon. Another District Council member also spoke at the remembrance event, saying, “I’m here today to honour the victims of the 9/11 terrorist attack and to remember along with my fellow elected officials and community members here today… The names of those killed are read aloud by family members and loved ones, preserving a solemn tradition that has become central to the country’s 9/11 commemorations.
Because the court was in session, one friend of a friend who was stuck at the stairwell and just remembering what even I was doing that day while I was clerking on what is now the Maryland Supreme Court and having to continually run messages to then Chief Judge Robert Bell to let him know what was happening outside the courtroom. We can raise our children to know that their country is good, that their fathers are brave, and that our flag is a symbol of justice and freedom. We can be a nation whose heroes are not fanatics for an abstract cause, but the kind who race into buildings and give their lives on a Tuesday morning for strangers they’ve never met,” he added. At Ground Zero in New York, the site where the World Trade Center towers once stood, an annual remembrance ceremony continues to honour the victims.
“As an American, 9/11 means a lot of different things. In my own personal experience, I worked on Capitol Hill on 9/11, where I found out that a family friend was on the plane that hit the Pentagon. I’m very sad that we don’t have 25 years of hope in the community and the people caring for one another. We lost that lesson so quickly, and I hope that it does not take another tragedy like September 11 to regain that sense of truly what being American is all about,” Valeri said.
I spent the whole day stuck on Capitol Hill. The metro was shut down, and fighter jets were scrambling all day long…
