President Donald Trump will be attending the Pentagon’s memorial of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks instead of New York City’s memorial at Ground Zero, according to a new report. Trump will speak at the Sept. 11 memorial ceremony at…
Page A2From§Eachthe milkman edition — 3 September 2026
Ground Zero, where retired officers told Mamdani and Hochul to stay away, confirms a former president's visit.
As it ran on the front
The plaza has a gate, and this week it swung two different ways for four different names.
Start with the rule: Ground Zero's own organizers do not allow speeches at the anniversary ceremony, the New York Times reported August 27 — a policy that applied even to the president who wanted the microphone. Donald Trump had planned to mark the 25th anniversary of September 11 there. He didn't get the podium, so on August 28 the Washington Examiner confirmed the pivot: Trump will speak at the Pentagon instead, in Arlington, on the day itself. The plaza kept its rule. The president kept his speech. They just happened someplace else.…
…(cont) Two days after that, on August 30, Fox News reported that retired Port Authority police officers were urging Zohran Mamdani and Kathy Hochul to stay away from the Ground Zero ceremony entirely — not the microphone this time, the plaza itself. Trump lost a podium. Mamdani and Hochul got asked to lose the sidewalk.
Then, Wednesday, The Hill's sister network confirmed the fourth name: Former President Biden will be there. A spokesperson verified his plans to attend the ceremony — a private citizen now, one administration removed, walking onto the same plaza that Mamdani and Hochul were asked to skip.
Follow the four names in order and the plaza stops looking like it's rationed by microphone rules and starts looking like it's rationed by who still has to answer for the last election. The man barred from talking got a building in Virginia to talk in instead. Mamdani and Hochul got a request to not show up at all. The man no longer facing voters gets confirmed on the guest list a week out. That's not a memorial service. That's a seating chart, and this year the surest way onto it was leaving office already.
“They didn't cancel the plaza, they just handed out four different doors for four different names — one goes to Virginia to talk, two get told to skip the sidewalk, and one who's done running for anything walks straight onto it. Watch who a place lets stand there for free and you'll see who it still answers to. This week that access goes to a former president, not to the two people who were asked to stay home.”
“The Pentagon was hit that day too, so honoring the people there isn't a downgrade, it's just — well, it's not Ground Zero, is it, but that's not a snub, that's scheduling. And the officers, they're private citizens, retired, they can ask whoever they want to skip whatever public memorial they — did I just call it a sidewalk? That's not what I meant to say.”
The receipts
President Trump originally intended to commemorate the 25th anniversary of Sept. 11 with remarks at ground zero, but the memorial’s organizers do not allow speeches. Mr. Trump changed his plans.
Former President Biden will be at Ground Zero in New York City for the 25th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, The Hill's sister network NewsNation confirmed Wednesday. A spokesperson verified the former president's plans to attend the 9/11 site memorial event to the network — a little under a week after White...
Retired Port Authority police officers are urging Zohran Mamdani and Kathy Hochul to skip the 25th anniversary 9/11 commemoration at Ground Zero.
This page is a back-issue: the story as it ran, receipts as they were. The current edition is at the front.