US President Donald Trump has warned that the United States faces “very real threats right now” as he marked the 25th anniversary of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, while accusing unnamed individuals of seeking to take the country in a “communistic way.” Trump made the remarks on Tuesday during a commemoration on the Ellipse outside the White House, where he honoured 9/11 first responders and victims and vowed to prevent another attack on the United States.
The event, organised with the Tunnel to Towers Foundation, featured a 21-foot steel beam recovered from the South Tower of the World Trade Center. The beam has travelled more than 10,500 miles across the United States as part of the foundation’s Steel Across America tour, serving as a memorial to those who died and the first responders who rushed into the burning buildings. About 150 first responders from New York, Washington and Pennsylvania attended the ceremony.
One of the major moments of the ceremony was Trump’s posthumous presentation of the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Welles Remy Crowther, the equities trader and volunteer firefighter remembered as the “Man in the Red Bandana.” Crowther, who was 24 when he died, repeatedly helped people escape the South Tower after it was struck, and is credited with saving 18 people before the building collapsed. His mother, Alison Crowther, and sister, Paige Crowther Charbonneau, accepted the nation’s highest civilian honour on his behalf.
Crowther’s story has become one of the enduring accounts of heroism from the September 11 attacks. He had been working in the South Tower when the building was struck and used a red bandana to cover his face from smoke as he helped guide people towards safety. His actions became widely known after survivors described being rescued by a man wearing the distinctive red bandana.
Trump also used the ceremony to pay tribute to the hundreds of firefighters, police officers and other emergency workers who died while responding to the attacks. He announced that a new US Coast Guard cutter would be named after Jeffrey Palazzo, a firefighter and Coast Guard reservist who responded to the attacks, while praising the sacrifices made by first responders and their families.
The president said the country must ensure that the devastation of September 11 is never repeated. “Nobody will ever even think of such a thing being able to happen again,” Trump said, as he pledged to protect the United States from future attacks. His remarks came as the country prepares for the formal 25th-anniversary commemorations on Friday.
The anniversary will be marked at the three sites targeted in the 2001 attacks — the World Trade Center in New York, the Pentagon and the Pennsylvania field where United Airlines Flight 93 crashed. Trump is scheduled to visit the Pentagon on Friday, while Vice President JD Vance is expected to represent the administration at the New York ceremony.
The commemorations come a quarter of a century after 19 al-Qaeda hijackers seized four commercial aircraft, crashing two into New York’s World Trade Center, another into the Pentagon and the fourth into a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, after passengers attempted to retake control of the plane. Nearly 3,000 people were killed in the attacks, which reshaped US foreign policy, national security and the country’s approach to terrorism.
As the United States prepares to mark the anniversary, Trump’s warning about current threats has added a contemporary security message to a commemoration centred on remembrance and national resilience. For families of the victims and survivors, however, the anniversary remains primarily a moment to remember those who were lost and the extraordinary acts of courage displayed by ordinary people and first responders on one of the darkest days in American history.
