Right-wing provocateur Laura Loomer publicly urged Vice President JD Vance to refuse a handshake with New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani at an upcoming 9/11 anniversary ceremony. Loomer, an ally of President Donald Trump with a large social media following, made the plea Tuesday in a series of X posts laced with anti-Muslim rhetoric. Vice President…Do not shake [Mamdani's] hand when you attend the 9/11 ceremony in New York,” she wrote.
Like past mayors, Mamdani will be in attendance. Mamdani, a democratic socialist and New York's first Muslim mayor, has faced calls from prominent Republicans to skip the anniversary event. On Sunday, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, who was in office in 2001, told Newsmax that he opposes Mamdani attending the downtown event.
Earlier this month, former New York Governor George Pataki, who was in office during the attacks, told City & State that Mamdani should skip the event. "With respect to the mayor, I think anyone who doesn't intentionally distance themselves from Hasan Piker, who has said that America deserved the attacks of September 11th, should not be there," Pataki told the outlet. Piker, a far-left streamer, is a vocal supporter of the mayor.
Conservative critics have also challenged Mamdani's appointment of Ramzi Kassem as the city's chief legal counsel, citing Kassem's past representation of a man whose brother-in-law was one of the 9/11 hijackers. The controversy intensified after The New York Post reported Saturday that, following the mayor's signing of an executive order designating September 11 as a "Day of Remembrance and Service," the ceremonial pen was handed to Kassem. Mamdani, who has condemned the 2001 attacks as “horrific,” said he still plans to attend Friday's ceremony.
Also this week, he released over 170,000 pages of internal records that show officials misled people about the safety of the air around Ground Zero after the September 11 terror attacks. One prominent official who will not be in attendance on Friday is President Donald Trump. According to The New York Times, the Republican president had initially planned to be there, but changed his mind after he was informed that no political speeches were allowed.
After the story was published, Trump claimed that reporter Maggie Haberman had “made up the story.” The president will instead commemorate 9/11 by attending a service at the Pentagon alongside first lady Melania Trump. Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
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