• 9/11 families and New Yorkers press for distance at Ground Zero
• Mamdani’s attendance at the memorial becomes a flashpoint
• Ramzi Kassem’s role drives much of the anger
• The petition grows into a massive public rebuke
• Past remarks and associations keep the backlash alive
• The memorial day remains centered on grief, respect, and tension
New York is once again staring straight at a raw wound, and this time the fight is over who should be in the room when the city marks 9/11. Mayor Zohran Mamdani plans to attend the Ground Zero memorial despite a loud and emotional push from victims’ families who want him nowhere near the ceremony. For many of those families, the issue is not politics in the abstract, but the feeling that the day deserves a tighter circle of grief and a cleaner sense of respect.
The annual remembrance is set for Friday morning and remains one of the most solemn events on the city calendar. It is an invitation-only gathering for families, dignitaries, and invited guests, with Vice President JD Vance and several former presidents expected to be present as well. That alone would make the day heavy, but the controversy around Mamdani has turned it into something even more charged.
At the center of the backlash is his decision to appoint Ramzi Kassem as the city’s chief legal counsel. Kassem previously represented Ahmed al-Darbi, an al Qaeda operative who pleaded guilty to war-crimes charges, and that connection has enraged many of the people who signed the petition asking Mamdani to stay away. The petition has reportedly pulled in about 110,000 signatures, a number that shows how far the anger has spread.
The language in that petition is blunt and personal, which fits the mood around the memorial this year. It says the day is not just a public event, but a deeply private moment of mourning for families who lost loved ones in the attacks. It also warns that people seen as clashing with the purpose of the ceremony can strip away from the focus and add fresh pain to a day that already carries enough of it.
Mamdani has not backed off. He has said he wants the week to stay centered on the families who lost relatives and on the first responders who ran toward danger and gave everything they had. That message sounds sturdy on paper, but it has not been enough to calm the criticism, especially from those who believe actions matter more than polished statements once the anniversary arrives.
The anger has only grown because of a separate symbolic episode involving a pen used for 9/11-related executive orders. Mamdani handed the pen to NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch and asked her to pass it to Kassem, a move critics slammed as tone-deaf and insulting. On social media, the reaction was fast and fierce, with many treating it as proof that the mayor does not grasp how fraught the moment really is.
Former Gov. George Pataki and former Mayor Rudy Giuliani, both Republicans, have also urged Mamdani to keep his distance. Giuliani said it offends him that Mamdani is coming, pointing to his own ties to families who still feel the impact of that morning every day. Their criticism adds another layer of pressure, because it turns the debate from a petition into a broader civic rebuke.
The list of grievances does not stop at Kassem or the pen. Critics have also brought up Mamdani’s past reluctance to clearly denounce the phrase “globalize the intifada,” his praise for an unindicted co-conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, and his support for candidates who made disturbing comments about 9/11. His continued association with Hasan Piker has also drawn heat, especially after Piker said America “deserved 9/11.”
Mamdani later called Piker’s remarks “objectionable and reprehensible,” but he still has not fully cut ties with him. He has also said he would “discourage” people from using the phrase “globalize the intifada,” a line that did little to satisfy skeptics who wanted a sharper break. The result is a mayor trying to steady the room while everyone else is still arguing over whether the room should have been his to enter in the first place.
That tension is hanging over Ground Zero in a very real way, and it is not fading just because the date on the calendar keeps moving closer. For the families who signed the petition, the memorial is about memory, loss, and the people who never made it home. For Mamdani, the ceremony is now also a test of whether he can stand in the middle of that grief without making it feel even heavier.
