Mamdani to attend 9/11 memorial despite Giuliani’s objections

NEW YORK (MNTV) — New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani will attend Friday’s 9/11 memorial ceremony at Ground Zero, rejecting calls from former Mayor Rudy Giuliani and other Republicans that he stay away from one of the city’s most solemn commemorations.

Mamdani, 34, said he intends to take part in the main ceremony and other events marking the 25th anniversary, insisting the focus should remain on the families who lost loved ones and the first responders who risked their lives. 

“I’m proud to be the mayor of this city. I love this city. I love this country,” he said. 

Giuliani, mayor at the time of the attacks, told Newsmax that Mamdani should not attend and sought to link Mamdani’s Muslim faith to the ideology of the attackers — rhetoric that shifted the dispute from honoring victims toward the mayor’s religious identity.

The confrontation carries weight because Mamdani is the city’s first Muslim mayor, placing him at the center of a national argument over whether faith should govern participation in public mourning. Last week he signed an order designating Sept. 11 an annual “Day of Remembrance and Service.” 

Opposition persisted — former Governor George Pataki also objected, and a petition against his attendance gathered nearly 100,000 signatures — but Mamdani declined to escalate. 

The ceremony is expected to draw former Presidents Clinton, Bush, Obama, and Biden; Trump is expected to mark the day at the Pentagon, with Vice President JD Vance representing the administration in New York. 

That a memorial to the dead has again become a political battleground, advocates note, says less about Mamdani than about how readily his identity is turned into a target.