Former FDNY Commissioner Tom Von Essen has publicly urged Mayor Zohran Mamdani to skip Friday’s 9/11 25th anniversary memorial ceremony.
Von Essen, who led the Fire Department during the 2001 terror attacks and lost 343 firefighters in the Twin Towers, told The Post that Mamdani’s presence would only deepen the pain for grieving families. “It’s a rough day. The families don’t need any more angst and Mamdani is going to bring angst,” he said. The ex-commissioner pointed to a recent executive order signing as fresh evidence of disrespect, noting that Mamdani had “the pen for his 9/11 executive order handed to his attorney [Ramzi Kassem]” — a lawyer who once represented an al-Qaeda terrorist connected to the Pentagon attack.
The ceremonial pen transfer last week drew immediate scrutiny. Mamdani signed two 9/11-related executive orders and then gave the symbolic pen to Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch, whispering “Can you pass this?” Tisch then handed it to Kassem, Mamdani’s chief counsel. Von Essen interpreted the moment as deliberate provocation. “He’s a very smart guy. He’s a genius at manipulating people,” he said of the mayor.
More than 100,000 people have signed a change.org petition demanding Mamdani stay away from the anniversary events. “The families don’t want him there. One hundred thousand people signed a petition telling him to stay away. I signed the petition,” Von Essen said. He also questioned Mamdani’s character directly: “He’s not big enough to stay away knowing he will be a distraction.”
Former Mayor Rudy Giuliani and ex-Gov. George Pataki have joined the chorus opposing Mamdani’s attendance. Giuliani, 82, whose post-9/11 leadership earned him the nickname “America’s mayor,” told Newsmax Sunday that the mayor’s planned presence “offends me.” “Having lost friends there and being very close to many of the families, it offends me that he’s coming,” he said. Giuliani also claimed without evidence that Mamdani “doesn’t agree that September 11 was an Islamic terrorist attack on the United States Of America,” before launching into an anti-Muslim conspiracy-laced rant.
Pataki, speaking to City & State last week, tied his objection to Mamdani’s political alliances. “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,” he said. Piker, a left-wing influencer who hosted Mamdani on his podcast during the mayoral campaign, made the “America deserved 9/11” comment during a 2019 livestream. Pataki added a second condition: “Anyone who has refused to reject the phrase ‘globalize the intifada,’ which unequivocally calls for violence against Jews, not just in Israel but anywhere in the world, should not be at that site.”
Mamdani, who was nine years old when the towers fell, has repeatedly insisted he will attend. On Sunday he outlined his plans to honor both first responder families and others killed in the attacks. “I want this week to be a focus on the families whose loved ones were stolen from them 25 years ago in the horrific act of terrorism on Sept. 11 and focus on the first responders who gave everything they could to this city and the people who came together for their fellow New Yorkers,” he said. He added, “In the days to come my focus will be on attending events that memorialize that incredible courage and I will be there at the memorial just as I was last year.”
City Hall has defended the pen hand-off to Kassem as routine protocol. Spokesman Sam Raskin said Kassem attended the signing “both to perform his official responsibilities and because he is personally invested in these executive orders as a longtime New Yorker who was in New York City on that terrifying day 25 years ago.” Kassem, as chief counsel, drafts the executive orders for the mayor’s signature.
Von Essen, who later served as the NY-NJ regional head of FEMA during the COVID-19 response, helped oversee the national pandemic effort after his fire department tenure.
Mamdani is scheduled to attend multiple 9/11 memorial events throughout the city this week.