President Donald Trump used a White House address marking the upcoming 25th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terror attacks to tout his administration's economic record and brag about his own presence in the aftermath of the deadliest of that day’s attacks.
The president was speaking at the Ellipse near the White House on Tuesday, where a piece of structural steel from the fallen World Trade Center twin towers was on display as part of a nonprofit group’s commemoration of the attacks. He said the “battered piece of steel” from the collapsed buildings was “a reminder that America is blessed with a strength no fire can consume, no evil can conquer, and no terror can destroy” before he segued into his own remembrance of being at the attack site in the immediate aftermath.
“The United States Steel Building was creaking, really creaking, and we thought it was going to fall down. The truth is, it creaked a lot. It creaked. It still creaks, but it never came down,” Trump recalled.
“And I'll never forget two firemen. We thought it was coming down on top of us, and two firemen, big, strong guys — and I'm not the smallest guy in the world — they grabbed me under the arm, said, ‘Got to get out of here!’ And they literally lifted me up.
“This is not easy to do. I'm big. They lifted me up and they started running with me. I said, ‘Fellas, I can run myself,’ but they were amazing. But they thought it was coming down. It didn't come down,” he added.
Trump has told that story about his supposed presence at Ground Zero at least once before.
During a January 2016 campaign stop in New Hampshire amid his first run for the presidency, Trump told attendees at an event that a “screech” sound had prompted the reaction from the firefighters.
“I was there when we actually thought the U.S. Steel building was coming down and I'll never forget that I was standing next to these two massive wonderful firemen and we heard a screech ... and everybody thought that the U.S. Steel building was coming down and it was not so far from us. And these two guys there were massive guys, two really big -- because I'm a big guy and they grabbed me. I must tell you honestly, I never knew I could run that fast,” he said at the time.
Trump has repeatedly claimed to have been near the World Trade Center site in the immediate aftermath of the attacks and has also boasted about having sent crews from one of his construction projects to assist in recovery efforts.
But first responders who were there say they never saw him on the ground. Yet the president continues to insert himself into the narrative each year the nation approaches the anniversary of the attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people.
The president quickly pivoted to boasting about how the country is now “stronger today than it's ever been before,” citing recent stock market performance and quoting dubious and unconfirmed statistics about the U.S. having a higher labor participation rate than ever before while comparing the country today to the period immediately after the attacks.
“When you looked at something like took took place on September 11th, you say, "I wonder if we could ever get back to a level of greatness. Well, we've done it for the past few months,” he said.
Trump’s remarks on Tuesday are not the only set he will deliver to commemorate the anniversary of the terror attacks.
On Friday, he will speak at a commemoration ceremony at the Pentagon, where 125 people working in the building died in the attacks in addition to the 59 passengers and crew aboard American Airlines Flight 77.
He will not join the four living former presidents in attending the annual commemoration at the World Trade Center site in New York, though Vice President JD Vance will travel there in his place.
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