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President Biden commemorated the September 11 anniversary on Monday in Alaska, far from Ground Zero in Manhattan or other sites memorializing the 2,977 Americans who died that day.
The president was forced to explain his decision to take trips abroad and only make it to Alaska to set foot on U.S. soil for a commemoration.
Mr. Biden said, that although the base was located far from Ground Zero, it was still key to that day’s history because planes were scrambled from there to defend U.S. airspace.
“We know that distance did not dull or diminish the pain we felt all across the nation on Sept. 11,” he said.
It was the first time that a sitting president did not mark the tragedy at one of the attack sites at New York’s World Trade Center, the Pentagon, Shanksville, Pennsylvania, or from the White House.
Instead, Mr. Biden delivered his remarks on the 22nd anniversary of the terror attacks from the Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson military base in Anchorage. The remarks were delivered while Air Force One stopped to refuel on Mr. Biden’s trip back from Vietnam and the G20 summit in New Delhi, India.
During his remarks to mark the somber anniversary, Mr. Biden defended the visits even if they left him far from the tragic sites of the terrorist attacks on such a dark day in history.
“These trips are a central part of how we’re going to ensure the United States is flanked by the broadest array of allies and partners who will stand with us and deter any threat to our security, to build a world that is safer for all of our children,” Mr. Biden said. “Something that today of all days, we’re reminded is not a given.”
Mr. Biden’s decision to skip 9/11 ceremonies at the attack sites or the White House drew a sharp rebuke from Republicans and two of New York’s largest newspapers. He is the first president to mark Sept. 11 outside the contiguous U.S.
“Yes, Biden was in India this weekend for the G20 conference. But he couldn’t arrange his schedule to make it back for a 9/11 ceremony, instead doing a flyby on the remotest part of US soil?” wrote Andrea Peyser, a New York Post columnist. “It may have been 22 years, but New Yorkers remember.”
Leonard Greene, opinion writer for the New York Daily News, said Mr. Biden was spending the day “about as far away from New York City as one can get.”
Rep. Corey Mills, Florida Republican, savaged Mr. Biden for not going to a memorial site or at least holding an event at the White House.
“Instead, Biden is having Vice President Harris, and her husband, going. He also has his wife, Jill Biden, going to lay the wreaths. I don’t think Joe Biden has the mental competency to do it himself, but it’s again, one more snub to the American people,” Mr. Mills wrote on social media.
Mr. Biden discussed the 9/11 attacks during his remarks.
“We’ll never forget that when faced with evil and an enemy that sought to tear us apart, we endured,” Mr. Biden said. “While every year we mark this hallowed day, it’s never easy.”
The White House dispatched Vice President Kamala Harris to the National September 11 Memorial and Museum at ground zero in Manhattan. She attended the memorial service for about an hour before leaving while the victims’ names were still being read to hop on a plane back to Washington.
First lady Jill Biden laid a wreath on the 9/11 memorial at the Pentagon and Ms. Harris’ husband Doug Emhoff attended an event at the Flight 93 National Memorial in Stoystown, Pennsylvania, which commemorates passengers who died in a plane crash there after fighting the hijackers.
Mr. Biden visited all three 9/11 memorial sites in 2021 to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the attacks. Last year, he delivered remarks from the Pentagon memorial.
While in office, Presidents George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Donald Trump participated in memorial services at one of the three attack sites.
In 2005, Mr. Bush opted not to attend the attack sites and instead held a memorial service at the White House. And in 2015, Mr. Obama participated in a moment of silence on the White House lawn and then addressed U.S. troops from Fort Meade in Maryland.
• Jeff Mordock can be reached at jmordock@washingtontimes.com.
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