‘It Offends Me’: Giuliani Says Mamdani Should Skip 9/11 Memorial
By Dana Whitfield · Reporting from Washington ·
Rudy Giuliani is 82 years old, and he is still attempting to manage New York City from the sidelines.
# The Gatekeepers of Grief
Rudy Giuliani is 82, and he still tries to steer New York City from the sidelines. In a Newsmax appearance reported by The Guardian, the former mayor said there is "no question" that Mayor Zohran Mamdani should skip the city's 9/11 remembrance ceremonies. Giuliani claims Mamdani’s presence "offends" him. Because the terrorists acted "in the name of the Muslim religion," Giuliani argues that Mamdani—a practicing Muslim—is an intruder at the altar of city grief.
This is not a debate about protocol; it is an attempt to exile a sitting mayor from his own city’s history. Mamdani has already handled the paperwork of the office, signing executive orders to designate September 11 as a "Day of Remembrance and Service" and updating the city's network of sirens, radio frequencies, and evacuation routes. Yet, Giuliani and former Governor George Pataki treat the mayoralty as a prize, granted only to those who pass a purity test designed by the ghosts of the 2000s.
Is Faith a Qualification?
The strongest case against Mamdani targets his staff. ABC News reports that Mamdani appointed Ramzi Kassem as chief legal counsel, a man who once represented a convicted al-Qaeda member. Pataki said that anyone who fails to distance themselves from far-left influencers like Hasan Piker—who suggested America "deserved" the attacks—has no business at Ground Zero.
This is partisan math: the belief that a leader’s legitimacy depends on the purity of his lawyers or his distance from internet trolls. In a functioning republic, the mayor is the mayor. He does not need a permission slip from a former governor to attend a public ceremony. To suggest that a city attorney's past client disqualifies the mayor from honoring 3,000 dead citizens is a leap in logic that ignores how law firms work and how cities are governed. It treats the mayor not as a chief executive, but as a guarantor for every legal brief filed by his staff.
The Ghost of Executive Order 9066
This playbook always ends in a failure of the state. When a government uses a national security crisis to exclude people based on their religion or ethnicity, it erodes the institution it claims to protect. The U.S. government did this in 1942. Using the trauma of Pearl Harbor, the state forced 125,000 Japanese Americans into barbed-wire camps—roughly two out of every three of whom were U.S. citizens.
The logic then mirrors Giuliani’s logic now: a specific identity makes a person an inherent threat. Mamdani said that 9/11 was the moment many New Yorkers were "marked an 'other'." By demanding he skip the ceremony, his critics try to finish that job.
The Office Outweighs the Grudge
The New York Post reports that a petition with 100,000 signatures demands Mamdani's absence. But a city is not run by signatures on a digital page; it is run by institutions. If former officials bar the Mayor of New York City from the city's most solemn official event, the office becomes a costume rather than a seat of power.
Mamdani must attend. He does so not as a gesture of personal piety, but as a requirement of the office. The moment former officials decide which current leaders are "patriotic" enough to perform their duties, the rule of law yields to the rule of the grudge.