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Good morning, and welcome to Wednesday. Martin here. It seems hard to believe we’re only halfway through a four-day week, such is the ongoing torrent of political news in Donald Trump’s America. But we’ve got you covered, as always, when it comes to what matters.
In today’s ‘First Draft’ we look at the truly appalling spectacle unfolding in New York, where the outmatched GOP is dragging the 9/11 25th anniversary itself into the gutter with rancid Islamophobic attacks on Zohran Mamdani – a mayor, as it happens, with superb polling numbers. Looking further north, we take in a miss for the Democratic Socialists of America, after hopes were briefly raised in New Hampshire. There’s also more alarming news about Trump’s forever war with Iran. In we go.
‘Toxic Air’ in New York
On Tuesday, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani released more than 170,000 pages of documents he said suggest previous city leaders lied about dangers from toxic air caused by the destruction of the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001, a threat that lingered for years.
“People got sick because the leaders they trusted lied and told them they were safe to breathe in toxic air,” Mamdani told reporters at City Hall, standing with politicians, relatives of the 9/11 dead, and campaigners on behalf of thousands sickened and killed by Ground Zero toxins, prominently including ‘Daily Show’ host Jon Stewart.
“As the years pass and the human toll grows, we reckon with the cost of Sept. 11 whenever another New Yorker is stolen from us too soon,” Mamdani said.
He did not say which leaders he believes lied to New Yorkers. Such restraint was no doubt wise. But it stood in grim contrast to the utter lack of restraint shown by the howling Republican Islamophobes who continue to demand Mamdani stay away from Friday’s ceremonies at the 9/11 Memorial, marking 25 years since nearly 3,000 people were horribly killed in moments.
Outside City Hall, 9/11 family members who do not want Mamdani to attend gathered. They did so with support from a selection of outer-borough Republican politicians – not a tribe with the greatest reputation for eloquence or statesmanlike behavior thanks to one Donald J. Trump, Esq., late of Jamaica Estates, Queens, but certainly one never shy in shouting the odds.
Vickie Paladino, a councilwoman from Queens, went low.