Bidens to Travel to 9/11 Attack Sites on 20th Anniversary

President Biden and First Lady Dr. Jill Biden will commemorate the 20th anniversary of 9/11 next Saturday by traveling to the three sites of the terrorist attacks.

In a brief announcement released Saturday, the White House said the president and first lady “will honor and memorialize the lives lost 20 years ago” by traveling to New York City, Shanksville, Pennsylvania and the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia.

Vice President Kamala Harris  and Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff will travel to Shanksville, Pennsylvania for a separate event, then join the President and First Lady at the Pentagon.  

Additional details will be announced later this week, the White House said.

The Bidens’ itinerary is similar to the one President Barack Obama followed in 2011 on the 10th anniversary of the attacks. Obama’s visit to New York City coincided with the opening of a memorial at the site where the World Trade Center towers once stood.

Next Saturday’s anniversary falls less than two weeks after the end of the nearly two-decade-long U.S. war in Afghanistan. The war was launched weeks after the 9/11 attacks to retaliate against the al-Qaida plotters and the Taliban, who provided them safe haven.

Biden on Friday directed the declassification of certain documents related to the Sept. 11 attacks in a gesture toward victims’ families who have long sought the records in hopes of implicating the Saudi government.

The President will also be visiting the New York metropolitan area on Tuesday, Sept. 7 to survey damage caused by Hurricane Ida.

During that trip, Biden will visit Manville, New Jersey and Queens, New York.

Many of New York’s 13 storm-related deaths occurred in Queens, where residents of illegal basement apartments were trapped in their flooded homes as the city was pounded by torrential rainfall. 

New Jersey saw at least 25 deaths.

Damage in Manville, NJ, where Biden is set to stop, included a banquet hall that was leveled by an explosion while it was surrounded by floodwaters as the storm swept through the region.