Trump, Biden expected to visit Flight 93 National Memorial for 9/11 anniversary | TribLIVE.com
TribLive Logo
| Back | Text Size:
https://naviga.triblive.com/news/pennsylvania/joe-biden-wife-to-visit-flight-93-national-memorial-for-9-11-anniversary/

Trump, Biden expected to visit Flight 93 National Memorial for 9/11 anniversary

Megan Tomasic
| Wednesday, September 2, 2020 2:19 p.m.
AP
Joe Biden and President Donald Trump plan to visit the Flight 93 National Memorial in Somerset on Sept. 11 .

President Trump and Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden both plan to visit Shanksville to commemorate the 19th anniversary of the 2001 terrorist attacks, according to the White House and a Biden campaign spokesman.

The president — who will be in Westmoreland County on Thursday — and first lady Melania Trump will visit the Flight 93 National Memorial “to honor and remember the lives lost” on Sept. 11, 2001, White House spokesman Judd Deere told the Associated Press. Trump is expected to speak, Deere said, though the National Park Service had planned to have no speakers this year.

In 2016, Trump and Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton both spent Sept. 11 in New York and both visited the Ground Zero memorial in lower Manhattan.

The Washington Post reported that Biden will attend the ceremony at the Somerset County memorial. Ike Hajinazarian, regional press secretary for the Biden campaign, would not specify the location of the scheduled appearance. Biden’s wife, Jill, is expected to make the trip.

Additional details will be released later. Katie Cordek, spokeswoman for the Flight 93 National Memorial, directed questions to Biden’s campaign.

Terrorists hijacked United Airlines Flight 93 on Sept. 11, 2001. The 40 passengers and crew members died when the plane crashed in a field in Stonycreek Township.

Nearly 3,000 people were killed on Sept. 11, 2001, when hijackers flew commercial airplanes into New York’s World Trade Center, the Pentagon and the Pennsylvania field. The passengers and crew aboard United Flight 93 are credited with trying to breach the cockpit after four hijackers tried to fly the plane to a suspected target in the nation’s capital.

Biden, as vice president, visited the national memorial for a 9/11 service in 2012.

“What they did is still etched in our minds — not only yours, but millions of Americans. It’s so important that we always remember,” Biden told families of Flight 93 victims.

Biden also attended the dedication of the Flight 93 National Memorial on Sept. 10, 2011, along with former Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush.

Trump visited the memorial for the annual 9/11 service in 2018, as did Vice President Mike Pence in 2019.

This year’s memorial event is scheduled to continue as an abbreviated ceremony because of the coronavirus pandemic. According to the site’s website, the normally 90-minute service will be reduced to a 20-minute moment of remembrance. Names of each passenger and crew member are to be read aloud in place of a keynote speaker and musician.

The ceremony is scheduled to begin at 9:45 a.m. at the Memorial Plaza and will observe the exact time Flight 93 crashed, at 10:03 a.m.


Copyright ©2025— Trib Total Media, LLC (TribLIVE.com)