President Joe Biden will visit every 9/11 location where hijacked planes crashed in 2001 to pay tribute to those who were killed in the attack, commemorating the 20th anniversary of tragic event, Reuters reports.
The U.S. president’s commemoration tour will commence at 8:30 in New York City, on the location of the former World Trade Center, before the twin towers were attacked by aircrafts, collapsing to the ground.
Later, he will visit Shanksville in Pennsylvania, where United Flight 93 landed into a field after passengers overpowered the attackers and stopped another target from being struck.
When Biden returns to Washington, he will pay tribute with a visit to the Pentagon, which was hit by another jet on the same day.
The anniversary occurs only a few months after the U.S.-led war ended in Afghanistan, which began two decades ago with the goal of eradicating al Qaeda, which was responsible for the 9/11 attacks.
Members of both political parties have criticized Biden’s departure of U.S. forces from Afghanistan in August, months after a timetable set by his Republican predecessor, Donald Trump, and the country’s subsequent swift collapse to the Taliban.
Biden is not slated to speak at any of the memorials, but he did release a video on Friday expressing his sympathies to the victims’ families and highlighting the national unity that arose, at least initially, in the aftermath of 9/11.
Biden praised the acts of bravery that occurred in the aftermath of the assaults.
“We also saw something all too rare: a true sense of national unity,” the U.S. president noted.
As a Democrat, Biden promised to foster such togetherness when he took office at the beginning of the year, but the nation remains ideologically divided.
On the annual commemoration of 9/11, U.S. presidents frequently visit one of the three attack sites, although it is uncommon for them to visit all three on the same day.
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