As the 25th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks approaches, New York’s annual Ground Zero ceremony remains one of the country’s most closely watched memorial events. This year, the focus has narrowed to New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, whose planned presence at the commemoration has drawn sharply different reactions from families of those killed in the attacks. The disagreement has put a local memorial dispute at the center of a wider debate over grief, politics and Islamophobia in the city that was hit hardest on Sept. 11, 2001.
Petition drives the dispute into public view
A public petition opposing Mamdani’s attendance was reported by CBS New York on August 20, 2026, after family members who lost relatives in the attacks said they did not want the mayor at the 25th remembrance ceremony. CBS New York reported that Giovanni Galante, whose wife Grace Catherine Galante was killed in the north tower, helped start the petition and said Mamdani’s attendance would be disrespectful because of “the people he supports.” At that point, the station reported more than 23,000 signatures on the petition, though it did not say all of those signatures came from victims’ relatives.
The petition’s language asks organizers to weigh Mamdani’s “public positions, associations, and responses to rhetoric,” according to CBS New York. Supporters interviewed by the station included Monica Iken Murphy, who lost her husband in the south tower, and 9/11 advocate John Feal, who said Mamdani should remain at City Hall unless he takes what they view as more concrete action for the 9/11 community. Dennis McKeon, who organizes a survivor group on Staten Island, told the station he respected the families’ right to voice that position.
What remains unconfirmed is the exact share of petition signers who are themselves family members of those killed on Sept. 11. Popular Information later reported that earlier coverage overstated that number and said the most detailed public accounting it found identified only a small number of named relatives on the record, even as the total petition count continued to rise.
The divide is especially significant in New York City because the Ground Zero ceremony is both a private remembrance for families and a civic event attended by elected officials. Mamdani, now serving as mayor, appeared publicly with Gov. Kathy Hochul on September 1, 2026, at an event focused on counterterrorism funding, where both invoked the approaching 25th anniversary and its continuing meaning for families and first responders. Hochul said the federal government was withholding 40% of the state’s counterterrorism funding, equal to $87 million, underscoring how Sept. 11 still shapes city and state policy.
At the same time, not all 9/11 relatives agree with the petition. Popular Information reported that September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows, a group it said included 250 family members of victims, issued a statement supporting Mamdani’s attendance. The group said a New York City mayor’s presence at Ground Zero follows the role previous mayors have played in bearing witness with families, survivors and first responders.
The city has not released any formal roster showing which family organizations support or oppose Mamdani’s attendance, and ceremony organizers have not publicly announced any change in participation rules tied to the dispute. That leaves New Yorkers with a confirmed split in public statements, but no comprehensive measure of where the broader 9/11 family community stands.
The argument over Mamdani is unfolding against a backdrop of earlier controversy over anti-Muslim rhetoric in New York politics. During the 2025 mayoral race, The Associated Press reported that Mamdani said Muslim New Yorkers had long faced indignities after Sept. 11, and that Andrew Cuomo laughed along when radio host Sid Rosenberg suggested Mamdani would be “cheering” another 9/11 attack. AP reported that Mamdani framed those attacks as part of a broader pattern of Islamophobia directed at Muslim New Yorkers.
That history helps explain why some of Mamdani’s defenders see the current petition as more than a disagreement over memorial protocol. September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows said the effort to exclude him carried “Islamophobic sentiment,” according to the statement quoted by Popular Information. Petition organizer Galante denied that religion was the issue, but Popular Information also reported more inflammatory comments he made elsewhere while defending the campaign.
For residents, the practical reality is that the September 11 ceremony is still expected to proceed as the city marks the attacks’ 25th anniversary on September 11, 2026. What New Yorkers should expect, based on public statements so far, is continued scrutiny over who attends, how families are represented and how the city balances memorial tradition with a political climate still shaped by the legacy of Sept. 11.