Good Friday evening. In this edition: Americans commemorate the 25th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
Plus, Vance, Houthis and Reflecting Pool.
9/11 Anniversary
Twenty-five years after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, Americans gathered to remember the nearly 3,000 people killed that day, honor the first responders who rushed toward danger and reflect on the legacy of an attack that reshaped the country and the world.
At Ground Zero, the annual ceremony began with first responders carrying the American flag in a solemn procession before the national anthem was performed and the first bell was rung at 8:46am, marking the moment American Airlines Flight 11 struck the North Tower of the World Trade Center.
Additional bells marked other moments from the attacks, including when the second plane struck the South Tower, when American Airlines Flight 77 hit the Pentagon, when the Twin Towers collapsed and when United Airlines Flight 93 crashed in a field near Shanksville.
For the first time, organizers added a seventh moment of silence to remember the thousands who have since died from illnesses and injuries linked to exposure to the toxic ash and rubble at the World Trade Center site.
All four living former presidents — Joe Biden, Barack Obama, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton — attended the ceremony, along with Vice President JD Vance and other dignitaries.
Before the ceremony, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani (D) was seen shaking hands with former Mayor Rudy Giuliani (R), who had publicly called for the city's first Muslim mayor to skip the event.
At the ceremony, Michael Massaroli Jr., who lost his father on 9/11, urged Americans to "please stop" using the tragedy to attack Muslims, saying doing so does not honor the victims, who included people of all faiths and ethnicities.
"You do my dad's legacy and the legacy of all these victims no honor by using this tragedy to spread hate. We have seen a medley of people come up today, of all races, all religions, all creeds. And this tragedy is just that — it's a tragedy," he said.
"I've had to grow up and spend the past 25 years seeing people use it to hate on our Muslim brothers and sisters, to hate on people who don't look like them, and that's wrong, and that does no honor to the victims here."
At the Pentagon, a ceremony honored the 184 people killed in the attack — 125 inside the building and 59 passengers and crew aboard American Airlines Flight 77.
President Trump, first lady Melania Trump, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chair Gen. Dan Caine and former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice were in attendance.
President Trump used his remarks to remember the victims and first responders while also portraying the ongoing Iran war as an extension of the fight against terrorism.
"Today we renew the sacred oath that we first swore in their names a quarter of a century ago: We will never, ever forget. That's why we fight today. We don't have a choice," he said.
"On days like 9/11, we learn what a country is truly made of. We're learning right now what we're made of, and we have to be strong and we have to be smart."
The president also paid tribute to members of the military who served in the war on terror and those now fighting Iran.
"For 25 years, our best and bravest have kept America safe," he said. "We salute our first responders and law enforcement. We love them. And we salute the service members working right now to ensure the world's number one sponsor of terror, the Islamic Republic of Iran, will never, ever have a nuclear weapon."
Ms. Rice, who was President Bush's national security adviser on 9/11, reflected on both the country's response and the government's failure to prevent the attacks.
"Those of us in authority on that day did not see the nature of the danger in time to prevent the attack of 9/11. We did what we knew to do but, by definition, it was not enough," she said.
"I will always carry deep personal remorse for the pain that you, the families of the fallen, still feel and for the trauma that our country endured."
But Ms. Rice also recalled how Americans and their allies responded in the aftermath.
"We responded in ways that the evil men who attacked us could never have imagined," she said. "They believed that we would be terrorized into retreat. Well, they picked the wrong people."
At a separate remembrance ceremony, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin reflected on the failures that led to the creation of his department and its "zero-fail" mission to prevent another attack.
"The Department of Homeland Security, we were stood up because of failures, honestly," he said. "Our mission is to make sure it never happens again … We can't afford to miss one opportunity to prevent it from happening again."
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In other news…
Vice President JD Vance urged Republicans to show up at the polls in November during his keynote speech at the GOP midterm convention, while also seeking to win over independents and voters disillusioned with the current administration. "Don't give the country over to a bunch of crazy people because you happen to disagree with us on a policy issue here or there," he said Thursday night in Dallas. The primetime speech put a major spotlight on the 2028 hopeful, who basked in cheers of "JD" and "28" at various points in his remarks. "We got to take care of business this November, then we'll worry about what comes next," he told the crowd. President Trump closed out the convention with more remarks, urging Republicans to pretend he was on the ballot in November. A balloon drop then brought the first-ever GOP midterm convention to a close.
The Houthis, an Iran-backed militia based in Yemen, captured Perim Island at the southern entrance to the Red Sea, further threatening Saudi oil exports after the kingdom shut down a major oil pipeline following an attack the day before. The Houthis on Thursday captured the historic port city of Mokha as they seek to take control of Yemen's Red Sea coastline. Their capture of the island in the middle of the vital Bab el-Mandeb Strait could further disrupt oil shipments, with the Iran war having effectively shut down oil transport through the Strait of Hormuz.
The contractor behind the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool's summer renovation told the Trump administration that flaws in its own work and plans — not vandalism — caused the pool's new liner to peel and break loose, according to documents reviewed by the New York Times. President Trump had repeatedly blamed the pool's troubles on vandalism and directed the Justice Department to charge individuals he claimed had destroyed the liner with knives and box cutters. The Justice Department ultimately charged several people but later dropped the cases after evidence emerged that the damage was caused by problems with the installation rather than vandalism.
For your radar…
President Trump meets with Irish Prime Minister Micheál Martin in Dublin on Saturday morning, part of a weekend trip to Ireland that also includes the Irish Open golf tournament. Watch LIVE on C-SPAN around 5am ET.
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