Survivors, first responders, and victims’ families from the 9/11 community are “disgusted and outraged” by Zohran Mamdani’s decision to campaign and pose for a smiling photo with a radical imam once named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, said leading 9/11 attorney Michael Barasch, whose firm represents more than 45,000 clients. He called the encounter “an insult to every 9/11 survivor and family member.”
In an exclusive interview with Breitbart News on Tuesday, Barasch — the renowned 9/11 lawyer and managing partner of Barasch & McGarry — said his phone has been “ringing off the hook” since the photo emerged on Saturday, as first responders, survivors, and families voiced disgust over Mamdani’s embrace of Siraj Wahhaj, the Brooklyn imam tied to anti-American extremism. “We can’t let Mamdani into City Hall,” he warned.
Barasch said the backlash was immediate. “Why is he currying favor with extremist Muslims? They’re not voting for him anyway,” he said. “All they’re doing is sowing hatred — the kind of hatred that led to the attacks in ’93 and 2001. So why would Zohran Mamdani give this radical imam the time of day? I don’t get it, and neither do my clients.”
The renowned 9/11 lawyer stressed that the outrage stretches well beyond first responders. “About half my clients were responders, but the vast majority are ordinary New Yorkers — office workers, teachers, students, and downtown residents,” he said. “This shouldn’t be political — for the people still living with 9/11’s consequences, it’s life and death.”
Barasch said the episode “ripped the Band-Aid off” for those still living with the fallout. “To see Mamdani intentionally platforming a man like Wahhaj — someone who supported the terrorists — is a slap in the face to every New Yorker who was there, who got sick, or who buried someone.”
Barasch said outrage across the 9/11 community is almost unanimous. “We have to stay away from Islamist extremists,” he warned. “I represent moderate Muslims, Jews, and Christians — the toxic dust didn’t discriminate. Mamdani’s embrace of Wahhaj insults every single person in the 9/11 community — those who got sick, who lost loved ones, or who now live with the fear of cancer.”
He tied the controversy to the rhetoric that Mamdani has refused to condemn. “He’s platforming people who chant ‘globalize the intifada’ — a rallying cry rooted in the same extremist ideology that inspired 9/11,” Barasch said.
First responders, he added, view the photo as part of a disturbing pattern. “These are the people who take care of us,” he said of police and firefighters. “And here’s a candidate who’s been hostile to first responders choosing to pose with a figure embraced by anti-American extremists. How can anyone in the 9/11 community support that for mayor? It’s scary.”
Barasch called the gesture cynical politics. “If he wants to appeal to moderate Muslims, fine — do it by showing how you’ll support them, not by currying favor with an extremist who’s dangerous to everybody.”
“What worries me most is the effect this could have — emboldening extremists to think it’s normal to hate Jews and to hate first responders,” Barasch said, adding that with Mamdani, he doesn’t expect new cops or firefighters — the very people who ran toward the towers while everyone else was running away. “That’s what really worries me.”
Veterans of the first World Trade Center attack, he added, feel especially betrayed. “Some of my clients responded to the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993 — they’re in their sixties now, and they all vote,” Barasch emphasized. “This isn’t symbolic; it betrays the promise to ‘never forget.’”
Barasch questioned whether Mamdani grasps what 9/11 means to New Yorkers. “He’s thirty-two. He was eleven on 9/11,” Barasch said. “I don’t think he forgot; I don’t think he ever knew. Has he even been to the 9/11 Museum?”
On funding for the 9/11 Victim Compensation Fund and health benefits program, Barasch said he does not believe Mamdani can undercut federal support and credited President Donald Trump for securing it. “I was honored to be in the Rose Garden in 2019 when President Trump signed the permanent extension of the James Zadroga Act — keeping the Victim Compensation Fund and the World Trade Center Health Program running through 2090,” he said. “He’s always supported the 9/11 community.”
“As a Jewish American, I was personally insulted that Mamdani met with this extremist imam and normalized him,” Barasch said. “That big smile in the photo — I almost threw up.”
He concluded by stressing the importance of voting, noting that “you may not love the alternative, but choose a moderate — Republican or Democrat — because we cannot let Zohran Mamdani into City Hall.”
Joshua Klein is a reporter for Breitbart News. Email him at jklein@breitbart.com. Follow him on Twitter @JoshuaKlein.
Read the full article here