President Donald Trump will pay tribute to the victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks Tuesday at a ceremony in western Pennsylvania, taking on a rare role that has sometimes been challenging for him: consoler-in-chief. First lady Melania Trump will accompany her husband to the event that marks the 17th anniversary of the attacks that killed more than 3,000 people and triggered ongoing battles against violent extremists. After hijackers flew planes into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, some 40 passengers and crew aboard United Airlines Flight 93 – believed to be headed to the U.S. Capitol building or the White House – organized a charge into the cockpit to confront their captors. Amid the ensuing fight the plane crashed into a field in Somerset County, north of Shanksville. Marking the solemn occasion requires Trump to give a formal speech, something he is not accustomed to doing as he delivers the kinds of partisan, free-wheeling, off-the-cuff campaign speeches he has been making ahead of the Nov. 6 midterm congressional elections.
Speaking at the Pentagon, one of the three sites attacked with hijacked airplanes on Sept. 11, 2001, Trump said, “the terrorists who attacked us thought they could incite fear and weaken our spirit. But America cannot be intimidated, and those who try will soon join the long list of vanquished enemies who dared to test our mettle.” On Tuesday, White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders said the president’s focus will be on “remembering the lives that were lost” and honoring those who “put their lives on the line to help” respond to the tragedy. The Shanksville ceremony will include the sounds of the Tower of Voices, a 93-foot-tall concrete and steel structure featuring a wind chime for each person on board with its own distinctive sound. The tower is the final phase of the 2,200-acre Flight 93 National Memorial. A visitor’s center opened three years ago; a memorial plaza was dedicated on the 10th anniversary in 2011. The 9/11 commemoration has become an annual event for presidents since President George W. Bush grabbed a bullhorn to speak to workers in the rubble of the destroyed World Trade Center.
