Ground Zero on September 11, 2026 remains one of the closest memorials America has to sacred ground. The 25th anniversary of those horrific terrorist attacks belongs to those who lost loved ones in the deadliest terrorist attack in our history which I previous addressed in my article, “Mayor Mamdani Has No Place at the September 11 Memorial This Year or Any Other”.
At the time of this writing, more than 65,000 Americans, including thousands of 9/11 family members, have signed a petition asking New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani to stay away from this year’s memorial. The petition continues to grow as more relatives make clear that his presence would dishonor the day. Most of the 9/11 community has made its position plain.
Yet a much smaller and heavily funded group is being elevated to challenge them. September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows, an organization that claims roughly a mere 250 members worldwide, has defended Mamdani and attacked the petition. Since its founding in 2002, the organization has represented a minority viewpoint within the 9/11 community. While most families and first responders supported decisive action against the terrorists who murdered their loved ones, Peaceful Tomorrows focused on opposing the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and criticizing America’s response to the attacks.
Public records show that George Soros’ far left organization, Open Society Foundations, has given $525,000 to the group since 2016. The same Soros network and its allied organizations poured tens of millions more into left wing groups whose endorsements, voter mobilization, and political groundwork helped elect Mamdani. Charles G. Wolf, who lost his wife, Katherine, on September 11, stated the matter plainly, “Anything that is backed by George Soros is illegitimate. This is George Soros and his billions of dollars trying to cause public strife in America.”
Soros has long financed efforts to reshape American politics according to an aggressively progressive vision that treats American strength as the problem and American memory as an inconvenience. A small organization with limited membership receives substantial funding and institutional amplification, while the far greater number of 9/11 families who want the memorial kept free of political controversy are dismissed or ignored. The money trail runs from Open Society Foundations to Peaceful Tomorrows and into the larger political network that helped place Mamdani in City Hall.
The left’s broader project follows the same pattern. It elevates voices that minimize the meaning of 9/11, downplay the Islamist threat and portray American self defense as the greater offense. It funds fringe organizations that claim to speak for families while tens of thousands of actual family members reject the political theater. It promotes politicians who view Ground Zero as another stage for progressive messaging rather than a place of solemn national mourning.
The side defending Mamdani’s attendance commands relatively little genuine support among those who lost the most. What it does command is money, institutional influence, and the machinery of one of the most active progressive philanthropic networks in the country. That imbalance does not alter the fundamental truth.
September 11 is not about Zohran Mamdani, progressive activists, partisan messaging, or the financiers who bankroll them. It is about the nearly 3,000 innocent Americans who never came home and the families who continue to live with that absence every day. American memory belongs to the victims and those who loved them. It does not belong to ideologues who treat that memory as an obstacle to be managed. The families have spoken with clarity, and their request deserves respect.
The same pattern recently played out at another solemn occasion. Army Sgt. Angel Sarah Rampersad, a New Yorker killed in an Iranian attack on a United States base in Jordan, was laid to rest in Queens on Friday July 31, 2026. Mamdani arrived prepared to deliver remarks, but the family did not want him speaking. He was seated in the fourth row and when it became clear that he would not be called to the podium, he reacted with visible anger. Families touched by terrorism, whether the relatives of 9/11 victims or service members killed by Iran backed forces, keep delivering the same message. They do not want this mayor intruding upon their grief.
That brings us to the money itself. George Soros did not accumulate his fortune by building products or businesses used by ordinary Americans. He made it through currency speculation, major financial wagers, and his famous 1992 short sale of the British pound which earned him more than $1 billion and helped force Britain out of the European Exchange Rate Mechanism. That capital was later transferred into the Open Society Foundations network. Soros has contributed more than $32 billion of his personal fortune to Open Society Foundations and related entities. Those foundations now control tens of billions of dollars in assets and distribute roughly $1 billion or more each year.
A documented $525,000 since 2016 has gone directly to September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows, the small organization now presented as a countervoice to the tens of thousands of 9/11 families who signed the petition. Far larger sums have flowed through the same network into progressive political infrastructure, including the Working Families Party and allied organizations whose endorsements, organizing, and voter mobilization helped elect Mamdani.
Tens of millions more have been directed over the years into progressive district attorney campaigns that prioritize social engineering over public safety, racial justice organizations associated with efforts to reduce police funding, and advocacy networks that treat American borders, military strength, and national memory as liabilities rather than assets to be defended.
The pattern is straightforward. Financial speculation produces the capital. The capital is converted into philanthropic grants. Those grants amplify a fringe 9/11 organization while financing the broader progressive apparatus that elects politicians rejected by many of the victims’ families. The result is a heavily financed minority voice presented as legitimate opposition while those who lost the most are told that their objections do not matter.
No billionaire, political organization, activist group, or mayor has the moral authority to overrule the families of the murdered. Ground Zero was consecrated by the blood of nearly 3,000 innocent Americans and by the courage of the police officers, firefighters, paramedics, and ordinary citizens who ran toward death that morning. The anniversary belongs to their memory and to the families who have carried their loss for 25 years. Mamdani should listen to them, respect their grief, and stay away. He won’t, but he should.
