In the aftermath of the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, New York City leaders lied to the people who’d just been traumatized.
Newly released documents show city officials knew the air quality around the city after the attack was more dangerous than they told the public. Most notably, the air was reportedly unsafe to breathe.
Mayor Zohran Mamdani made the announcement Tuesday as he released the 170,000 documents.
“These are documents that show what the city knew about the toxic air around Ground Zero, when they knew it, and how they acted to limit liability,” Mamdani said.
New documents
The records noted the presence of asbestos and other hazardous materials. Inhaling asbestos, a common insulation used as recently as the 1980s, causes lung cancer.
The collapse of the towers released massive amounts of dust containing asbestos, metals, concrete, glass and other potentially harmful particles.
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“People got sick because the leaders they trusted lied and told them they were safe to breathe in toxic air,” Mamdani said.
One of the documents highlighted in the records is an October 2001 correspondence known as the “Harding memo.” It warned a city deputy mayor about potential lawsuits involving exposure to poor air quality and unsafe working conditions around Ground Zero.
“The city began covering their ass three weeks in, in a memo,” Jon Stewart, comedian and activist, said at the announcement. “The memo is Legislative Alternatives to the fiscal responsibility for 9/11.”
That document was previously dealt with in litigation but is now public for every New Yorker to see.
“The document describes discussions that the Giuliani administration was having about liability and health hazards,” Steve Banks, NYC Corporation Counsel, said.
Another memo discussed in the announcement came from Rep. Jerrold Nadler in February 2002.
He shared concerns about how asbestos was being handled in Lower Manhattan and that levels of the toxic chemical were present in many different buildings.
“My colleagues and I who represented ground zero and the surrounding communities immediately warned local and federal officials about the health risks posed by the toxins in the air,” Nadler said during the announcement. “I was screaming at the top of my lungs to protect our communities, my constituents. But officials like EPA administrator Christine Todd Whitman and Mayor Giuliani denied claims like mine, saying the air was perfectly safe.”
9/11 health issues
More than 2,700 people died in New York City when the planes hit those towers and subsequently collapsed.
However, the death toll from that terror attack is thousands more from illnesses obtained on that day, according to Mamdani.
At least 140,000 people, including those from all 50 states, have enrolled in the World Trade Center Health Program, which provides medical monitoring and treatment to responders, survivors and others who developed health conditions linked to exposure from the 9/11 disaster.
Some 49,000 of them have already been diagnosed with cancer related to their exposure that day. Some of them went to work at the site more than half a year after the attacks.
“We know that there were people, for instance, who went back to work in the Municipal Building after May 30th and the Municipal Building hadn’t been cleaned up and it was very dusty and a lot of the people who went to work there have come down with many different cancers,” Nadler said.
What’s next?
Several lawsuits have already been filed over this issue. The settlement of one of those is why these documents were released in the first place.
“Administration after administration has ignored those calling for answers and clarity, instead choosing to bury them in legal arguments and in red tape,” Mamdani said. “We will do no such thing as we mark 25 years. It is time for this painful chapter to end.”
City officials said more documents would come out over the next year.
As this information comes out, the city is also spending money to ensure people have access to it.
“As part of our commitment to a governmental transparency that has too long been absent, city hall has made a more than $34 million commitment to create a new public portal providing information about our city’s response to the horrific attack,” Mamdani said.
