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Just days before the 25th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks, New York City has released a trove of previously undisclosed documents suggesting government efforts to downplay – or even mislead – residents about dangerous air quality following the attacks.
At a news conference on Tuesday, Mayor Zohran Mamdani announced the publication of 170,000 pages concerning health issues following the collapse of two skyscrapers in the World Trade Center complex, known as the Twin Towers.
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Mamdani said the effort would deliver “accountability around city government’s response to September 11 that New Yorkers have been denied for years”.
His remarks reinforced long-running suspicions that leaders in the United States prematurely allowed workers and residents back into area around Lower Manhattan where the towers fell.
“It would be one thing if government had stood alongside survivors and provided them with everything they needed at every step of the way. And yet, we know that could not be further from what actually happened,” Mamdani said.
“People got sick because the leaders they trusted lied and told them they were safe to breathe in toxic air.”
During the September 11 attacks, the Twin Towers were struck by two hijacked planes, leading to their collapse and the deaths of 2,753 people on site. The destruction sent a cloud of dust across Lower Manhattan. Fires burned in the rubble for months.
Thousands of police officers, firefighters and construction workers spent time working in the soot, often without proper protection.
Within weeks of the collapse, employees and residents were also allowed to return to nearby buildings, including One Liberty Plaza, which had sustained damage during the attacks.
But many of those who worked or lived around the site, known as “Ground Zero”, have seen their health decline in the years since. Some developed respiratory or digestive-system ailments that appeared almost immediately. Others have fallen victim to illnesses that developed over time, including cancer.
The rubble of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, in New York [File: Alexandre Fuchs/AFP]What’s in the documents?
Tuesday’s release includes a document sent in October 2001 to then-Deputy Mayor Robert Harding, detailing the city’s potential legal exposure after the 9/11 attacks.
The so-called Harding Memo shows officials anticipated as many as 10,000 lawsuits against the city over issues such as “toxic exposure” due to the poor air quality and “faulty” safety equipment.
The Harding Memo also outlined means through which the city could “limit” its liability, including by appealing to Congress to create a fund for victims and requesting indemnification from the US government.
Another memo, released in February 2002, detailed how officials worried that criticism from US Representative Jerry Nadler could open the city up to “major public relations problems” and a “barrage of lawsuits”.
Ester Fuchs, a former special adviser to then-Mayor Rudy Giuliani, pointed to statements from Nadler accusing the government of quashing documents that “showed higher than acceptable levels of asbestos” in the area around the attack.
Fuchs went on to acknowledge that “there is at least a low level of asbestos in the dust in many buildings in lower Manhattan”. She suggested that, if Nadler’s accusations were correct, the city needed to act.
Asbestos, a mineral used in the construction of the Twin Towers, is also a known carcinogen, linked to scarring of the lungs and mesothelioma, a type of cancer.
“At the least, we should discontinue telling people to clean their apartments with wet mops and rags,” Fuchs wrote, referencing guidance the city had previously released.
Why are the documents being released now?
In the months following the attacks, city and federal officials repeatedly reassured residents, workers and first responders that air-quality levels were safe.
But questions about what – and when – the government knew about air contaminants have persisted in the years after.
The release of Tuesday’s documents addresses a lawsuit brought by advocacy groups like 9/11 Health Watch, which sought to bring to light records about public health after the attacks.
Mamdani highlighted that multi-year legal battle during his remarks on Tuesday, slamming past city governments for failing to act in the public interest.
“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.”
The mayor promised more documents would be shared over the next year, suggesting there could be “millions” of additional pages to come.
Appearing alongside Mamdani were survivors and victims advocates, including comedian Jon Stewart.
Stewart paid tribute to the survivors who fought for government transparency while also battling severe medical conditions.
“I’m not saying that the information may have changed the outcomes, unfortunately, for their families,” Stewart said.
“But I guarantee you it would not have been the struggle that it was to get people to recognise that what they all knew and what we all knew who live in downtown Manhattan: that there was poison in the air and on the ground.”
In a statement, 9/11 Health Watch also praised the records’ release, thanking labour unions, community groups and others for their advocacy work.
“For 25 years, four different Mayoral administrations kept from the public, the U.S. Congress, and the City Council documents showing what the City actually knew about the danger of the toxic chemicals in Lower Manhattan and Western Brooklyn,” Benjamin Chevat, the group’s executive director, said.
He underscored that, even as city officials knew of the dangers, they “continued messaging to the public that the air was ‘safe and acceptable’.”
Comedian Jon Stewart speaks on Tuesday during a news conference on the release of documents related to health conditions facing 9/11 survivors and emergency responders [Michael M Santiago/Getty Images via AFP]How many people were affected?
Nearly 3,000 people died in New York on September 11, 2001, which involved four hijacked planes in total. One hit the Pentagon in Washington, DC, while another crashed into a Pennsylvania field after passengers fought the hijackers.
In the decades since, roughly 4,343 victims have died from illnesses related to the event, according to the World Trade Center Health Program.
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates 400,000 people were exposed to toxic contaminants, stressful conditions and situations that put them at risk of physical injury as a result of the attacks.
Mamdani called Tuesday’s document release “the right thing to do”, though it is likely to trigger a wave of new lawsuits against the city for withholding information.
“We hold an obligation each of those New Yorkers to ensure that ‘never forget’ is not just a platitude, but that it is something material,” Mamdani said, citing a common phrase evoked after the 9/11 attack.
Stewart, meanwhile, said the release isn’t just about exposing what the local government knew. It also marks the start of ensuring victims have better access to healthcare moving forward.
“There’s more work to be done,” he said.
