New York City has a socialist mayor who handed a 9/11 ceremonial pen to a man who defended an al-Qaeda operative.
Families of the murdered are begging him to stay away from Ground Zero.
And a Fox News contributor who watched the South Tower get hit and then spent over a decade chasing killers for the FBI just put Mayor Zohran Mamdani on blast in a way that will be hard to forget.
What Parker Said on America Reports
Fox News contributor and former FBI agent Nicole Parker got emotional while railing against New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani during a discussion of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
Parker appeared on Fox News’ *America Reports* to discuss calls from those who lost loved ones in the attacks for Mamdani to stay away from the 25th anniversary remembrance ceremony.
Fox News anchor John Roberts noted that Mamdani is receiving pushback over an executive order signing where he passed off his ceremonial pen to NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch, who then handed it to Mamdani’s chief counsel, Ramzi Kassem, who once represented al-Qaeda operative Ahmed al-Darbi.
Parker recalled witnessing the 9/11 terrorist attacks and called Kassem’s presence at the signing “abhorrent.”
She didn’t hold back. Her words came out with the weight of someone who has carried that day for 25 years.
“It is abhorrent,” Parker said. “I am disgusted… I watched the South Tower get hit by an airplane. I did not see the first tower because I was still at my desk but I saw what happened. I saw people jumping. They had no better option than to jump.”
Parker also said: “For Mayor Mamdani to say that the focus is on the families and on the responders and the loved ones of those that were killed, you’re right, I agree with him on that.”
That last line is worth sitting with. Parker is not a woman given to cheap shots. She gave Mamdani credit where she could. And she still called what he did abhorrent. That tells you something about how serious the pen incident actually is.
The Pen, the Lawyer, and What It All Means
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani faced backlash after giving a ceremonial pen from a 9/11 remembrance ceremony to a top aide who once represented a convicted al-Qaeda member whose brother-in-law hijacked the plane that struck the Pentagon. Mamdani signed executive orders ahead of the 25th anniversary of the September 11 attacks, designating the date a citywide day of remembrance and service.
After signing the final order, Mamdani handed the pen to NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch and asked her to pass it to chief counsel Ramzi Kassem. Kassem previously represented Ahmed al-Darbi, who pleaded guilty to war-crime charges tied to al-Qaeda plots against commercial ships and was the brother-in-law of Khalid al-Mihdhar, one of the hijackers aboard American Airlines Flight 77, which crashed into the Pentagon, killing 184.
After signing the final document, Mamdani handed the pen to NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch and quietly asked, “Can you pass this?” Tisch passed it to Kassem, who had entered the press conference roughly 15 minutes late.
The mayor’s office offered an explanation. Kassem and his legal team actually helped write both executive orders, according to the mayor’s office. That detail did not quiet anyone down.
Families of victims did not accept the explanation either. Dennis Warchola, whose firefighter brother died in the North Tower, said: “How can you defend a guy like that who wants to do Americans or any innocent person harm?” Joyce Cohen Day, whose mother died in the South Tower, told the Washington Times that Mamdani deliberately gave a pen “to an al Qaeda lawyer.”
And that petition to keep Mamdani away from Ground Zero? A petition signed by more than 101,000 people, including families of victims, retired NYPD officers, and Port Authority police, demanded he stay away.
Mamdani also faced renewed scrutiny after a 2023 post marking the 9/11 attacks resurfaced online, in which he wrote: “Nearly 3,000 New Yorkers died on 9/11; 22 years later, the death hasn’t stopped. We mourn our neighbors who died that day. The hundreds of thousands who died in the wars that followed. The unknown millions injured and displaced. In their memory, we work toward a better world.”
Some 9/11 families called on the socialist mayor not to attend New York City’s 9/11 commemoration after he faced backlash for interviewing Hasan Piker, who in 2019 said, “America deserved 9/11.”
That is the company Mamdani keeps. That is the record he carries into Ground Zero.
Who Nicole Parker Is, and Why Her Words Cut Through
Parker did not come to this fight from a comfortable distance. In her book, she details her journey beginning with a finance career right next to the Twin Towers in New York City during the 9/11 attacks, and then her path to the FBI.
On September 11, 2001, she was working for Merrill Lynch on the top floor of the World Financial Center in New York City. She witnessed up-close the horrific deadly terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center. Her colleagues evacuated their building and were led to safety thanks to the heroic efforts of NYPD officers.
She vowed to God that she would give back and serve this great nation. That vow led her to leave a multibillion-dollar hedge fund in 2009 and apply to become an FBI special agent.
She recounts a challenging and exemplary 12-year career spent mainly on violent crime with the FBI in Miami, including mass shootings.
So when Nicole Parker says she is disgusted, that word is not a talking point. It is a verdict from someone who reorganized her entire life around the promise that what happened on that morning would never happen again.
And now the man who runs New York City handed the remembrance pen to a lawyer who spent years defending a convicted al-Qaeda operative. Mamdani did it at a ceremony he himself called a day of remembrance. He did it in front of cameras. And he did it days before showing up at Ground Zero over the objections of more than 101,000 Americans who signed a petition asking him not to come.
That is not a misunderstanding. That is a posture. And the families of the murdered see it clearly even if the mayor’s office does not.
Zohran Mamdani is a democratic socialist whose political worldview treats American foreign policy as the root of the world’s problems. He has associated with figures who have said things about September 11 that no one with any decency should let stand unchallenged. His chief counsel defended a man whose family connection to the hijackers runs directly to the Pentagon attack. These are not unrelated data points. They form a picture.
Parker’s appearance on *America Reports* cut through because she is not a partisan operative. She is a woman who left a lucrative career, trained alongside the best law enforcement officers in the country, spent over a decade chasing violent criminals, and did all of it because of what she saw from her desk at the World Financial Center on a clear September morning 25 years ago.
When someone like that gets emotional on live television, it is worth paying attention to why.
The families of the 2,977 people killed that day are not asking for much. They are asking the man who runs their city to show enough basic respect to stay away from a ceremony meant to honor the dead. That is not a complicated request. And the fact that Mamdani appears determined to attend anyway, over the explicit objections of the victims’ families, tells a story about his values that no amount of executive order language can paper over.
Nicole Parker said she is disgusted. She earned the right to say it. And a lot of Americans watching that segment felt exactly the same way.
Sources: Mediaite, “I Am Disgusted! Fox News Contributor Who Joined FBI Due to 9/11 Gets Emotional While Railing Against Zohran Mamdani”; Fox News, “Mamdani Under Fire After Symbolic 9/11 Pen Goes to Former al-Qaeda Defense Lawyer”; Fox News, “Ex-FBI Special Agent Makes Plea to Mamdani Ahead of 9/11 Anniversary”; Legal Insurrection, “Mamdani’s 9/11 Pen Goes to Lawyer for al-Qaeda Operative”; Daily Caller, “Mamdani Signs 9/11 Order Recognizing Day of Remembrance, Then Hands Symbolic Pen to al-Qaida Lawyer”; Fox News, “Why I Left the FBI,” by Nicole Parker; Fox News contributor biography, Nicole Parker.
