Some family members of 9/11 victims used the 25th anniversary ceremonies to openly call on the federal government to hold Saudi Arabia accountable for the attacks.
During the ceremonial reading of the names at ground zero Friday, Terry Strada, the widow of 9/11 victim Tom Strada, received cheers after she admonished prior administrations, including the past presidents seated before her, for failing to get answers about the Saudi government’s alleged role in the attacks.
“Administration after administration, including leaders in front of us here today, chose to protect the Saudis instead of standing with the 9/11 families,” she said.
Terry Strada, whose husband, Tom, died at the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, said that she and other people who lost family members still hope a trial will someday happen.
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A coalition of victims’ families are suing the Saudi government over their alleged role and have continued to pursue evidence they say points to deep Saudi complicity. The Saudis deny that claim and are fighting the suit in court.
Many of the 9/11 hijackers were Saudi nationals, according to the FBI.
The Saudis have repeatedly denied having any role in facilitating the attacks and replied in court that they remain “an ally of the United States [and] a sworn enemy of Al Qaeda.”
White House spokesperson Anna Kelly told ABC News last week that “President Trump is leading the most transparent administration in history, and his team is working diligently to identify records that are responsive to these families’ request.”
Terry Strada, National chair of the group 9/11 Families United, poses near her husband’s name on the memorial on the 25th anniversary of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Sept. 11, 2026, in New York.
Adam Gray/AP Photo
Strada, the national chair of the advocacy group 9/11 Families United, said that presidential administrations broke “promises both public and private … it has been one betrayal after another.”
President Donald Trump “can still change that,” she added.
“Tell the Saudis to stop lying,” she said. “Tell them if they want to be friends with the USA they cannot continue to deny all of this — all of the pain, all of the destruction that we have all been suffering through.”
Trump attended a ceremony at the Pentagon at the time of the Manhattan ceremony. Strada urged Vice President JD Vance, who attended the ceremony, to “carry that message back” to Washington.
“How can it be, 25 years, and still we have no justice for the role Saudi Arabia played in your murder?” Strada asked as many attendees applauded in approval.
Strada wasn’t the only family member who called on Trump to provide more scrutiny of the Saudi government.
A nephew of 9/11 victim Lisa Marie Terry also brought up the alleged Saudi involvement in the attacks after he finished reading some of the names.
“President Trump, you are our last hope. Release the unredacted files that implicate Saudi Arabia while what’s left of the victims’ families are still alive to see it,” he said to cheers.
In statement released Friday afternoon, a White House spokesperson said, “President Trump is leading the most transparent administration in history, which is why he authorized the declassification and release of hundreds of pages of documents related to the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001.”
“The President will always pay tribute to the American heroes we lost in the tragic September 11 attacks, their beautiful family members, and to the acts of heroism that defined that fateful day when the unbreakable spirit of the American people prevailed,” the statement said.
On Friday, the CIA released 71 presidential briefs related to the 9/11 attacks, ranging in dates from 1998 to Sept. 12, 2001.
Mourners pause as they stand at the memorial during a ceremony commemorating the 25th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks at the National September 11 Memorial in New York, Friday, Sept. 11, 2026.
Spencer Platt/Pool via AP
“The products trace the story of CIA analysts’ evolving understanding of al-Qa’ida and efforts to highlight and warn of Osama Bin Ladin’s attack plotting despite sparse, vague, and imperfect information,” the agency said in a statement.
Brett Eagleson, the president of 9/11 Justice, the coalition of victims’ families suing the Saudi government over its alleged role in the attacks, welcomed the documents’ release but pointed out that the records omit key documents they’ve requested as part of their suit.
Most notably missing are phone records belonging to Omar al Bayoumi, a Saudi national, Eagleson said in a statement. According to a lawsuit filed by the some of the 9/11 families, Bayoumi allegedly provided logistical and financial support to two of the hijackers.
“Families have asked both past and current administrations to release the records that will help expose the full truth,” Eagleson said.
“It is time for the Trump administration and Congress to do their part in helping the 9/11 Families get the justice we have fought for by holding the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia accountable for its proven role in the attacks that changed all of our lives so deeply and irreparably 25 years ago,” he added.
Terry Strada who lost her husband Tom Strada, stands with others who lost loved ones in the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks listens during a press conference about the September 11th Transparency Act on Capitol Hill August 5, 2021, in Washington.
Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images
In July, New York Republican Rep. Nicole Malliotakis, joined by Democratic Reps. Dan Goldman and Jerry Nadler, wrote a letter to a little-known but powerful advisory panel called the Public Interest Declassification Board, housed within the National Archives. It carries the power to consider requests for sensitive government secrets and make recommendations to the president about whether to declassify them.
The lawmakers’ request, sent at the behest of the 9/11 families, bemoaned the “repeated obstacles” attorneys for the families have faced “in obtaining access to these materials from U.S. law enforcement and intelligence agencies.”
Attorneys for the families believe those records could help them better understand the timing and nature of 9/11 hijackers’ communications and key events in the hijackers’ planning of the attacks.
The board responded weeks later, writing that it was “actively engaged in interagency consultations to determine what equities, if any, may remain in relation to these records.” It urged patience as “those discussions continue.”
The U.S. has long been a strategic partner with the Saudi Arabia for decades.
Trump has had a close relationship with the Saudi government in both of his terms and last November invited Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to the White House for a state visit. It was the first time MBS visited the U.S. in seven years.
Trump defended MBS when he was asked by ABC News chief White House correspondent Mary Bruce about the anger from 9/11 families over the visit.
“As far as this gentleman is concerned, he’s done a phenomenal job,” Trump said of the prince.
President Donald Trump meets Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in the Oval Office of the White House, Nov. 18, 2025, in Washington.
Evan Vucci/AP
MBS responded, “I feel painful about families of 9/11 in America, but we have to focus on reality.”
The prince alleged that Osama bin Laden used Saudis to destroy the relationship between the kingdom and the United States.
“We’ve been working to prove [bin Laden] wrong and continuing developing our nation. It is critical for the safety of the world,” he said.
-ABC News’ Cindy Smith and Nicholas Kerr contributed to this report.