ABC, CBS Skip President Trump Awarding Posthumous Medal of Freedom to 9/11 Hero

Ahead of the Republican midterm convention, President Trump held a moving event at the White House Ellipse to honor those murdered nearly 25 years ago on September 11, 2001, by radical Islamic terrorists. As part of that, he awarded a posthumous Presidential Medal of Freedom to Welles Crowther, the man known as “the man in the red bandana” who rescued over a dozen souls from the World Trade Center’s South Tower.

But none of that mattered to ABC and CBS as their flagship morning and evening newscasts ignored both the event and the award accepted by Welles’s mother and one of his sisters.

Tuesday’s NBC Nightly News ended with a full report about the President’s decision to honor Crowther.

Here was how anchor Tom Llamas led into correspondent Aaron Gilchrist’s conversation with his mother, Allison:

Finally tonight, as we mark 25 years since the September 11th attacks, we were remembering the bravery and courage from that day, including the man in the red bandana, credited with saving more than a dozen lives. His identity was originally a mystery. Now 25 years later, he’s been awarded one of the nation’s highest honors, and his mother is telling Aaron Gilchrist what it all means.

Gilchrist explained to the unaware that Crowther “was one of the heroes who emerged on one of the nation’s darkest days” when “[t]he equities trader and volunteer firefighter rescued 18 people at the cost of his own life.” 

In the short-term following the attacks, his heroics were anonymous until his mother heard of stories from survivors about a man in the South Tower wearing a red bandana, his trademark look since he was a young boy (click “expand”):

GILCHRIST: He was one of the heroes who emerged on one of the nation’s darkest days. Welles Crowther was 24 years old, working in the South Tower of the World Trade Center when the planes hit. [SIRENS] The equities trader and volunteer firefighter rescued 18 people at the cost of his own life. [APPLAUSE] President Trump today paying tribute to that bravery.

TRUMP: The highest civilian honor, the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

GILCHRIST: Welles’s mother, Allison, receiving the posthumous honor. [TO CROWTHER] What does your son receiving that medal, mean to you?

ALLISON CROWTHER: Oh, it’s a huge honor.

GILCHRIST: Today, a simple red bandana connects Allison to her son. He had one growing up, and in 2001, kept one tied around his wallet.

CROWTHER: I said, “Wells, are you still carrying that thing? You’re working on Wall Street now.”

GILCHRIST: Like thousands, Welles didn’t come home on 9/11. When his remains were recovered in 2002, Allison could bury her son, but she still was desperate to know what happened to him. Then, she found a newspaper article with a familiar detail.

CROWTHER: This mysterious man wearing a red bandana, a red handkerchief, going around, putting up small fires, saying, you know, stand up, if you can stand, stand up now. If you can help others do so, follow me, I know the way.” And I said, “Welles, there you are.”

Gilchrist even spoke with one of the people Crowther saved that day (click “expand”):

GILCHRIST: Kelly Reyher was in a South Tower elevator when the second plane struck. Badly burned, he remembers crawling into a smoke-filled lobby and hearing a clear, commanding voice through the darkness.

KELLY REYHER: I remember him being in the stairwell and calling everyone to the stairwell and opening the door to the stairwell and saying, “The stairwell is here.” Oh, heeding that advice is what saved me.’"

GILCHRIST: Welles used his red bandana to shield his face from the smoke as he went back and forth, helping more people.

Allison Crowther said he’s “so proud of him” and “it’s the price of greatness, losing him, but I’m — I’ll always be so proud of him.”

Wednesday’s Today tacked on a little under a minute about the 9/11 event to a story about the midterms convention.

However, Capitol Hill correspondent Ryan Nobles framed it through the lens of the liberal, elitist media’s latest attempt to “fact-check” the President: “President Trump is drawing criticism for comments he made about September 11th, just days ahead of the 25th anniversary of the attacks.”

Of course, the relevant portion wasn’t played uninterrupted (or in totality):

TRUMP: I took the whole crew down there right after this happened.

NOBLES: The President suggesting that he was pulled from a building near Ground Zero that firefighters were worried might collapse.

TRUMP: We thought it was coming down on top of us, and two firemen, big, strong guys — and I’m not the smallest guy in the world — they grabbed me under the arms. They got to get out of here, and they literally lifted me up.

Nobles added the President “later clarifying that he was not at Ground Zero on September 11, writing in a social media post, ‘I was there, obviously not on the same day as the collapse, but shortly thereafter,’ adding ‘everything I said was exactly accurate.’”

Only then did Nobles bring up Crowther and the venue for said remarks about the 9/11 aftermath: “The President made the comments at an event honoring 9/11 first responders, including volunteer firefighter Welles Crowther, who saved 18 people before losing his life. He was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom.”

To see the relevant NBC transcripts from September 8 and 9, click here and here.