New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani handed a ceremonial pen to a lawyer who once represented the brother-in-law of a Pentagon hijacker.
The pen, used to sign two 9/11-related executive orders at a City Hall event on September 4, went to Mamdani’s chief counsel, Ramzi Kassem. The gesture drew swift public backlash from 9/11 family members and elected officials.
The signing itself was solemn in purpose. The first order established September 11 as an official citywide Day of Remembrance and Service, calling for a moment of silence and coordinated community activities. The second updated government emergency preparedness protocols, revising measures that had not been touched since 2007. Fire Commissioner Lillian Bonsignore, NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch, and other senior officials attended the event.
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According to a report, Kassem arrived at the Blue Room roughly 15 minutes into the press conference. After signing the orders, Mamdani handed the pen to Tisch and asked her to pass it along. She gave it to Kassem. Video from the event captured the exchange. The mayor’s office later confirmed that Kassem and his team had drafted both executive orders as part of his role. Kassem did not comment publicly.
Kassem, 48, is a professor at CUNY School of Law. He previously directed legal clinics representing Muslim, Arab, and South Asian communities, as well as individuals held in U.S. national-security cases. Among his clients was Ahmed al-Darbi, a Saudi national whom Kassem began representing in 2008, serving as lead civilian defense counsel.
Al-Darbi was captured in Azerbaijan in June 2002, held at Bagram Air Base, then transferred to Guantanamo Bay later that year. In 2014, he pleaded guilty before a military commission to conspiracy, terrorism, attacking civilian objects, and aiding the enemy. The charges stemmed from his role in planning and supporting an al-Qaeda operation targeting oil tankers, including the October 2002 bombing of the French-flagged MV Limburg off the coast of Yemen. That attack killed one crew member and injured others. Al-Darbi was already in U.S. custody when the bombing occurred. Under a plea agreement, he provided extensive cooperation to American authorities and was transferred to Saudi custody in 2018 to finish his sentence through a rehabilitation program.
Al-Darbi is the brother-in-law of Khalid al-Mihdhar, one of the five hijackers aboard American Airlines Flight 77, the plane that struck the Pentagon on September 11, 2001. U.S. officials disclosed the family connection publicly when charges against al-Darbi were announced in 2007. Kassem has also represented other Guantanamo detainees and, more recently, Columbia University activist Mahmoud Khalil.
The pen presentation, at an event meant to honor the victims of September 11, became the flashpoint for criticism directed at the mayor.
