9/11 families will ask a federal appeals court to order release of documents they say link Saudi Arabia to the attacks, faulting years of official secrecy.
Families of Sept. 11 victims are expected Wednesday to ask a federal appeals court to order the U.S. government to release materials they say connect the Saudi Arabian government to the plot that hijacked airplanes and crashed them into New York and Washington, D.C.
ABC News reported the planned request comes as relatives continue to press for full disclosure of what the government still holds back a generation after the attacks.
The decision on whether to declassify more records ultimately rests with President Donald Trump. A White House spokesperson told ABC News last month the administration is already working the request.
"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."
That answer stands in contrast to the record families describe from prior years.
At this year’s 9/11 commemoration in New York, with past presidents present, several relatives faulted the U.S. government for keeping the materials secret. Terry Strada, widow of victim Tom Strada, put the charge directly.
"Administration after administration, including leaders in front of us here today, chose to protect the Saudis instead of standing with the 9/11 families,"
Strada’s line captured the core complaint: successive governments chose alliance management over sunlight for the people who lost husbands, wives, parents, and children.
Evidence already released in a related lawsuit traces the activities of Omar al Bayoumi, a Saudi national who had been living in California. Families say he was a Saudi intelligence asset and that he assisted at least two of the hijackers.
The FBI has long noted that many of the 9/11 hijackers were Saudi nationals, with others from the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, and Lebanon. That basic fact has never settled the harder question of whether any official Saudi channel aided the plot.
Saudi Arabia has repeatedly denied facilitating the attacks. In court, the Saudis replied that they remain an ally of the United States and a sworn enemy of Al Qaeda.
they remain "an ally of the United States [and] a sworn enemy of Al Qaeda."
Families are not asking a court to revise history on the spot. They are asking it to force the government to stop sitting on the paper. The appeals court filing expected Wednesday is the next step in that fight.
What the withheld documents actually show remains untested in public. Families say the files tie the Saudi government to the hijacking plot. Riyadh says it had no such role. The government still holds the material. Trump’s team says it is locating what is responsive.
For the widows, widowers, and children still waiting, process language is not the same as production. They have heard promises before. They want the records out where the country can read them.
Taxpayers and victims’ families should not have to beg for the truth about who helped murder nearly 3,000 Americans on their own soil.
