Nearly twenty-five years after 9/11, the families of the victims are still waiting for justice. The president of the United States said in a dramatic speech at the White House that the families of those killed on September 11, 2001, "should have to wait no longer" and that "we have a duty to bring those responsible for these crimes to justice." But that was not Joe Biden in 2022, or Donald Trump in 2017, or even Barack Obama in 2012-- it was George W. Bush in 2006. While most of America has moved on through four presidential administrations while images of those devastating attacks fade from memory, the families of 9/11 are still waiting for some kind of accountability. Since that devastating day, there has not been one conviction of anyone involved in planning or facilitating the attacks. Five "high value detainees" with direct connections to the plot have been at Guantanamo for years, but all they've had are preliminary hearings and delays. Part of the challenge is that many of their confessions were obtained under torture at CIA "black sites" overseas between 2002-2006. Moreover, there has been no true assessment of Saudi complicity, even though 15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudis, and it is clear that several Saudi operatives in the U.S. assisted some of the hijackers when they got here. Did they do so officially? Under orders? That's still undetermined, but there's a mountain of circumstantial evidence. The families are so exasperated that they've filed a lawsuit against the kingdom. Justice for the Forgotten Families of 9/11 is about the quest for justice by the families of the victims a quarter-century after the worst terrorist attack in US history.
Tom McMillan, a retired sports PR executive and lifelong student of history, has served on the board of trustees of Pittsburgh's Heinz History Center, the board of directors of Friends of Flight 93 National Memorial, the board of directors of the Antietam Institute, and the marketing committee of the Gettysburg Foundation. McMillan has written four books on U.S. history--ranging from the Battle of Gettysburg to September 11th to the Star-Spangled Banner--and regularly gives book talks throughout the Northeast and Midwest. After graduating with a journalism degree from Point Park University in Pittsburgh, PA, McMillan worked for forty-three years in media and communications, including ten years as a sportswriter for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and twenty-five years as VP/Communications for the Pittsburgh Penguins of the National Hockey League (his name is on the 2009 Stanley Cup, and he has three championship rings). Tom and his wife, Colleen, reside in Pittsburgh and Gettysburg, PA. They also volunteer as ambassadors at Antietam National Battlefield.
