Obama Stands Alone As 9/11 Families Demand Justice

New York City Mayor Bill De Blasio is the latest in a string of high profile politicians to express support for a bill allowing family members of 9/11 victims to sue Saudi Arabia in U.S. courts, the Daily News reports. President Obama is scheduled to visit the country, which is deep in turmoil over falling oil prices and the encroaching militant threat of ISIS, on Wednesday. The hope is that the talks will smooth over troubled relations between the two nations.

Democratic presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders have also come out for the bill. Along with Senator Chuck Schumer, Clinton pressured President Obama to “take a hard look” at declassifying the twenty-eight pages of the 9/11 Commission Report which are thought to shed light on Saudi complicity. The Saudi government has threatened economic consequences should the bill pass.

Meanwhile, Obama’s deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes fanned the flames when he admitted earlier today on a podcast to David Axelrod that “a lot of the money, the seed money if you will, for what became Al Qaeda, came out of Saudi Arabia.” Rhodes did not accuse Saudi Arabia of intentionally funding terrorists, but admitted that it was “complicated.”