Witness History
Witness History
With the president on 9/11
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October 30, 2020
10 minutes
Available for over a year
On September 11 2001, President George W. Bush was visiting an elementary school in Florida as two planes hit the World Trade Center. In an image that would become iconic, the White House chief of staff, Andrew Card, broke the news to the president by whispering in his ear as he listened to schoolchildren practising their reading. In interviews from 2011, Andrew Card recalls the moment that transformed President Bush’s presidency and the course of recent history.
PHOTO: President George W. Bush shortly after learning of the 9/11 attacks (AFP/Getty Images)