Latest / Sid & Friends In The Morning / Giovanni Galante & Charles Wolf | 9/11 Widowers Update Listeners on Petition Attempting to Bar Mamdani from Ground Zero
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: Bruce Blakeman, did you not work for the Port Authority
- 0:02Speaker 1: at one point?
- 0:02Speaker 2: I know you did.
- 0:04Speaker 3: I was a commissioner of the Port Authority of New
- 0:06Speaker 3: York and New Jersey for eight years.
- 0:09Speaker 1: Eight years the Port Authority. So this is gonna hit
- 0:13Speaker 1: close to home for you. We're about to commemorate twenty
- 0:16Speaker 1: five years. I know you listen to me every day.
- 0:18Speaker 1: I am beating this drama. I had Bill Donnie you
- 0:22Speaker 1: want from the Catholic League. He's written a long letter
- 0:24Speaker 1: urging Mamdanie not to come nine to eleven. I brought
- 0:28Speaker 1: on survivors, victims, the families. I brought on the guy
- 0:31Speaker 1: that started the petition. I'm bringing on another lady. I
- 0:34Speaker 1: am on a mission to keep this mayor away.
- 0:37Speaker 2: Now.
- 0:37Speaker 1: I know I can't do it, and I know the
- 0:39Speaker 1: odds are stacked against me, but I also know that
- 0:42Speaker 1: the overwhelming majority, not even the overwhelming majority of nine
- 0:48Speaker 1: to eleven families, don't want this anti American mayor there.
- 0:52Speaker 1: So I'm not asking you whether you think he'll come
- 0:55Speaker 1: or not, or if you a governor, if you would
- 0:57Speaker 1: stop him from coming or not. I want, as a
- 0:59Speaker 1: guy that work with a port authority who lost people
- 1:02Speaker 1: that day. I want you to tell me, do you
- 1:04Speaker 1: think the mayor should show up?
- 1:07Speaker 3: Well, first of all, said, I don't know if you
- 1:09Speaker 3: know this or not, but my nephew was murdered on
- 1:12Speaker 3: that day. No, Sergeant Tommy Jurgens, my sister Linder's older boy,
- 1:17Speaker 3: the oldest boy. I'm twenty six years old, Army veteran,
- 1:21Speaker 3: volunteer firefighter, New York State Court officer, was giving first
- 1:25Speaker 3: day to a woman who was severely burned in Tower
- 1:28Speaker 3: two when it collapsed on him. We never got a
- 1:31Speaker 3: body or DNA. We only got his side arm and
- 1:33Speaker 3: his badge. So it's very personal to me. I am
- 1:37Speaker 3: a family member and I don't think zorn Mundanmi should go.
- 1:43Speaker 3: It's as if you know someone's having a wake and
- 1:46Speaker 3: they asked you not to go to the wake for
- 1:49Speaker 3: personal reasons, you wouldn't go. So I mean, I don't
- 1:53Speaker 3: think he should go. But here's where I'm going to say.
- 1:56Speaker 3: If he's hell bent on going, I think people have
- 1:59Speaker 3: a way to respectfully protest that. Turn your back on him,
- 2:05Speaker 3: don't say anything to him, don't make a ruckus be
- 2:11Speaker 3: solemn because it is a solemn day. Just turn your
- 2:15Speaker 3: back on.
- 2:15Speaker 1: Him the courageous man that started the petition to keep
- 2:19Speaker 1: the mayor away. His wife Grace twenty nine years old,
- 2:23Speaker 1: murdered that day, and a friend of his name, Charles Wolf.
- 2:26Speaker 1: I think Grace worked the Cannipitzgerald. His friend Charles wolf Wolf,
- 2:31Speaker 1: who's a love Your wife, Catherine, was also murdered that day.
- 2:35Speaker 1: She wrote at Marsh Emma Clennan. So with that said, Giovanni, Charles,
- 2:41Speaker 1: welcome to the show. How are you guys today?
- 2:44Speaker 2: Good morning, great, thanks for having me on.
- 2:46Speaker 3: You got it.
- 2:46Speaker 1: Let me start with you for a second. Giovanni, when
- 2:48Speaker 1: you came on the show a couple of weeks ago
- 2:51Speaker 1: and I was humbled. You said, you try to reach
- 2:53Speaker 1: out to me when you started this petition, so thank
- 2:55Speaker 1: you for that.
- 2:55Speaker 2: I think you had.
- 2:56Speaker 1: About fourteen thousand signatures. The next day you had about five,
- 3:00Speaker 1: and last I heard, you were closer to ninety. What
- 3:03Speaker 1: is the actual number on the petition right now?
- 3:07Speaker 2: It's eighty one nine and fifty two I believe, And
- 3:11Speaker 2: when we spoke, I only had about fifteen hundred two thousand.
- 3:16Speaker 2: You didn't give you enough enough credit for your your
- 3:19Speaker 2: listeners and the support that I've gotten. They love you.
- 3:24Speaker 2: They love this petition. I have to say. I called
- 3:28Speaker 2: you back and I said, I want to come on
- 3:29Speaker 2: the show, and I want to thank everyone that sent
- 3:32Speaker 2: me emails, everyone that signed the petition, and everyone that's
- 3:36Speaker 2: sharing it. They've been great. I got to say, your
- 3:39Speaker 2: audience is spectacular.
- 3:41Speaker 1: Ah, thank you. Wow, they're real Americans.
- 3:45Speaker 2: Go ahead, I'm sorry, No, no, thank you.
- 3:47Speaker 1: They're real Americans, are patriots, and they love you, and
- 3:49Speaker 1: they you know, they love Grace and you know the
- 3:52Speaker 1: same thing I've never told to you before, Charles. This
- 3:55Speaker 1: will be the first time. Obviously. My heart goes out
- 3:58Speaker 1: to you, and God rest your build a wife, Catherine Sole.
- 4:01Speaker 1: I'm devastating. I'm gonna ask you some of the same
- 4:03Speaker 1: questions I asked my friend Giovanni here. Some of them
- 4:07Speaker 1: will be a little difficult, I'm warning you now, But
- 4:10Speaker 1: take me back to that, Yeah, take me back to
- 4:12Speaker 1: that horrible morning coming up on twenty five years and
- 4:16Speaker 1: nine to eleven. Where were you and what were you
- 4:18Speaker 1: doing when you figured out that Catherine was not coming home?
- 4:22Speaker 4: Well, I live in Lower Manhattan. I live in Greenwich Villege,
- 4:26Speaker 4: the historic district of Greenwish Village on Bleaker Street and
- 4:30Speaker 4: she had left her work. She'd Interestingly enough, she did
- 4:34Speaker 4: express the fact that her mind is not at ease
- 4:38Speaker 4: that morning.
- 4:39Speaker 1: And yes, you know why that was the case. You
- 4:42Speaker 1: know why what she was referring to it not.
- 4:44Speaker 4: Then, but I do now. My wife had a tendency
- 4:49Speaker 4: to be a prescient In other words, she could decide
- 4:56Speaker 4: to do something and against all odds, it would happen.
- 4:59Speaker 4: She kind of well, she actually had a dream the
- 5:03Speaker 4: night that she accepted the position at Marsha McLennan, which
- 5:07Speaker 4: which was in the like the two Thursds of the
- 5:10Speaker 4: way through August. She had a dream and she told
- 5:14Speaker 4: me about the dream, and she wrote it down and
- 5:16Speaker 4: I found that book in January of two and it
- 5:20Speaker 4: is a prophetic dream about the attacks themselves. Oh my god,
- 5:25Speaker 4: I want to go into any more of that, but
- 5:27Speaker 4: at this point, but yeah, she has she had she
- 5:31Speaker 4: was prescient, I guess didn't really know it until after
- 5:35Speaker 4: the fact and found this book. But she uh, you know,
- 5:38Speaker 4: we live in a small studio apartment, uh hit the
- 5:42Speaker 4: corner of Bleaker and Thompson Streets in the village, and
- 5:46Speaker 4: I had turned off the television so I could get
- 5:48Speaker 4: some work done because I work from home, and she said,
- 5:51Speaker 4: would you mind turning the TV back on?
- 5:54Speaker 2: Please?
- 5:55Speaker 4: My mind is not at ease. I had never heard
- 5:58Speaker 4: her say that, and we've been together for thirteen years.
- 6:01Speaker 4: So she went to work, and I happened to be
- 6:05Speaker 4: a pilot, just a private pilot, not an airline or
- 6:07Speaker 4: a jet pilot, just a private you know, four seater,
- 6:10Speaker 4: six seater propeller plane. And I know I've been to
- 6:13Speaker 4: a lot of air shows and so forth in my years.
- 6:16Speaker 4: And I heard the plane fly over, and instantly I
- 6:19Speaker 4: knew it was a twin engine plane at full throttle.
- 6:22Speaker 4: And then I hit it hurt. I heard it hit
- 6:25Speaker 4: the building, but I didn't know what it hit the
- 6:27Speaker 4: building because I faced the other direction. My little balcony
- 6:32Speaker 4: faces uptown rather than downtown. But it flew directly over
- 6:35Speaker 4: our building. And then I ran down into the street
- 6:39Speaker 4: and saw the gash in the building, and it all
- 6:41Speaker 4: went from there. I ended up calling the FBI to
- 6:45Speaker 4: tell them that was no accident, because I knew it
- 6:47Speaker 4: was deliberate. And so that's what happened that morning.
- 6:53Speaker 1: Did you have a chance I know? For example, how
- 6:55Speaker 1: what Lutnik has become a friend of mine was with
- 6:57Speaker 1: President Trump. His brother was able to make a call
- 7:00Speaker 1: before he died.
- 7:01Speaker 4: That day in that the plane hit well, first of all,
- 7:04Speaker 4: I know Howard very well, and he and his sister
- 7:07Speaker 4: and I did a lot of post nine to eleven work.
- 7:11Speaker 4: But the plane hit Captain's office directly four hundred and
- 7:15Speaker 4: fifty miles an hour, so she never knew what was coming,
- 7:19Speaker 4: and she never knew it happened because she, she and
- 7:22Speaker 4: all the others right in her office area were instantaneously vaporized,
- 7:27Speaker 4: which I'm glad she didn't suffer.
- 7:29Speaker 1: Of course. Absolutely. This is Charles Wolfe who lost his
- 7:32Speaker 1: wife Katherine, and Giovanni Gallante who went the courage to
- 7:36Speaker 1: start this position petition.
- 7:38Speaker 4: One more thing before you go, the governor or the
- 7:43Speaker 4: of the man who's running for governor. I forgot it's Blakemanaman.
- 7:48Speaker 3: He gave it.
- 7:49Speaker 4: He gave a piece of advice. And I wanted to
- 7:52Speaker 4: say that I've already done that because Mandy showed up
- 7:56Speaker 4: at the visitation of King Charles the Third back in
- 8:00Speaker 4: late April, and remember the mayor. The mayor was going
- 8:05Speaker 4: around kind of interrupting conversations and so forth, and I
- 8:09Speaker 4: didn't like that. So when he came over to me.
- 8:13Speaker 4: My hands were in my pockets and I turned my
- 8:15Speaker 4: back to him.
- 8:16Speaker 1: Good for you, good for you. Well, when we get
- 8:18Speaker 1: back to you, Charles, we're not done yet with you,
- 8:19Speaker 1: just yet. But Giovanni, you said you went from fourteen
- 8:22Speaker 1: thousand signatures actually fourteen hundred on your petition to better
- 8:27Speaker 1: than eighty thousand. Now, do you have any more confidence
- 8:30Speaker 1: today than we spoke two weeks ago that maybe, just
- 8:33Speaker 1: maybe something is getting through to this more on this
- 8:36Speaker 1: mayor or do you feel like, while yes, my audience
- 8:39Speaker 1: has been great and New Yorkers have been great, that'll
- 8:42Speaker 1: still be there and maybe you'll have to do what
- 8:44Speaker 1: Bruce Blateman said and Charles just said, just turn your
- 8:47Speaker 1: back on this creep.
- 8:50Speaker 2: Well, I want to say your audience is great, and
- 8:55Speaker 2: it is awesome. But I told you I was doing
- 8:58Speaker 2: a press conference on September eighth at twelve pm at
- 9:02Speaker 2: City Hall.
- 9:03Speaker 1: I got good news for you. I got news for
- 9:04Speaker 1: good news for you. You did tell me about that,
- 9:07Speaker 1: and you called me yesterday and I will be coming
- 9:11Speaker 1: with Bruce Blakeman.
- 9:13Speaker 2: Awesome, awesome. I you know I asked for your support.
- 9:16Speaker 2: Bruce Blakeman would be great to have him there as well,
- 9:19Speaker 2: obviously as a citizen and someone that cares about his nephew.
- 9:23Speaker 2: It's a you know, a thing that if we get
- 9:25Speaker 2: enough people there, maybe we have a better chance of
- 9:28Speaker 2: you know, telling this guy, dude, stay home, you're not welcome,
- 9:33Speaker 2: just stay away. You know this this press conference, I
- 9:37Speaker 2: think we'll bring a lot of people to City Hall
- 9:40Speaker 2: on that day at twelve o'clock September eighth. I asked
- 9:42Speaker 2: your audience, whoever can make it, I would appreciate them
- 9:45Speaker 2: standing by us and just being there, just for the support.
- 9:49Speaker 2: The more people we have, the better it is. The
- 9:52Speaker 2: you know, one other thing that I do want to
- 9:54Speaker 2: mention is all these people that show love. It's great,
- 9:57Speaker 2: but we have a few trolls, you know, just the
- 10:00Speaker 2: few out of the eighty two thousand and maybe eight,
- 10:03Speaker 2: so it's a small fraction, but they keep calling us
- 10:06Speaker 2: bigots and guacious and all these names. Obviously, and I
- 10:10Speaker 2: want to make it clear so they understand the simple words.
- 10:15Speaker 2: We do not hate anyone, no Muslims, no Jews, no Blacks,
- 10:22Speaker 2: no Irish, no Italian. We just hate the fact of
- 10:27Speaker 2: people coming here to try to change our way of life,
- 10:30Speaker 2: our way of life is the American Dream. It's simple
- 10:35Speaker 2: if you can't understand those few words. For the people
- 10:38Speaker 2: that do think that we hate everyone, we just hate
- 10:42Speaker 2: the people that hate us, that want to kill us.
- 10:46Speaker 2: It's not about religion or any other ethnicity, just the
- 10:52Speaker 2: people that hate us. And I hope that this can
- 10:56Speaker 2: clear up all the news media that talks about, you know,
- 10:59Speaker 2: bring us into a world of heat with Palestine and
- 11:04Speaker 2: Islamic people and all of these words that we didn't
- 11:07Speaker 2: make them up.
- 11:08Speaker 3: They did. Yep.
- 11:09Speaker 2: These are things that we want because we believe in
- 11:13Speaker 2: the American dream. Okay, that day changed our lives and
- 11:18Speaker 2: America forever. So I think it should clear up most
- 11:23Speaker 2: of the people that you know strolling around, you know
- 11:26Speaker 2: us the nine to eleven people, and they're making them
- 11:28Speaker 2: afraid to even speak out. Some of them.
- 11:30Speaker 1: Oh, I know, George Soros has a packed out there.
- 11:32Speaker 1: And in fact, I had Joanne Areyola on my counsel
- 11:35Speaker 1: lady from Queen's, and she talked about and then I
- 11:39Speaker 1: brought on a lady Charles directors to you, who actually
- 11:42Speaker 1: helps wun that package is in charge of it. And
- 11:45Speaker 1: her name is Elizabeth Miller and her father Doug Miller
- 11:49Speaker 1: was murdered that day till he was a firefighter. Anybody
- 11:53Speaker 1: who died that day was murdered. That's the bottom line.
- 11:56Speaker 1: So she lost her dad that day. She was six
- 11:58Speaker 1: years old. And I heard her news clipping a couple
- 12:01Speaker 1: about a week ago, and she said that she was
- 12:03Speaker 1: okay with the mayor coming. So long story short. She
- 12:06Speaker 1: was on this show a couple of days ago, and
- 12:09Speaker 1: I said, you know, Liz, and I love you. Don't
- 12:11Speaker 1: get me wrong, I love you. I felt horrible for you.
- 12:14Speaker 1: But this mayor hangs out with people, but he's friends
- 12:17Speaker 1: with them. He doesn't know him. He's friends with people
- 12:21Speaker 1: who thought your father. Who thinks your father deserved to die?
- 12:25Speaker 1: That's right, sounds rough, right, they think your father deserved
- 12:29Speaker 1: to die. Do you know? As sweet as she was,
- 12:31Speaker 1: she was on for fifteen minutes. I couldn't sway her
- 12:34Speaker 1: to go the other way. She thinks that the mayor. Now, look,
- 12:37Speaker 1: she's a Democrat and she would have voted for mom Donnie.
- 12:39Speaker 1: She admits that she lives on Long Island. But are
- 12:42Speaker 1: you shock, Charles when you hear any family member of
- 12:45Speaker 1: a nine to eleven victim okay with the mayor showing up.
- 12:50Speaker 4: Everyone has their opinion. Some people have an opinion such
- 12:54Speaker 4: as that because they aren't fully informed. Some other people
- 13:00Speaker 4: just have a way of reasoning that doesn't want to interfere.
- 13:05Speaker 4: I'm not going to put the lady down. I mean,
- 13:07Speaker 4: she lost her dad. I would jeez, I'd hate to
- 13:09Speaker 4: have lost my dad at six years old, wouldn't really
- 13:12Speaker 4: know who he was. But you know, everybody has their
- 13:16Speaker 4: their viewpoint, and I don't agree with it at all.
- 13:22Speaker 4: I have my own reasoning for it, and it's basically
- 13:26Speaker 4: that Mendami is essentially an Islamist. I have no problem
- 13:35Speaker 4: with Islam as a religion, but don't force it on me,
- 13:41Speaker 4: and don't force its rules on me. In church at
- 13:46Speaker 4: the cathedral Saint John the Divine, and I have been asked.
- 13:49Speaker 4: I'm a reader there and I was asked to read
- 13:52Speaker 4: the Quran a couple of times for the morning service.
- 13:57Speaker 4: And it was harmless, very good things. But I believe
- 14:01Speaker 4: what King Charles said in his speech to Congress this
- 14:05Speaker 4: last spring, okay, is that Sharia law which comes along
- 14:13Speaker 4: when you want to take over a country. Now, you see,
- 14:16Speaker 4: being Muslim in your own private sense is fine, but
- 14:20Speaker 4: it's when they start to apply Sharia law, which controls you.
- 14:24Speaker 4: And there's a reason why the First Amendment says there
- 14:27Speaker 4: shall be no establishment of a religion. It doesn't prevent religion.
- 14:32Speaker 4: It means that everyone has the right to exercise their
- 14:35Speaker 4: own private practice of religion. So that's fine. But when
- 14:40Speaker 4: you want to take over a country, when you want
- 14:43Speaker 4: to when you want to oppress people, that's a whole
- 14:46Speaker 4: different situation. So that's the way I see it.
- 14:50Speaker 1: Oh, you're right, you're running the money. You got about
- 14:52Speaker 1: three minutes to go, and want to get one more
- 14:54Speaker 1: from both of you. Giovanni. Again, those signatures went up
- 14:58Speaker 1: eighty thousand fold. For folks are listening right now that
- 15:01Speaker 1: are victims' families or New Yorkers in general. Has been
- 15:06Speaker 1: moved closer and closer to this day. What is your
- 15:09Speaker 1: message to them this morning?
- 15:11Speaker 2: Well, if they want to sign the petition, they can
- 15:14Speaker 2: look it up under the change dot org and if
- 15:20Speaker 2: they can't find it, they can email me and I
- 15:22Speaker 2: would send it to them under the change dot org.
- 15:24Speaker 2: It's under the memory of those loss in September eleventh,
- 15:27Speaker 2: with dignity. They can look it up or they can
- 15:29Speaker 2: email me at WTC one nine to eleven, one at
- 15:33Speaker 2: AOL and I love them all and appreciate all their feedback. Well,
- 15:38Speaker 2: thank you.
- 15:38Speaker 1: They love you too. Now your wife, of course, Grace
- 15:41Speaker 1: good Restersoul was twenty nine years old. I don't know
- 15:44Speaker 1: how old Katherine wants, Charles, but I'm going to ask
- 15:47Speaker 1: you to do something that Giovanni did for me, which
- 15:50Speaker 1: was hard on him, but he got through it. And
- 15:53Speaker 1: that is, if you had a chance to visit heaven
- 15:56Speaker 1: this morning, and I have one more conversation with Hathwine,
- 16:01Speaker 1: what would you say to her?
- 16:04Speaker 4: I love you. I would hug her and I would
- 16:08Speaker 4: say tell her I love her, but she already knows that.
- 16:11Speaker 4: But I would tell her I love her. And let's say,
- 16:15Speaker 4: let's say it was a thirty second in her change,
- 16:17Speaker 4: and I would just tell her I love her, and
- 16:21Speaker 4: that when my life ends, I look forward to being
- 16:27Speaker 4: with her again.
- 16:28Speaker 1: How old was Catherine on that tay job forty?
- 16:31Speaker 4: She had just turned forty.
- 16:32Speaker 1: Oh my god, listen. Both of you guys are great men.
- 16:35Speaker 1: You're courageous and I love you, guys. What do you do?
- 16:38Speaker 2: Love you?
- 16:39Speaker 1: And New York loves you, America loves you, And I'm
- 16:42Speaker 1: here for you, and I will do whatever I can
- 16:44Speaker 1: in my power to help you do whatever you want
- 16:47Speaker 1: to do and accomplished certainly. Again, like I said, Giovanni,
- 16:50Speaker 1: I spoke to Bruce Blakeman last night. We're going to
- 16:52Speaker 1: go together on the eighth to be there for you guys.
- 16:54Speaker 1: But anything else, you guys ever need, reach out to
- 16:57Speaker 1: me and God bless you both the great patriots, and
- 17:00Speaker 1: I'm willing sorry for what you guys about to go
- 17:01Speaker 1: through the last twenty five years.
- 17:03Speaker 4: I william your word have on my heart.
- 17:06Speaker 2: Thank you.
- 17:06Speaker 3: Charles.
- 17:07Speaker 1: Yeah, you're quite a guy yourself, buddy.
- 17:09Speaker 3: Thank you.
- 17:09Speaker 1: You're sweet man. You too, Giovanni. I love you both.
- 17:12Speaker 1: Thank you so much. That is Giovanni Galante and Charles Wolf.
- 17:15Speaker 1: Giovanni lost his twenty nine year old wife, Grace on
- 17:19Speaker 1: that day and Charles lost his forty year old wife,
- 17:22Speaker 1: Kathwine on that day.
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- 17:53Speaker 1: What the heck is going on here