They call it "sportswashing."
It means to use sports to whitewash a controversy. That's the term a group of 9/11 victims uses to refer to the LIV Golf Series, a professional golf tour set up to rival the PGA Tour, bankrolled by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
As Trump National in Doral is hosting LIV this weekend, a group of 9/11 victims called 9/11Justice.org held a news conference a mile away, calling for Saudi Arabia to be held accountable for what they say is clear evidence of involvement in the 9/11 terror attacks.
"Some golfers stated that they were just trying to provide for their families, our brother Danny and 2,976 others were just trying to provide for their families on that fateful day as well, LIV golf to us is death golf,” said Dennis McGinley, whose brother died in the South Tower.
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The 9/11 families see the LIV Golf Series as a massive propaganda effort by the Saudis.
"What if those who murdered your loved ones continuously evaded justice and then came into your country to do business, to buy off your fellow Americans, and to change the public’s opinion of them?” said Juliette Scauso, who lost her firefighter father that day 21 years ago.
Former president Donald Trump is playing in the pro-am part of the tournament. The families are angry that he has hosted LIV tournaments at his clubs, and that he went to Saudi Arabia on his first foreign trip as president, back in 2017.
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The 9/11 families also say President Joe Biden got rolled by the Saudis after he went to the Kingdom last summer, only to see the Saudis side with Vladimir Putin when it decided to reduce oil production.
“The US has been bullied by Saudi Arabia for 21 years, it is time for this country, this government, and the people of America to push back,” said Brett Eagleson, who lost his father in the attacks.
The families said they’re thankful that President Biden declassified FBI documents from an investigation called Operation Encore, which probed the terrorist attacks after the 9/11 Commission released its report. According to 9/11Justice.org, the documents show at least 12 Saudi government officials directly assisted the 9/11 hijackers.
“Without these facilitators, there was zero chance of 9/11 taking place, these are the words of the FBI, not ours,” McGinley said.
Eagleson pointed out that after the Saudis backed out of the oil production agreement they made with the Biden Administration and sided with Putin instead, there was a call in Congress to retaliate.
"So when senator Blumenthal of Connecticut, my senator, introduced legislation to ban arms sales to the Kingdom, this is what the Kingdom had to say,” Eagleson said, and then played a video of Saudi Prince Saud Al Shaalan which the Prince had tweeted. It shows him saying, in English, that “This Kingdom, all of us, we are products of jihad and martyrdom, that’s my message to anybody that thinks they can threaten us."
"The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has never been brought to justice, they’ve never admitted their guilt," said Tim Frolich, who narrowly escaped the South Tower before it crumbled down.
The Saudi government has always maintained that it had no role, direct or indirect, in the 9/11 attacks.
