By Steve Crane | Editor-in-chief
“The further away you are, it doesn’t resonate as much. I want people to have that understanding and have a connection ... we all suffered because so many good people were lost that day.” - Devora Kirschner, who had been married for six months to Lt. Darin Pontell on Sept. 11, 2001, when he was killed in the Pentagon, one of 69 Marylanders who died in the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
On the 25th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, Pera Onal has the stories of some of the families of the 69 victims from Maryland, their struggles and their fears. And Tim Lambert, the editor-in-chief of our sister publication in Pennsylvania, offers a first-person remembrance of the crash in Shanksville, on land partly owned by his family.
We also have the story of Maryland health officials who released their own vaccine guidelines Thursday, separate from federal recommendations, the first under the Vax Act, a state law designed to push back against the Trump administration’s shifting policies on vaccinations. Danielle J. Brown has that story.
William J. Ford reports that immigrant advocacy groups sued Immigration and Customs Enforcement over its “arrest first, ask questions later” policy of sweeping up immigrants and citizens alike without probable cause as part of its immigration crackdown. And Christine Condon has the story of Salisbury residents, many involved in lawsuits against Perdue over PFAS contamination in the groundwater, skeptical of Perdue’s request to increase its wastewater discharge permit.
Those headlines and more, plus news of the week, are below for you on this somber anniversary.
Part of the memorial to the five residents of University Park who died in the 9/11 attacks. Besides a marker, the memorial includes a reflection garden with five prominent stones. (Photo by Steve Crane/Maryland Matters)
By Pera Onal
Howard County resident Devora Kirschner had only been married to Lt. Darin Pontell for six months when he was killed in the Sept. 11 attack on the Pentagon 25 years ago.
Pontell, 26 at the time, had been working as an intelligence officer in the Navy when American Airlines Flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon. A Columbia native, Pontell was one of 69 Maryland residents killed in the attacks.
“It seems like forever, but then I can quickly bring myself back to that time and have it feel like just yesterday,” Kirschner said this week.
She and other survivors — Waldorf resident Basmattie Bishundat, whose son Romeo, was killed in the Pentagon, and Frederick residents Sharon and Alan Linton Sr., whose son Alan Jr. was on floor 102 of the World Trade Center’s South Tower on 9/11 — talk about the loss, the acceptance, the lingering pain and their fears that people are forgetting what that day meant.
From left, Lt. Gov. Aruna Miller, Health Secretary Meena Seshamani and Public Health Deputy Secretary Meg Sullivan testify in February on Moore administration priority legislation known as the Vax Act. (Photo by Danielle J. Brown/Maryland Matters)
By Danielle J. Brown
Maryland health officials issued a first-ever state vaccine schedule Thursday ahead of the annual flu and respiratory illness season, under a new policy created to buck anti-vaccine messaging from the Trump administration in recent years.
The guidelines were issued by Health Secretary Meena Seshamani using her new authority under the Vax Act, which authorizes the state to set vaccine recommendations based on guidelines from established health groups, independent of federal guidelines from of agencies like the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The law also ensures that those treatments are covered by insurance companies in Maryland and allows pharmacists to administer vaccinations to anyone age 3 or older without a prescription from a doctor.
There aren't many surprises in the state vaccine schedule, which aligns with recommendations issued by medical societies such as American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Academy of Family Physicians, and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. It recommends a familiar list of about a dozen vaccinations for children, including polio, measles chicken pox and more, before they enter school. Annual flu and COVID-19 shots are rec0mmended for adults, and additional vaccinations may be recommended for those who are immunocompromised.
Austin Rose, at lectern, a managing attorney with the Amica Center for Immigrant Rights, spoke Thursday as advocates announced a lawsuit against the Trump administration for "warrantless arrests" of residents in immigration stops. (Photo by William J. Ford/Maryland Matters)
By William J. Ford
Immigrant and legal advocacy groups sued the Trump administration Thursday for violating the Fourth Amendment and other laws with what they called the government's "arrest first, ask questions later" policy of immigrant arrests.
The 56-page lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Baltimore, accuses Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents of engaging in "warrantless arrest" that sweeps up people without cause beyond the fact that they appear to be immigrants.
It said 80% of those arrested by ICE in Maryland since 2025 had no criminal convictions and that of 1,300 arrests made in Operation Safe Community, a two-week ICE enforcement surge in Maryland and Virginia last month, less than a third had criminal convictions. The lawsuit also said that of the nearly 7,000 street arrests in Maryland since Jan. 20, 2025, the day President Donald Trump was sworn in to his second term, 93% of those arrested have been citizens of Latin American or Caribbean countries, in what one attorney called racial profiling.
IN OTHER NEWS
A piece of Shanksville: United Flight 93 crashed in Shanksville on land Pennsylvania Capital Star Editor Tim Lambert owned a piece of -- and he realized then that the land didn’t belong to him anymore, but to the families and a grieving nation after 9/11.
PFAS and Perdue: Perdue Agribusiness has faced lawsuits for years claiming it polluted local groundwater with PFAS, the cancer-causing "forever chemical." So neighbors were skeptical when Perdue asked to increase the treated wastewater it pours in a local stream.
ICE at the polls?: Latino advocacy and voting rights groups sued Tuesday to block an Immigration and Customs Enforcement policy of letting officers enter polling locations in certain circumstances to conduct immigration enforcement during the elections.
MATTERS YOU MAY HAVE MISSED
Medicaid missteps: Lawmakers were left frustrated and confused after a 2.5-hour discussion with state auditors and health officials turned into a debate over whether millions in Medicaid payments made on behalf of incarcerated individuals were proper.
BCCC leader grilled: The president of Baltimore City Community College defended the school against a recent state audit that found management problems and the potential payment of financial aid to "ghost students." Lawmakers seemed unimpressed.
Awaiting word on TPS: Temporary protected status for 170,000 Salvadorans expired Wednesday at midnight, but Homeland Security said protection will remain while the administration decides whether to extend El Salvador’s protection, in place since 2001.
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