Ogonowski exclusion not political, 9/11 ceremony panel says
In organizing a State House ceremony for Tuesday to mark the sixth anniversary of Sept. 11, 2001, planners said yesterday they never envisioned they would set off a political firestorm by not inviting Jim Ogonowski, whose brother was killed in the attacks and who is now engaged in a heated race as he seeks to become the state's first Republican congressman in more than a decade.
Ogonowski, who has been a speaker at the ceremony the past four years, was not asked to come back. However, added to the program as the keynote speaker was Martin Meehan, a former US representative whose wife is chairing Democrat Niki Tsongas's campaign against Ogonowski.
"I never really thought about this as a political situation," said Ted Livingston, executive director of the Massachusetts 9/11 Fund, which planned the event this year. "We didn't seek to include or exclude anyone because of party lines."
Livingston said the 12-member committee planning the ceremony this year decided not to give speaking roles to victims' families, and wanted to focus on the stories of three beneficiaries of funds set up in the names of victims.
Several family members asked to be involved in other aspects of the program, including the invocation and the singing of the National
Ogonowski still plans to attend the ceremony, according to family members, but will not have a formal role.
He is planning to halt campaign activities Tuesday.
"He has been honored to speak in the past, and would have been honored to have been asked this year," said campaign manager Dustin Olson, who would not make Ogonowski available for comment. "But ultimately, 9/11 is not about one person or one family. It is a time to remember and honor all those who were lost that day."
In the past, Ogonowski was asked by Governor Mitt Romney, a Republican, to be part of the ceremony, and the 49-year-old Dracut farmer addressed the crowd at every anniversary except the first, when he was at ground zero in New York.
Governor Deval Patrick did not get involved in putting together this year's program, according to a spokesman, and left the planning up to the Massachusetts 9/11 Fund, a Boston-based nonprofit that had a secondary role in the previous anniversary ceremonies. Still, Patrick, who will be speaking at the event, spent several hours last week walking the streets of Lowell shaking hands and imploring voters to support Tsongas.
Patrick's chief of staff, Doug Rubin, was a political consultant for Tsongas before joining Patrick's staff in April. The spat was first reported by the Boston Herald yesterday.
After winning their party's nominations last week, Ogonowski and Tsongas are locked in a bitter battle for an open seat in the Fifth Congressional District, a race that Republicans see as their best chance in years to capture a congressional seat.
Ogonowski frequently references his brother on the campaign trail, and the tragic story has helped him land prominent interviews on CNN's "Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer" and Fox News's "Your World with Neil Cavuto."
Matt Viser can be reached at maviser@globe.com. 