Last week, Republican Pennsylvania state representative and congressional hopeful Rob Mercuri sent out an exploitative fundraising email using the anniversary of 9/11 to ask for donations. He invoked the nearly 3,000 American victims and the later sacrifices of American service members in a pathetic attempt to fundraise off their deaths.

Mercuri decided to remember the lives of those lost that day and in later wars by asking people to “chip in $25 or $50.” He spent more time talking about the “fundraising deadline” than he did the victims, heroes and veterans who fought to protect our freedoms.

This isn’t the first time Mercuri has tried to capitalize on one of darkest days in our nation’s history. In 2020, he released a campaign ad on 9/11, using the Flight 93 National Memorial as a prop.

Mercuri should know better than to use the deaths of thousands of Americans for shameless and partisan opportunism. Some things are more important than a politician’s selfish fundraising appeals and ambition.

As veterans, we expect more from one of our own. The anniversary of 9/11 should be a day when we pause to remember those who died in the attacks and come together as one country, under one flag, galvanized once again as a nation.

Some days are just not for politics, and this was one of them.

We hope that Mercuri will do the right thing and apologize for using this national day of mourning as a political prop.

Craig Romanovich, Jim Harvey, Tammy Garcia, Scott Lambert, Ken Nagel and James-Brian Byers

The writers are local military veterans.

Copyright ©2025— Trib Total Media, LLC (TribLIVE.com)