President Trump stood on the grass of the Ellipse near the White House on Tuesday and posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Welles Crowther, the 24-year-old equities trader and volunteer firefighter remembered as the "Man in the Red Bandana" for guiding strangers to safety inside the collapsing World Trade Center a quarter-century ago.

Crowther's mother, Allison, and sister, Paige, accepted the nation's highest civilian honor on his behalf during a "Steel Across America" ceremony that drew roughly 1,500 first responders, Gold Star families and members of the Tunnel to Towers Foundation, days ahead of Friday's 25th anniversary of the attacks.

"Today, in honor of his incredible bravery and all of the other countless unknown acts of heroism that day, it is my privilege to award the very special, the highest honor that we give, highest civilian honor, the Presidential Medal of Freedom," Trump told the crowd, according to a transcript of the ceremony.

Three trips into the sky lobby

Crowther worked on the 104th floor of the South Tower for Sandler O'Neill & Partners when the first plane struck the North Tower on Sept. 11, 2001. A former volunteer firefighter in his hometown of Nyack, New York, he tied a red bandana his father had given him over his mouth and nose and began leading dazed, injured survivors down smoke-filled stairwells to safety — making at least three trips back up into the wreckage of the 78th-floor sky lobby before the tower collapsed. Survivors have credited him with saving at least 18 lives.

"IT IS MY PRIVILEGE TO AWARD ... THE PRESIDENTIAL MEDAL OF FREEDOM"

The ceremony centered on a 21-foot, nearly 17,000-pound steel beam salvaged from the South Tower, which has spent months touring the country as part of the Steel Across America campaign before arriving at the Ellipse. Crowther's story went largely untold for years until his mother recognized the bandana in a survivor's magazine account; he has since become one of the attacks' most widely commemorated victims, with a Boston College dorm, a bridge and youth foundations named in his memory.

The award comes amid a tense run-up to Friday's anniversary in New York, where a separate controversy is brewing over whether Mayor Zohran Mamdani should attend the Ground Zero ceremony — a dispute that has drawn in victims' families on both sides.

Friday's 25th anniversary will mark one of the largest commemorative pushes in years, with events planned at the Pentagon, the Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, and Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan.