Nineteen radical Islamist hijackers boarded four American airliners on the morning of September 11, 2001. They turned those planes into weapons. The official death toll among victims stands at 2,977. At the World Trade Center in New York, 2,753 people died. At the Pentagon, 184 were killed. On United Flight 93, 40 passengers and crew died after they fought back—“Let’s Roll”—and forced the plane down in a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, preventing it from reaching its intended target in Washington.

Those 19 men were Muslims acting in the name of al-Qaeda’s ideology. The attacks united the country for a time. “Never Again” and “Never Forget” became national vows. What followed was more than two decades of war in Afghanistan and Iraq, thousands more American dead, and families shattered on both sides of the conflict. Twenty-five years is not ancient history. Yet the question lingers: has America forgotten?

The Muslim population in the United States has grown substantially since 2001, though not at the explosive rate sometimes claimed, but we also don’t know because the census does not ask a question about religion. Pew Research Center estimated about 2.35 million Muslims of all ages in 2007 and 3.45 million by 2017, or roughly 1.1 percent of the population. More recent figures place the community in the range of 4 to 4.5 million in the mid-2020s, with Pew’s 2023-24 Religious Landscape Study finding that 1.2 percent of U.S. adults identify as Muslim.

Pew’s long-term projection, issued years ago and still widely cited, anticipates about 8.1 million Muslims by 2050—roughly 2.1 percent of the population. Growth has come from immigration, higher fertility, and a younger age structure compared with other groups. The wide-open southern border during the Joe Biden administration allowed millions from all over the world, including Muslims on the terrorist watch list. Mosques have multiplied in tandem. There were an estimated 15 in 1950. By 2000 the count reached 1,209.

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The U.S. Mosque Survey recorded 2,769 in 2020, a 31 percent increase from 2010. Estimates for 2026 put the number between 3,000 and 3,400. They now exist in every state, with the largest concentrations in New York, California, New Jersey, and Illinois, and notable recent growth in Florida, Michigan, and Arizona. Friday prayer attendance has risen with the number of facilities. American Muslims are racially and ethnically diverse—no single group forms a majority—and they participate in civic life.

In 2026 a CAIR directory identified 255 Muslim elected officials across 26 states, a record. Four serve in the U.S. House. The rest are concentrated locally: 98 city council members, 63 education officials including school boards, 46 state legislators, 18 judges, and 11 mayors. New Jersey leads with 46, followed by Michigan with 40 and California with 24.

High-profile 2026 races include Abdul El-Sayed as the Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate in Michigan and Adam Hamawy running for Congress in New Jersey. This is ordinary democratic representation, not a conspiracy. It is also a visible change from the America of September 2001.

Contrast that institutional expansion with the trajectory of American churches. In 2000–2001 there were hundreds of thousands of Christian congregations serving well over 150 million adherents according to contemporaneous counts. By 2020 the U.S. Religion Census tallied more than 350,000 congregations of all faiths, the great majority Christian. Yet the underlying trends have been downward for many denominations. Protestant churches recently closed faster than they opened—Lifeway Research estimated about 4,000 closures versus 3,800 new plants in 2024.

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Public Religion Research Institute data show weekly religious-service attendance at 26 percent in 2025, down from 31 percent in 2013. The share of Americans who identify as Christian has fallen from 78 percent in 2007 to the low-to-mid 60s in recent Pew survey, while the religiously unaffiliated have risen to nearly 30 percent. Some measures of attendance have stabilized or even ticked up slightly after the pandemic, but the long decline in affiliation and regular participation is unmistakable.

What might another quarter-century bring for America? Pew’s 2050 projection of 8 million Muslims remains the most rigorous available benchmark; claims of 28 million by 2051 assume growth rates that have not materialized yet, but another Democrat president and an open border can quickly make that projection reality.

Continued immigration and the difference in fertility will increase the Muslim population and political weight. In cities and suburbs with existing concentrations, school boards and city councils could see Muslim majorities or near-majorities in some districts. In some places, it’s already happened. National politics will reflect that also.

The post-October 7 surge in antisemitic incidents and pro-Palestinian activism has already altered campus and street politics in ways unimaginable in 2001. Combined with the ongoing unchurching of large parts of the population, the cultural texture of the country will keep shifting.

None of this requires treating every American Muslim as a threat. The 19 hijackers were a small but dangerous part of a fanatical fringe. Most Muslim Americans live ordinary lives, work, raise families, and vote. At the same time, the ideology that produced 9/11 has not vanished, and demographic change is not cost-free. Churches that once formed the civic backbone of many communities are closing or emptying while mosques continue to be built. Memory of the specific crime of September 11—who did it, why they did it, and what it cost—competes with newer narratives.

Twenty-five years is long enough for a generation to come of age with no personal recollection of the falling towers. “Never Forget” was never only about the buildings or the body count. It was a warning about the ideas that sent those 19 men onto those planes. Whether that warning still shapes policy, culture, and self-understanding is the question America will answer over the next 25 years. The numbers are already moving. The memory is the part that can still be chosen. Has America forgotten ‘Never Again?’

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