“I was down there also,” the president said to an audience of 60 first responders and their families who had gathered in Washington to witness the signing ceremony. “But I’m not considering myself a first responder,” he added.

The president celebrated the first responders for their service in the single deadliest terror attack in US history while signing a bill that effectively makes the victims’s health care compensation fund permanent. Many of the first responders and other victims have continued to suffer debilitating medical issues due to the debris and destruction that blanketed downtown Manhattan in the wake of the attacks responsible for nearly 3,000 deaths.

“I spent a lot of time down there with you,” the president added, appearing to suggest without evidence that he participated in either rescue efforts or surveying the damage after the attacks.

Mr Trump also joked with the first responders that the stage set up in the White House Rose Garden might fall as they were all convening for a photo. He added that if the stage falls, the responders “are not falling very far”.

Yes, he is famous for his heroism and class he displayed in the aftermath…

Speaking with a local TV station hours after the attacks, Mr Trump described an “amazing phone call” he received about 40 Wall Street, a building he owned that “was the second-tallest building in downtown Manhattan, and it was actually before the World Trade Centre the tallest.”

“When they built the World Trade Centre it became known as the second-tallest, and now it’s the tallest,” he said. “And I just spoke to my people, and they said it’s the most unbelievable sight, it’s probably seven or eight blocks away from the World Trade Centre, and yet Wall Street is littered with two feet of stone and brick and mortar and steel.”

Mr Trump’s claims his building was the tallest in downtown Manhattan was not accurate from the very start, according to reports.

On Monday, the president described the group of first responders present at the White House as a “great looking group of people”.