On January 6, then-President Donald Trump's lies about the validity of the 2020 election prompted a mob of his extremist supporters to storm the United States Capitol, hoping to upend the joint Congressional session to nationally certify the victory of then-President-elect Joe Biden.
The insurrectionists shattered windows, ransacked offices, smeared excrement across the walls, and called for the execution of then-Vice President Mike Pence—whom they saw as a traitor for refusing to overstep his powers and unilaterally throw out electoral votes in swing states Trump lost.
Though the lives of every lawmaker and worker at the Capitol that day were endangered, few experienced more violence than the Capitol Police and the DC Metro Police.
Officer Brian Sicknick, who was sprayed with a type of mace during the riots, later died. In the days following, two Capitol police officers committed suicide. Another harrowing video shown at Trump's subsequent impeachment trial showed one officer pleading for help as the insurrectionists nearly crushed him in a door. On Wednesday, two other Capitol Police officers filed a lawsuit against Trump for sparking the riots that have burdened them with ongoing physical and emotional distress.
So people across the United States balked earlier this month when Trump absurdly claimed in a Fox News interview that the rioters were actually supportive of the police.
The former President said:
"Look, they went in and they shouldn't have done it. Some of them went in and they're hugging and kissing the police and the guards, you know, they had great relationships."
But perhaps no one found the news more abhorrent than Terry Fanone.
Fanone's son, Michael Fanone, is a Metropolitan DC Police officer and suffered stun gun blasts and was beaten with a flagpole during the riots. Some of the insurrectionists called for him to be shot with his own gun.
Fanone skewered Trump's claims in an interview with CNN's Don Lemon.
Fanone told Lemon:
"What goes through my mind is really outrage ... It's diminishing, it is devaluing. The thing that is so profound is after he made those statements, the silence that followed. And where was the outrage from, other people that were there, Congressmen who were there. The silence to me implies indifference ... or complicity."
When asked what she would say if she could speak to Trump directly, Fanone responded:
"Where's your courage? Where is your courage, because I know there are people out there ... The silence is so palpable and it's just outrageous. For me to say anything to Trump wouldn't matter, because he just can't hear."
She went on to decry the silence of Trump's enablers, whom she described as complicit.
Social media users shared her frustration.
She was far from the only one to condemn Trump's characterization of events.
On Thursday, news broke that the FBI arrested Daniel Rodriguez, the suspect who allegedly beat Officer Fanone with a flagpole.
The man who incited the riots remains at large.
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