Former D.C. police officer Michael Fanone, who suffered a heart attack and was beaten by a mob during the January 6, 2021 riot, was attacked Thursday night by protesters near the Capitol. He attended a House special committee hearing investigating last year’s riot.
Videos posted on social media showed Fanone, now an on-air commentator for CNN, being chased by protesters. A woman following Fanone is seen asking why he was at the Capitol on Jan. 6 and questioning his credentials as a law enforcement officer while pointing two phone cameras at him. As he walks away from the predators, the woman and other people follow him.
A man wearing a black hat and holding a large banner with an image of former President Donald Trump and the words “toxic loser” then used the banner to separate Fanone from the crowd following him. Shortly after, a man in dark shorts falls screaming. He tells nearby officers that the man with the anti-Trump poster “just hit me with his stick.”
Photos taken by The Washington Post and videos on social media show the man carrying the banner he was later handcuffed by law enforcement. In one video, the man identified himself as Stephen Parlato of Boulder, Colorado. The man said he was in D.C. to support the hearings and that he intervened because Fanone’s crooks were “inches away from his face. And [Fanone] was trying to get away.”
U.S. Capitol Police did not respond to multiple requests for comment late Thursday and early Friday.
Earlier in the day, Fanone attended a hearing for one of his accused attackers. “I hope from the bottom of my heart that he suffers” in prison, the former officer told a federal judge.
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As he left the hearing, Fanone sharply criticized Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), using colorful language while speaking to a reporter. Hawley’s actions on the day of the uprising were a focal point of Thursday’s hearing; he had raised his fist in support of the crowd, which included some would-be rioters, outside the Capitol, and footage later showed him running away from the would-be riot.
Fanone resigned from the police force last year and has spoken about his slow recovery from the physical and emotional trauma of the attack. He responded to a citywide emergency on January 6, 2021, and rushed to the Capitol to repel pro-Trump rioters. He was beaten unconscious with fists and rods and repeatedly stunned with electric shocks to the neck.
Daniel Rodriguez, among those charged in the attack on D.C. police officer Michael Fanone in the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, apologized in a videotaped interrogation. (Video: FBI)
The rioters then tried to yank his gun from its holster.
“Kill him with his own gun!” one shouted.
Fanon, who said he voted for Trump in the 2016 presidential election, has openly criticized lawmakers and pro-Trump voters for downplaying the violence that occurred last year.
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