Michael Fanone, a former Washington D.C. Metropolitan Police officer that responded to the January 6 Capitol riot, recently compared the indictment of former President Donald Trump to the killing of Al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden.
“When I first learned about the indictment, I had a long conversation with a friend of mine, Ryan Reilly, and I told him how proud I felt to be an American at that moment, much in the way that I did when I learned that our military had killed Osama Bin Laden,” Fanone said while appearing on CNN on Tuesday.
Fanone was then questioned by the show’s host, Laura Coates, regarding the comparison, which prompted the former law enforcement officer to say, “Osama bin Laden was a terrorist who committed a horrific act against American people and against our republic. And I believe that Donald Trump is a terrorist who committed horrific acts against the American people.”
The comment by Fanone comes shortly after Trump was indicted by the Department of Justice following an investigation by Special Counsel Jack Smith into the riot at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, and the former president’s efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election.
In the indictment, Trump was charged with conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy against rights and the obstruction of and the attempt to obstruct an official proceeding.
“The attack on our nation’s Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, was an unprecedented assault on the seat of American democracy,” Smith said in announcing the indictment. “It was fueled by lies, lies by the defendant targeted at obstructing a bedrock function of the U.S. government: the nation’s process of collecting, counting and certifying the results of the presidential election.”
In a statement following the indictment, Trump said: “This is nothing more than the latest corrupt chapter in the continued pathetic attempt by the Biden Crime Family and their weaponized Department of Justice to interfere with the 2024 Presidential Election, in which President Trump is the undisputed frontrunner, and leading by substantial margins.”
“These un-American witch hunts will fail and President Trump will be re-elected to the White House so he can save our Country from the abuse, incompetence, and corruption that is running through the veins of our Country at levels never seen before,” the statement added.
Fanone was present during the riot at the Capitol, where he was beaten by a group of rioters. Fanone eventually resigned from his post with the Washington, D.C. Metro Police Department and joined CNN as an on-air contributor. In the years since the riot, Fanone has been outspoken against what happened that day and received the Presidential Citizens Medal for his efforts on January 6.
“Tomorrow marks two years since the day I almost died defending the Capitol from people who thought overthrowing the government was a good idea,” Fanone said at a rally in January. “The events of that day felt like a wake-up call for me and many others that political violence is real. The worst part is that our elected leaders allowed this to happen.”
Trump is also currently facing legal trouble for a federal indictment on his alleged mishandling of classified documents and another indictment in New York for business and finance crimes. He has pleaded not guilty in the two cases.
