Michael Fanone With Tom Hudson: A Conversation

Tom Hudson is the chief content officer at WAMU, the NPR member station serving Washington, D.C., Maryland, and Virginia. He spent 10 years as vice president of news and as a special correspondent at WLRN Public Media in Miami, where he hosted The Sunshine Economy, The Florida Roundup, and the South Florida Roundup. He writes a weekly column on the investment markets for the Miami Herald and is also an adjunct lecturer in the Department of Journalism at the University of Miami.

Michael Fanone served as a Metropolitan Police Department officer assigned to the First District in Washington, D.C., for 20 years. He worked briefly as a patrol officer, then spent most of his career as a vice investigator in small mission units. He participated in more than 2,000 arrests for violent crimes and narcotics trafficking; served as a special task force officer for the FBI, ATF, and DEA; and earned more than three dozen commendations for his work. He currently serves as an analyst for CNN, a security consultant, and a firearms instructor. As he self-deployed to the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, Fanone had no idea his life was about to change. At the front of the line, he urged his fellow officers to hold their ground against the insurrectionists. A self-described “redneck” who voted for Trump in 2016, he was pulled into the mob, tased until he had a heart attack, and viciously beaten with a Blue Lives Matter flag. Someone shouted to kill him. In Hold the Line: The Insurrection and One Cop’s Battle for America’s Soul (Atria Books), Fanone tells the story of that day and provides a nuanced look at some of our country’s most critical issues.