Alex Morris wrote an article in Rolling Stone called Michael Phenone is not your fucking hero.

I think that captured me about as pointedly as possible.

I finished the article with Alex and she was like, so what do you want to do for the photo?

And I was like, well, I'll tell you what I don't do.

I'm not going to Capitol.

I'm not putting on a fucking uniform. I'm not going to the Capitol.

I'm not putting on a fucking uniform.

Staring off distantly into the American flag behind me and all the other shit.

And I was like, I tell you, I want to bring my dog, a cooler beer, and a lawn chair.

And I want to sit on the west front of the Capitol and drink beer and you guys can take pictures of it. So I had to call Nancy Pelosi, who was a speaker at

the time, to get permission for us to. So she's like, she's like, so what do you want to do? And I was

like, oh, man, we're just going to take some pictures.

And she's like, okay, nothing crazy, right?

And then later on that day, she calls me back.

She's like, Michael, were you drinking beer on the west front of the Capitol?

Yeah. Hey, folks. My guest today on the Michael Steel podcast is none other than Michael Phanone. He spent two decades with the Metropolitan Police Department here in D.C., where I grew up. On January 6th, however, 2021, he responded to the Capitol attack on his own. What happened that day changed the

course of his life. Since then, he's become a vocal critic of how the events of January 6th have

been downplayed by politicians, law enforcement, and the media.

Once a Trump supporter, he's been open about how the experience shifted his views.

Michael is the author of Hold the Line, The Insurrection, and One Copts Battle for America's Soul.

It's a candid account of that day and what it means for the future of American

democracy. We get into that, but we get into so much more. Peel back the curtain on this young man

...