Donald Trump Wants You to Forget This Happened - The Atlantic
In the early-morning hours of January 5, 2021, Thomas Webster, a former U.S. Marine and retired police officer, drove south on Interstate 95 toward Washington, D.C. Webster, who was then 54, had been conflicted about whether to attend the “Save America” rally, but Donald Trump had used the word patriot. Webster had joined the military at 19, taken his first plane ride to boot camp in South Carolina, gotten his first taste of lobster tail on a ship in the Mediterranean. He loved the sense of purpose he’d drawn from the oath he’d sworn when he joined the Marines: I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic. Check out more from this issue and find your next story to read. Webster, who’d retired from the New York City Police Department, where he’d been a street cop, a firearms instructor, and part of the Gracie Mansion security detail, lived in Goshen, New York, with his wife, Michelle, an Ivy League graduate who worked in biote
Listen − 1.0 x + Seek 0:00 51:56 Updated at 1:35 p.m. ET on January 12, 2026 This article was featured in the One Story to Read Today newsletter. Sign up for it here. In the early-morning hours of January 5, 2021, Thomas Webster, a former U.S. Marine and retired police officer, drove south on Interstate 95 toward Washington, D.C. Webster, who was then 54, had been conflicted about whether to attend the “Save America” rally, but Donald Trump had used the word patriot . Webster had joined the military at 19, taken his first plane ride to boot camp in South Carolina, gotten his first taste of lob
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