Onesti thanked police several times for protecting property during the 2020 summer unrest in response to the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis. He also talked about Marco DiFranco, an Italian American officer who died of COVID-19 complications last summer. Onesti presented John Catanzara, president of the Chicago FOP, with a Marco DiFranco Hero Award, in honor of the group of officers who guarded the Columbus statue at Grant Park on July 17, 2020, when demonstrators tried to remove it.
