On the afternoon of December 13, 2025, a gunman opened fire inside the Barus & Holley engineering building at Brown University, killing two people and wounding multiple others while final exams were underway. Students were ordered to shelter in place as a massive manhunt unfolded across Providence, leaving a campus that should be a sanctuary feeling like a war zone.
Authorities describe the suspect as a male dressed in black, possibly wearing a mask, who fled the scene and remained at large after confused initial reports that someone had been detained. That early miscommunication — telling frightened students one thing, then retracting it minutes later — is unforgivable in a crisis and only deepens public anxiety.
Local, state and federal agencies converged on the area as law enforcement worked through campus buildings and nearby neighborhoods to track the shooter, with hundreds of officers reported to be involved and the ATF and FBI assisting in the investigation. This scale of response is necessary, but it also highlights how brittle public safety becomes when violence erupts on our institutions of higher learning.
Retired NYPD inspector and Fox News contributor Paul Mauro laid out a blunt, realistic view on how police must think through the manhunt and how images or footage — like those discussed on The Big Weekend Show — can be used to identify suspects quickly. We should support law enforcement with clear priorities and resources, not second-guessing from ivory-tower bureaucrats or attention-seeking pundits who have never handled an active shooter.
Make no mistake: elite institutions that tout openness and soft security policies have to answer for vulnerabilities that allow killers to exploit crowded, lax environments during predictable events like exams. Brown’s own situation — with reports that open access and holiday crowds complicated the search — is a blunt reminder that good intentions are no substitute for common-sense protections.
This latest tragedy is part of a grim national pattern of attacks on schools and public places, and lawmakers who reflexively push more gun restrictions while ignoring criminal intent, mental health failures, and security policy shortcomings are failing the public. Hardworking Americans want leaders who will secure campuses, back the police, and implement real prevention measures — not virtue-signaling speeches that change nothing.
Our thoughts and prayers are with the victims and their families, and conservatives must also turn that sympathy into action: demand accountability from university administrators, insist on sustained support for the officers searching neighborhoods tonight, and press political leaders to stop playing politics and start protecting Americans. If ever there was a time for unity behind law and order, and for practical reforms to keep our children and students safe, it is now.
