What unfolded outside Zellerbach Hall at the University of California, Berkeley was not mere disagreement — it was a coordinated, thuggish attempt to shut down speech and intimidate Americans exercising their constitutional rights. Federal authorities have now opened a formal inquiry into the unrest, a welcome step that should lead to accountability for anyone who used violence to silence others.
Video from the scene shows masked agitators lighting flares, throwing bottles, and turning a campus sidewalk into a war zone while students and attendees tried to get inside, some suffering bloody injuries as a result. Multiple arrests were made amid the chaos, and at least one man required hospital treatment after being struck by a bottle — proof this was more than a protest, it was criminal behavior.
Turning Point USA staff and supporters who were there described being cornered, blocked from getting inside by what witnesses called a deliberately orchestrated blockade, and then physically attacked as they tried to exercise their right to assemble. Andrew Kolvet, the executive producer of The Charlie Kirk Show, rightly called the episode an abomination on national television — language that fits when campus mobs, not campus debate, set the terms.
UC Berkeley’s bland condemnations of violence ring hollow when students who show up peacefully for conservative events are left to fend for themselves while left-wing groups run roughshod over the campus. The university owes its students better than platitudes; it must explain why security failed at the entry points and whether officials did enough to prevent predictable trouble.
Now that the Department of Justice has demanded records and preservation of evidence, the federal government has a chance to show it will protect First Amendment freedoms equally for all Americans, not only for those whose politics align with campus elites. President Trump’s administration and the FBI-led Joint Terrorism Task Force should use every lawful tool to identify outside agitators who treat college campuses like battlegrounds.
At the same time, mainstream media and certain cable hosts who dismiss these events as mere “conspiracy theories” or refuse to call out organized leftist violence deserve scorn; their obfuscation enables the mob by normalizing it and gaslighting the victims. Conservatives will not be gaslit into silence — we demand truth, enforcement of the law, and consequences for those who weaponize disorder to destroy dissent.
This country was built on courage and the free exchange of ideas, not intimidation and street-level authoritarianism from the radical left. Americans — and especially college students who still believe in liberty — should stand with those who were assaulted in Berkeley and insist that universities, law enforcement, and federal prosecutors restore order and protect the basic freedoms our nation depends on.
