Ask SciCheck Files: The Relationship Between Mental Health and Mass Shootings

In the wake of mass shootings in Buffalo, New York, and Uvalde, Texas, some officials have cited mental illness as a reason for the unprovoked attacks. But as we’ve explained before, having a mental illness isn’t predictive of who will perpetrate a mass shooting.

Back in 2019, we answered a reader question about the relationship between mental illness and mass murder, following two mass shootings in Texas and another in Ohio. At the time, then-President Donald Trump suggested mental illness was one of the primary culprits. “Mental illness and hatred pulls the trigger, not the gun,” he said during a televised address following two of the shootings, which occurred over the same weekend.

Once again, there is another set of mass shootings — and politicians are making similar claims. On May 24, an 18-year-old killed 19 children and two teachers at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas. A week and a half before, another 18-year-old killed 10 people at a grocery store in Buffalo, New York, in a racially motivated attack.

In a speech at the National Rifle Association convention in Texas on May 27, Trump again focused on the role of mental health in mass shootings.

“While we don’t yet know enough about this week’s killing, we know there are many things we must do. We need to drastically change our approach to mental health,” he said, adding, “And clearly we need to make it far easier to confine the violent and mentally deranged into mental institutions.”