Robert F. Kennedy Jr. connected the rise of school shootings with the introduction of Prozac and other drugs, then said he was calling for research into whether psychiatric medications might contribute to violence. At his January 2025 confirmation hearing, he rejected the claim that he had blamed school shootings on antidepressants and said, “I was saying the science needed to be done.” The distinction matters: available evidence cited by experts does not establish that antidepressants cause school or mass shootings.
What did RFK Jr. say about antidepressants and shootings?
In remarks as a nominee for U.S. health secretary, Kennedy said, “It really started happening coterminous with the introduction of these drugs, with Prozac and with other drugs.” The January 29, 2025, confirmation-hearing transcript records that statement and his later explanation that “I was saying the science needed to be done.” These are Kennedy’s words, not findings from a study. C-SPAN’s hearing transcript provides the hearing context.
In later remarks, Kennedy described looking into whether SSRIs or other psychiatric drugs could contribute to violence. At the hearing, however, he disputed the characterization that he had blamed school shootings on antidepressants. Calling his position “blame” is therefore an interpretation of his statements, not a neutral description of what he said in that exchange. Reporting on his subsequent comments and the hearing record is summarized by FactCheck.org and PolitiFact.
Do antidepressants cause school or mass shootings?
The experts quoted in the reviewed reporting say current evidence does not establish that SSRIs or other antidepressants cause school or mass shootings. James Densley, co-founder of the Violence Prevention Project Research Center at Hamline University, told FactCheck.org: “There is no credible evidence that SSRIs or other antidepressants cause school or mass shootings.”
That conclusion is about what the evidence establishes; it is not a claim that every possible medication effect has been ruled out. Research reporting an association between SSRI treatment and broader violent-crime measures does not demonstrate that the medication caused the violence, and it does not directly answer whether antidepressants cause mass shootings.
What do the figures about medication and violence actually measure?
The reported percentages come from different populations, periods, medication categories, and datasets. They should not be compared as if they measured the same thing, and none proves a causal relationship.
Rank #2
| Figure | What it describes | Important limit |
|---|---|---|
| About 4% | U.S. mass shooters in the preceding three decades in an analysis of the Columbia Mass Murder Database who had a history of antidepressant use, as reported by FactCheck.org in 2025. | A history of use is not proof of use near an event or a causal role. This database and its scope differ from the Violence Project database. |
| 7% | U.S. mass shooters in the same Columbia Mass Murder Database analysis with a history of any psychotropic medication, as reported by FactCheck.org in 2025. | This category includes psychotropic medication broadly, not antidepressants alone. |
| 24% | People in the Violence Project database, covering mass shooters from 1966 through 2024, who had taken some prescribed psychiatric medication at some point, as reported by FactCheck.org in 2025. | This is a broader medication category and a different database and period from the Columbia analysis. |
| Fewer than 3% | SSRI users in the Swedish registry study discussed by FactCheck.org who committed a violent crime. | The study concerned violent crime, not mass shootings. Its authors cautioned against using the finding as a reason to withhold treatment. |
For cases with known medication status in the Violence Project database, the reported share with a recorded SSRI tracked the background rate of antidepressant use in the U.S. general population. That comparison is contextual, not proof that medication did or did not cause an individual act. Differences in definitions, whether medication status is known, and whether a record reflects lifetime history or use near an event all affect what the database counts. FactCheck.org explains the database figures and their limits in its analysis.
How common is depression medication use in the United States?
About 11% of U.S. adults took prescription medication for depression in 2023, according to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention figure reported by PolitiFact in 2025. PolitiFact also estimated that this rate represented about 28.85 million U.S. adults. That headcount is PolitiFact’s calculation, combining the CDC rate with the Census Bureau’s adult population estimate; it is not a direct CDC count. Neither figure measures violence or a medication’s effect on it. PolitiFact’s report explains the figures.
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Why the categories matter
“School shooting,” “mass shooting,” “mass violence,” and general violent crime are not interchangeable outcomes. Likewise, SSRIs, all antidepressants, and all psychiatric medications are different categories. A database recording whether someone ever took a medication cannot establish whether they were taking it near an incident, much less whether it caused the incident. Because databases use different inclusion criteria and time periods, their percentages describe their own samples rather than a single comparable rate.
The available reporting supports a careful conclusion: Kennedy raised a possible connection and called for research, but the cited evidence does not establish that antidepressants cause school or mass shootings. Observational associations and medication histories can prompt questions for study; on their own, they cannot answer the causal question.
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