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Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. appeared to suggest without any evidence that antidepressant medication might have played a role in the shooting at a Catholic church in Minneapolis on Wednesday.
Kennedy, who has long speculated that psychiatric drugs play a role in mass shootings, appeared on Fox and Friends on Thursday.
Host Brian Kilmeade asked Kennedy about the fact that the shooter, Robin Westman, reportedly initially identified as “Robert” but later legally changed their name and identified as a woman.
Kennedy responded by saying that the National Institutes of Health would do some of those types of studies before talking about Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRIs), a type of antidepressant.
“We're launching studies on the potential contribution of some of the SSRI drugs and some of the other psychiatric drugs that might be contributing to violence,” Kennedy said.
US Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. shakes hands with US President Donald Trump.(AFP via Getty Images)
No information has been released about whether Westman took SSRI drugs or any other type of antidepressant.
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Westman, who died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound, opened fire at around 8:30 at the church next to Annunciation Catholic School during a mass to celebrate the beginning of the school year.
Two children were shot and killed in the church pews while 14 children and three parishioners were injured.
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But despite the lack of evidence, Kennedy persisted.
“You know, many of them on there have black box, black box warnings that warn of suicidal ideation and homicidal ideation,” Kennedy said. “We can't exclude those as a culprit, and those are the kind of studies that we're doing.”
Sen. Tina Smith (D-Minn.), who lives not too far from Annunciation Catholic School, loudly criticized Kennedy.
“I dare you to go to Annunciation School and tell our grieving community, in effect, guns don’t kill kids, antidepressants do,” she said on X. “Just shut up. Stop peddling bullshit. You should be fired.”
Smith continued by mentioning how America has a problem with the proliferation of guns.
“In America, we are ten times more likely to be shot in a school or playground than any other developed nation,” she said.
Smith has been open about her bouts with depression in the past. During Kennedy’s confirmation hearings, she mentioned how she took a new generation of SSRIs, which helped her.
“I think that everyone should have access to that care and I think everyone should have access to that care and your job as secretary is to expand that access to that care, and not to spread lies and misinformation,” Smith told Kennedy in January.
314 Action, a group focused on recruiting candidates with a background in science, also put out a statement criticizing Kennedy’s remarks.
“RFK Jr. has a sick and twisted view of the world. Instead of promoting mental health and addressing the chronic crisis of gun violence in this country, he’s doubling-down on disinformation. SSRIs and anti-depressants are safe and tested medications,” Executive Director Erik Polyak said in a statement. “They are prescribed all over the world, but America is the only country with a mass-shooting problem.”
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Kennedy, who has no health care background but worked as an environmental lawyer, has long promoted pseudoscience such as the debunked claim that vaccines cause autism.
On Wednesday evening, HHS said that it had fired Centers for Disease Control Director Susan Monarez. But Monarez’s attorneys said she had not been fired. That triggered a series of resignations at the CDC, which is based in Atlanta.