So, Just How Many Trans Mass Shooters Have There Been?

Intrigued by the overall question of trans violence, I asked the web, "How many trans mass shooters have there been?" "AI" felt it would be important to set me straight before giving an answer:

Data on mass shootings indicate that the vast majority of perpetrators have been cisgender men, with transgender and nonbinary individuals responsible for only a tiny fraction of these crimes. While precise numbers vary depending on the definition of "mass shooting," major research sources show that trans and nonbinary shooters account for less than 2% of the total.

It then gave five names:

• Anderson Lee Aldrich: The nonbinary shooter responsible for the 2022 Club Q shooting in Colorado Springs.
• Audrey Hale: The transgender shooter of the 2023 Covenant School shooting in Nashville, Tennessee.
• Snochia Moseley: The transgender woman involved in the 2018 Rite Aid warehouse shooting in Maryland.
• Alec McKinney: A transgender male involved in the 2019 STEM School Highlands Ranch shooting in Colorado.
• Robert "Robin" Westman: The transgender woman accused of the 2025 Annunciation Catholic Church and school shooting in Minneapolis.

There are at least two possible other candidates.

• Dylan Jesse Butler, who killed three and injured two at a school in Perry, IA in January 2024
• Kimbrady Carriker, who killed five and injured two in Philadelphia in July 2024.

In the case of Dylan Jesse Butler, social media postings and images at least raised the question:

While law enforcement has not commented about the alleged shooter’s gender identity or sexual orientation, social media users focused on the appearance of a Pride flag on an account allegedly linked to the shooter, and it led to a narrative amplified by right-wing influencers online. That account is no longer available, but screen grabs of its content have circulated widely on social media.

Florida Gov Ron DeSantis said,

“This was somebody who was really hopped up on this gender ideology and you saw it in the profile, you know, the media doesn’t want to talk a lot about that because it doesn’t fit their narrative,” DeSantis said in Dubuque on Saturday.

Yahoo! notes that the shooter’s social media account featured “rainbow and transgender flag emojis and an image of graffiti that says ‘LOVE YOUR TRANS KIDS.'”

Regarding Kimbrady Carriker, Rep Marjorie Taylor Greene posted, based on photos in his social media,

Another trans shooter.https://t.co/w8zJ0GLc3e

— Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene🇺🇸 (@RepMTG) July 4, 2023

According to NBC News,

“The suspect has not identified themselves as trans. They have only identified themselves as male,” [member of the LGBTQ advisory committee for the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office Asa] Khalif said at Wednesday’s news conference. “But the language spewed out by the conservative press is violent and is dangerous, and it’s targeting trans women of color. It’s rallying the community to be violent, and we’re better than that.”

Typical discussions of this question say it all depends on what qualifies as a "mass shooting", while almost none say it depends on who qualifies as trans. But trans can mean almost anything. According to Wikipedia,

Transgender does not have a universally accepted definition, including among researchers; it can function as an umbrella term. The definition given above includes binary trans men and trans women and may also include people who are non-binary or genderqueer. Other related groups include third-gender people, cross-dressers, and drag queens and drag kings; some definitions include these groups as well.

. . . Accurate statistics on the number of transgender people vary widely, n part due to different definitions of what constitutes being transgender. Some countries collect census data on transgender people. Canada was the first country to introduce collection of census data on its transgender and non-binary population in 2021. Generally, less than 1% of the worldwide population is transgender, with figures ranging from <0.1% to 0.6%.

There are other questions about other shootings, especially the Pulse Nightclub shooting in Orlando, FL on June 12, 2016. Omar Mateen, a US-born Muslim from an Afghan family, killed 59 and injured 53 at the gay nightclub. According to Wikipedia,

Despite numerous anonymous and named reports of LGBTQ connections, the FBI was unable to verify any claims that Mateen was homosexual or frequented gay bars. The FBI investigation found the witnesses claiming Mateen's homosexuality were mistaken or refused to go on the record, and doubts that Mateen was gay. Law enforcement sources said the FBI found no photographs, text messages, smartphone apps, pornography, or cell tower location data to suggest Mateen lived a gay life, closeted or otherwise.

On the day of the shooting, Mateen's father, Mir Seddique Mateen, said that he had seen his son get angry after seeing a gay couple kiss in front of his family at the Bayside Marketplace in Miami months prior to the shooting, which he suggested might have been a motivating factor. Two days later, after his son's sexual orientation became a subject of speculation, Mateen's father said he did not believe his son was homosexual. Mateen's ex-wife, however, claimed that his father called him gay while in her presence. Speaking on her behalf, her current fiancé said that she, his family, and others believed he was gay, and that "the FBI asked her not to tell this to the American media."

From this, it sounds like the FBI was eager not to be able to verify any claims of Mateen's sexual orientation, which only goes to the issue that both official agencies and legacy media tend to minmimize or gaslight the public over such information. In addition, the lack of any meaningful definition of "trans" makes any verifiable statements about "trans mass shooters" impossible. For instance, was Tyler Robinson trans if he identified as cis male but had a trans partner, if indeed that's how he identified? How in fact did he identify? Does that matter?

Nor was Tyler Robinson a mass shooter; he was simply an assassin. So how do we characterize what's beginning to emerge as growing evidence of LGBTQ+ public violence? In the past few days, I've been able to quantify five definite trans mass shootings plus two possibles, five trans arsons, and two more if we add perps who are at least maybe this or that. The numbers just keep growing.

A better term might be "LGBTQ+ performative violence".