“Transgender-identified shootings are becoming more frequent,” Dr. Jennifer Bauwens said on “Washington Watch” Thursday.
In less than three years, there have been three school shootings in which media coverage has shown the shooter to be a gender-confused killer. A fourth shooting, which claimed the life of Charlie Kirk, has a transgender connection, too.
Despite a list of victims, quick internet searches produce stories of misinformation and the statistical improbability of a connection between mass shooters and transgender individuals.
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey similarly defended his local transgender community after a mass shooting event last summer.
“I have heard about a whole lot of hate that’s being directed at our trans community. Anybody who is using this … as an opportunity to villainize our trans community, or any other community out there, has lost their sense of common humanity. We should not be operating out of a place of hate for anyone,” Frey, a Democrat, said.
In Nashville on March 27, 2023, biological female Audrey Hale, 28, presented herself as a male (pictured above)when she shot and killed six people at The Covenant School in Nashville – three nine-year-old students at three staff members.
In Minneapolis last August, Robert Westman, 23, presented himself as a female (pictured below) when he fired more than 100 rounds through stained glass windows at Annunciation Catholic School during a morning Mass. Students eight and 10 years old died. Fourteen more and three elderly parishioners were injured.
In Utah last September, the Kirk shooter, Tyler Robinson, 22, was not known to identify as a biological female, but authorities cited text messages that Robinson allegedly exchanged with his “lover/roommate,” a person they described as a “biological male who was transitioning genders.”
Then, on Tuesday in the Canadian town of Tumbler Ridge in the province of British Columbia, Jesse Van Rootselaar, a biological male presenting as a female, killed two family members before attacking a school and killing six more.
After the Kirk shooting, The Oversight Project, part of The Heritage Foundation before breaking away as an independent organization in early 2025, called on the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to designate Transgender Ideology-Inspired Violent Extremism (TIVE) as Domestic Terrorism.
The facts show the transgender connection for these four shootings, all of which have come at a time in which culture has embraced transgenders, many medical professionals have encouraged gender-mutilation procedures for minors and the previous U.S. presidential administration welcomed transgenders to the White House and honored them with a day of recognition that happened to be on Easter Sunday.
It’s true that Joe Biden gave official recognition to the Transgender Day of Visibility (pictured above), which was established in 2009, every year of his term which began in 2021. But in 2024 the trans recognition – celebrated annually on March 31 – collided with Easter Sunday. Biden, a professing Catholic, could have recognized the transgender community on a different day but did not choose that.
Whatever mental concerns may exist among gender-confused young people are “further complicated by the ideology,” Bauwens told show host Tony Perkins.
It’s not been helpful for children who have expressed gender dysphoria to receive treatment, either chemical or surgical, for those symptoms, said Bauwens, noting that underlying issues are ignored.
Multiplied impact for children
Van Rootselaar began identifying as a female around age 12, according to reports.
He had a history of mental health–related contact with police and may have had access to weapons stored at home. Police said officials visited the residence multiple times in recent years for mental health calls, during which weapons were briefly seized under Canadian Criminal Code but later returned following a petition by the lawful owner, The Associated Press reported.
“This young man that we're talking about, we're talking about a very formidable age where he's going through this identification, and by the way, when you start identifying as transgender, you're essentially disconnecting from who you've been made to be,” Bauwens said.
That disconnect puts confusing emotions in play. Bauwens compares the decision-making process to the side effects any person might experience while taking medicine.
“When you're intentionally disconnecting from yourself, you’re more vulnerable to do things that you wouldn't normally do, and here you have an ideology that's promoting that kind of behavior. Then you have adults who are affirming it and applauding it,” she said.
And the effects are multiplied for children.
“Think how much harder it is for that child to come out from underneath the grip of that,” she said.
