CNN has been accused of using misleading data from the Gun Violence Archive to claim that the U.S. has surpassed 100 mass shootings in 2023.
According to a report by Breitbart News, both CNN and the Gun Violence Archive have departed from the standard definition for mass shootings, which is based on the FBI’s definition of a “mass murderer” who “kills four or more people in a single incident (not including himself).”
For CNN and the Gun Violence Archive, an incident with no fatalities is still considered a mass shooting.
This means that drive-by shootings, gang hits, homicides, and double homicides are renamed as mass shootings and counted as such.
This has allowed CNN to claim that there have been over 100 mass shootings already in 2023.
Breitbart News pointed out that Newsmax also used figures from the Gun Violence Archive to claim that the U.S. had witnessed over 600 mass shootings in 2022, while The Hill relied on the same data to claim that 609 mass shootings had occurred up to that point in 2022 alone.
However, the Gun Violence Archive’s data showing over 100 mass shootings in 2023 includes approximately 40 incidents in which there were no fatalities, around 25 incidents in which there was one fatality, and roughly 18 incidents in which there were two fatalities.
This departure from the standard definition of mass shootings has been criticized by some as misleading and inaccurate.
