By Lee Williams
SAF Investigative Journalism Project
Gannett’s flagship, USA TODAY, actually warned its shrinking readership that gun owners may call out its staffers for using fake mass-shooting data in their reporting.
In a story published Monday, reporter C. A. Bridges, who writes for the USA TODAY NETWORK, first claimed there have been six mass shootings in Florida this year, “double the number in the state last year at this time.”
Bridges then admitted he got his mass-shooting data from the Gun Violence Archive, or GVA, and he warned that the GVA data could be challenged.
“The GVA numbers, which have been disputed by pro-firearm organizations, may differ from the FBI or CDC as they collect data from more than 5,000 law enforcement, government and media sources,” Bridges wrote.
To be clear, the Gun Violence Archive has been debunked dozens of times for its fake mass-shooting data. Anytime four or more people are even slightly wounded with a firearm the GVA calls it a mass shooting—even if the incident is gang, drug or domestic-dispute related. Initially, politicians, gun control activists and the mainstream media treated the GVA’s reports as if they were gospel, but most now see the ridiculousness of the group’s claims.
In 2023, for example, the GVA claimed there were 656 mass shooting, which equates to 1.79 mass shootings per day. Not even USA TODAY with its once vast resources could have covered all of the mass shootings.
Even the Trace, the propaganda arm of former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg’s anti-gun empire, appears to have stopped using GVA data. Trace staffers turned toward the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention, or CDC, for a story published in 2024. They did not rely upon GVA data.
As to Bridges’ wild claims about the source of GVA’s data, the “5,000 law enforcement, government and media sources,” nothing could be further from the truth.
When I interviewed GVA co-founder and executive director Mark Bryant in 2021, he said his researchers consult a mass of about 7,500 sources, including: law enforcement Twitter, law enforcement Facebook, law enforcement police blotters and media sources. But he admitted that the easiest is to grab were the media sources. Law enforcement is clinical. The media looks more subjectively at an incident.
Bryant deflected blame for the media’s overhyping and misuse of his data.
“If the numbers are misleading, the journalist didn’t do their homework, you could make that argument,” Bryant said during the previous interview. “The media zeroes in on it, not us. At one point we wanted to take mass shootings out of the loop, but the phone started ringing on a daily basis. It’s important to me that we’re not misinterpreted.”
USA TODAY is not the only national media source that still uses GVA’s faulty numbers. CNN maintains the “Mass Shootings in the US Fast Facts,” a webpage where the GVA data is updated, and CNN anchors frequently cite GVA’s numbers.
CNN defines a mass shooting just like the GVA, as “one that injured or killed four or more people, not including the shooter.”
The GVA’s all-inclusive definition is magic for CNN and any other member of the anti-gun media, because it creates much bigger numbers. For example, according to the GVA, there were 417 mass shootings in 2019. The FBI says there were 30, because it uses a much narrower and more realistic definition.
As a result, USA TODAY, CNN and other media outlets who use the GVA data are hooked, because once they publish the false numbers, there is no going back to the truth without a lot of explaining.
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