Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. visits CDC after Friday’s shooting

U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. visited the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention headquarters in Atlanta Monday in the wake of a deadly shooting near the agency’s Roybal Campus that left both the suspected gunman and a police officer dead.

Police said the suspect opened fire shortly before 5 p.m. Friday from across the street at Emory Point, a mixed-use development near Emory University and the CDC. Bullet damage was seen in the walls and windows of at least four buildings on the CDC campus. And the Associated Press reported Monday that the gunman fired more than 180 shots into the campus and broke about 150 windows. 

The shooting suspect has been identified as 30-year-old Patrick Joseph White of Kennesaw, according to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. Police say he was found dead with gunshot wounds on the second floor of a CVS at Emory Point, but have not released further details about possible motives for the shooting. Reporting from the New York Times and CNN allege that the shooter blamed his health issues on the COVID-19 vaccine. Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. testifies before a Senate Appropriations subcommittee on Tuesday, May 20, 2025. (Screenshot from committee webcast)

Kennedy — who has repeatedly questioned the safety and efficacy of vaccines and promoted widely debunked claims about vaccine harm — toured the campus alongside Deputy HHS Secretary Jim O’Neill and CDC Director Susan Monarez.

“We know how shaken our public health colleagues feel today,” Kennedy said in a statement posted to X the morning after the shooting. “No one should face violence while working to protect the health of others.”

“We are actively supporting CDC staff on the ground and across the agency,” he added. “Public health workers show up every day with purpose — even in moments of grief and uncertainty.”

But some public health workers and advocates have bristled at Kennedy’s statement, arguing that the secretary has fueled public mistrust of vaccines and public health workers, placing CDC employees in greater danger.

Fired But Fighting, a coalition of former U.S. Department of Health Human Services workers and supporters, called for Kennedy to resign from his role as health secretary.

“​​Kennedy is directly responsible for the villainization of CDC’s workforce through his continuous lies about science and vaccine safety, which have fueled a climate of hostility and mistrust,” the group said in a statement. “The ongoing destruction of our public health infrastructure has destroyed the systems meant to prevent tragedies like this from happening. Cuts to CDC’s injury prevention center, including programs to reduce gun violence and support mental health, have put our country at greater risk.” U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff said he was grateful that the committee worked on a bipartisan basis to reject major Trump cuts for the Atlanta-based Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Ross Williams/Georgia Recorder (file photo)

Sen. Jon Ossoff, a Democrat who voted against Kennedy’s confirmation as health secretary, also criticized the Trump administration’s cuts to the agency. 

“The CDC has been under sustained political attack since this administration took power,” Ossoff said. “This is the world’s preeminent epidemiological agency responsible for protecting the American people and the world from deadly disease outbreaks, and the Secretary of Health and Human Services is a notorious crank who has embraced, over the course of his career, countless unfounded conspiracy theories about public health.”

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