Show: ALL IN with CHRIS HAYES Date: December 2, 2015 Guest: Shannon Watts, Jim Cavanaugh, Al Shaprton CHRIS HAYES, MSNBC HOST: Thank you, Chris. All right. It is 8:00 p.m. here in the East, 5:00 p.m. on the West. And if you`re just joining us, if you`ve been looking at the Internet today, you know there`s been a horrific mass shooting. It`s the worst mass shooting in this country since Sandy Hook that killed more than two dozen children in a school. That mass shooting today taking place at the Inland Regional Center. It`s a Social Security nonprofit with over 600 employees. It serves 35,000 people. Many of them with developmental challenges. It appears the target of the mass shooting was a conference center inside that facility in San Bernardino, a conference center that had been rented out for the day to the county Department of Health, which was holding, essentially, a Christmas banquet. Reports that as many as 200 people were in that room, around 11:20 local time, when we are told three gunmen burst into that room and started firing with long guns. Some reports say they had masks on. Others indicate they may have been wearing, though that is as yet to be confirmed, some sort of bulletproof vests or armor. The three gunmen managed to escape what soon became an absolutely chaotic scene. First responders coming to the facility and offering triage right there out in front of the facility, and right now, the latest is that three of those suspects, one has been killed by police in a shoot-out in an SUV, one was possibly shot by police, but is in custody, and a third remains at large. That live helicopter shot you`re looking at right now as it hovers over San Bernardino, California, is capturing an ongoing manhunt as police continue to search the area, not very far from the scene of this crime, for that final, we believe final, remaining suspect. Again, at this hour, one suspect is at large. One suspect was shot and is in police custody. And one suspect, we believe, is deceased. Earlier, the police encountered an SUV, you see that on the right, a shoot-out began between the police and the men inside that vehicle. One of the suspects, it appears, was able to get out of that vehicle and flee. Two remain behind. One of them dying inside the vehicle. The squad teams that were calling on to the scene incredibly careful with how they went about extracting that body, worried about possible booby traps. Early in the day, as chaotic reports streamed in, as dozens and hundreds of employees were evacuated to the nearby golf course. We saw pictures of people being searched, their hands above their head. We saw people lying on the ground being tended to with gunshot wounds. Amidst all this chaos, rumors begun to circulate with reports of multiple gunmen. Often, often in these cases, reports of multiple gunmen proved to be incorrect. There`s a great deal of skepticism and weariness that it could, in fact, be multiple gunmen, but as of this hour, it does appear that there were, in fact, three gunmen, one of whom remains at large and you can see some of the law enforcement officials from San Bernardino, now moving out through residential areas, in back alleys. We saw them searching yards and houses. The county sheriff`s office has instructed residents to remain inside with their doors closed. Joining me now, I want to go to NBC`s Blake McCoy, who is at the scene of today`s shooting. And, Blake, what is the latest there? BLAKE MCCOY, NBC NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Well, Chris, we`re only about a mile or two away from where that very active search is underway right now. You can see the precaution as those law enforcement officers are taking in heavy armor, and they`re moving slowly and methodically through that neighborhood with dogs sniffing, leading the way in the search for this third suspect. And they`re being very careful because the reports we have are these three suspects who opened fire in this regional center were, themselves, in tactical gear and opened fire with what we`re told are long guns -- law enforcement not speculating on what type of guns, but long guns. And 14 people killed, 17 people injured. It was about four hours later, after the shooting, that that SUV was tracked down. Officers had reports that the suspects got away in a black SUV. They were able to get an ID on that vehicle and it`s only a mile or two away from where we are right now. Officers from across the region were already here, responding to the shooting at the building about two blocks behind me. They all hightailed their way over to that neighborhood. That`s where the shoot-out happened with that SUV. It is riddled with bullets. The official word from officers is two suspects in that vehicle are down. That`s their words. We don`t know if one was killed, both were killed, but two down. And they did see one then run off into the neighborhood. And that`s why they have that neighborhood on lockdown, warning residents to stay inside, while they try to track down this third suspect. HAYES: Blake McCoy, thank you very much. We`ll be checking back in with you. I want to let viewers know, in that corner there, if we can bring up the shot of the live press conference, we`ve been getting updates periodically throughout the day from local officials in San Bernardino about things. We are awaiting a police press conference just in a few minutes and are hoping, expecting some more concrete information -- concrete information today has been very hard to come by, partly because this has remained, until this hour, essentially an active shooter situation. I mean, we have had a shooting followed by the three suspects managing to escape the scene, followed by those suspects being encountered by law enforcement, followed to now a manhunt for the lone remaining suspect. And everything that has happened today has been baffling and confusing and chaotic and has not gone along with any preordained scripts. I mean, the target makes no sense. The three individuals working together, all of it right now, at this hour, a just complete horrifying mystery. NBC`s Tom Costello has been following the story from the newsroom in Washington. And, Tom, are we closer to making sense of what is going on here? TOM COSTELLO, NBC NEWS CORRESPONDENT: I think we`re getting a better sense. Law enforcement authorities, at least on the federal end of things, are getting a better sense of how this may have gone down, but not all of it, I would tell you, do we have to the point that we can report it. I think what we can say here is that law enforcement authorities here in Washington believe that that building, the inland regional center, which as you know, was a community center of sorts for people with developmental disabilities, that that building itself was targeted because of the people were inside at the time. In other words, this was not a random choice. This was on purpose. And that it is highly unlikely that this was any sort of jihadi type of terrorism. That, instead, what we may be looking at is something where individuals within that building for some reason were targeted. But beyond that, we`re waiting for more solid information from federal authorities. Throughout the day, as you know, there`s been this concern that we may be witnessing some sort of a domestic ISIS terror attack. I`ll tell you, the thinking in Washington from senior law enforcement officials is that that is unlikely, that this is something perhaps more personal, but we don`t have anymore information than that. We`ll get it to you as soon as we do. But the fact that this neighborhood now is entering into the nighttime hours -- imagine if that was your family, your children, your spouse in one of those homes tonight, when you got a mass killer on the loose, who has already killed 14 people, 17 people wounded, and he is in your neighborhood. Imagine the terror that you would be experiencing right now, with these armed units of police patrol cars, SWAT teams, helicopters overhead, cruising and searching for this suspect. And then imagine the anxiety on the ground if you`re in charge of these SWAT teams, helicopters overhead and this roving police unit, you want to find this guy before he takes somebody hostage or does -- or inflicts even more pain or injures or kills anybody else. So, it is a very, very high-stakes game that we`re witnessing right now. This is not Hollywood. This is real life, life and death, in which people have died already. And a masked killer is on the loose right now -- Chris. HAYES: All right. Tom Costello, thank you for that. I want to reemphasize something Tom said because in the proximity, of course, to the mass murder in Paris and, of course, in the times we live in, immediate thoughts about whether some jihadi group could be responsible for this. There is no definitive reporting in either direction, but we want to reiterate what Tom said, which is the thinking among law enforcement is that it is unlikely to prove to be jihadi terrorism. A quote earlier today from a law enforcement official from San Bernardino who basically said, this is no indication of, I think we believe he said, the traditional type of terrorism you may be imagining. I think his way of communicating there was no indication, and I think there is now indication against, though nothing definitive this may be this work of some kind of jihadi cell or some kind of jihadi group. The motivation for shooting up a Christmas banquet in a midst of a nonprofit surgeon social service agency in a city in the Inland Empire in California, in the poorest city of its size in all of California, the motivation for this horrific act remains completely, completely opaque at this moment. It`s part of what is both so baffling and enraging and terrifying as we go into the night local time with that manhunt still active. I want to bring in NBC`s Jacob Soboroff who is on the scene. And, Jacob, can you give me a sense of what it looks like there as police are left to essentially search block by block for this last remaining suspect. JACOB SOBOROFF, NBC NEWS: That`s exactly what`s going on, Chris. This neighborhood, this local residential neighborhood which a local resident just told me just second ago, is usually pretty mellow is completely shut down by law enforcement personnel. These sheriff`s deputies, I just heard them tell a resident who was trying to drive home, she can`t drive home but she can park her car and walk down the block, a block down in that direction, which is east from where we are, sheriff`s deputies told me to step back, because they`re expecting even explosives -- potential explosives to be found and they said, find a place where you can take shelter. So I`ve come back about a block away from where we were originally stationed. We saw heavily, heavily armed tactical officers, like we`ve been seeing from the sky all day long. The position I`m in, Chris, is about directly in the middle of the Inland Regional Center where the shooting happened this morning and where the standoff with the suspects happened later on this afternoon. And as you said, it is an all points bulletin here for the remaining suspect if there is one. HAYES: All right. Jacob, thank you. I want to touch on something Jacob just said, because throughout the day, there have been numerous reports. And I want to reiterate the fact that in these situations, it`s a particularly chaotic one, initial reports are sometimes erroneous, or unconfirmed. So, I want to let you know that we`ve been hearing and what we`re able to definitively confirm. Throughout the day, there have been fears of IEDs. There`s been some scanner reports of calling in bomb-disarming robots. There had been reports about. Obviously, they treated the SUV with tremendous care, on the off-chance it was rigged in some way. Jacob just mentioned the fear of some possible explosives being around. We have no definitive confirmation that any of those have been encountered, but there have been reports of that. That`s what our knowledge of that stands at the moment. Again, we are awaiting a police presser at this moment, as the manhunt continues. Hoping that we are going to get a little bit more definitive information about who these suspects are, the state of the many injured who have been rushed to area hospitals, the last count was 17 injured, 14 dead. That`s 14 fatalities today, as of now, at this moment, the most since Sandy Hook. I want to bring in NBC News justice correspondent, Pete Williams, who`s been working this story with his sources all day. And, Pete, any indication from law enforcement on what direction this investigation, still in its infancy has taken? PETE WILLIAMS, NBC NEWS JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, there`s a preliminary sense of it, Chris. The initial feeling is and this is the working assumption is that this was, in fact, some sort of workplace violence shooting, that the source -- the people who fired the shots chose that building because of the people who were inside. That it was not a random thing, that it was not a desire merely to shoot some people to make a point, that that was chosen on purpose because of a dispute involving the people inside. Now, that, as I say, is a working assumption, and sometimes investigations go down one road and that turns out to be a blind alley and they go in a different direction. But that`s their assumption at this point, that it`s, in other words, not some sort of internationally inspired or jihadist kind of terrorism. HAYES: There is reports, and again, this is not confirmed by NBC News as of yet, there are reports from the "L.A. Times," which is an excellent news organization, has been working this story, it`s in their backyard, that a dispute at a holiday gathering may have sparked the mass shooting. That, in fact, there may be some indications that there was actually some kind of argument, someone left and came back. But, again, Pete, what you`re saying jives with that and Tom Costello`s, again, in the preliminary working assumptions, there was not an act of violence as a kind of political or ideological statement. WILLIAMS: Right. I think I`m basically saying the same thing the "L.A. Times" is. Now, as to whether this person was there earlier and came back, I don`t -- I don`t know about that part. The part that`s a little hard to square with that is that there was an argument and somehow three people came back to shoot. It doesn`t seem right. HAYES: Right. WILLIAMS: That seems like it was more planned than that. It may be that the individual went in to see if someone was there, that he was mad at and came back and this had been planned for some time. But the point here is, without getting into that level of detail, which we just don`t know if is true or not, it does appear to be workplace violence and not some type of internationally-inspired or jihad-style terrorism. In other words, not a Paris-style attack. HAYES: All right. Pete Williams, thank you. We`ll be checking back in, of course. Joining me now on the phone from San Bernardino, MSNBC national correspondent, Trymaine Lee. Trymaine has been out there are if several hours, watching this all unfold. And I got to imagine that law enforcement has been pretty afraid. It`s been an unbelievably difficult day there. TRYMAINE LEE, MSNBC NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (via telephone): That`s right, Chris. There was a moment an hour and a half or so go when the scene took a dramatic turn. After an hour or so of relative calm, they were pushing reporters back another block further up. But there was a moment when I saw two officers running towards their vehicle. One had an assault-style rifle in his hand, jumped in the car and sped off, actually kind of fishtailing around the corner, that`s how fast they were going, followed by another car and another car and another car. And it was right before or as the shoot-out and standoff was unfolding a few miles away. So, certainly, what had been a sad and a dramatic day continues to be dramatic and sad. Now, I also spoke with a few people who had loved ones inside the center at the time of the shooting. And to kind of piggyback on the idea of just how frightening this ordeal has been and how terrifying it has been, to have these suspects still on the loose and these people weren`t getting much information from police, they still hasn`t had their loved ones in their arms. I mean, I spoke to one gentleman named Mr. Gutierrez. His wife is a director inside the center and he said that she called him and he could hear the chaos in the background, as she and a group of her colleagues, you know, hid in an office and barricaded the door with desks. And now, she said she saw a heavyset man dressed in all black with a mask on his face and a big gun firing at people a floor or two below them. And so, to say it`s been a terrifying deal is kind of understating it. Especially, again, as you mentioned, at least one suspect is still at large. HAYES: All right. Trymaine, I want to go now I want you to stay with us the hospital is now giving a press conference. We`re still awaiting a police press conference, but let`s listen into what the hospital is saying. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: -- just as a precaution to ensure the safety of our patients and staff. I`m sorry, go ahead? REPORTER: Family members might know victims. How are they supposed to get any information from you? UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The families of the victims have been notified and have been directed where to go. I can`t determine where any of the patients came from, whether or not they were law enforcement or not. REPORTER: Are some of your patients well enough yet to share what they know with law enforcement? UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Well, two of the victims are -- I`m sorry, let me refer to my notes on the conditions. We have two critical but stable, two are in Fair, and one is still being assessed. REPORTER: So has the Fair been able to speak with law enforcement and share information? UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I am not aware of whether or not they`ve spoken with law enforcement or not. REPORTER: Do we know the gender of these patients? UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, five adult patients. REPORTER: Where did everybody else go? UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: As far as hospitals? I would imagine that there are a couple other hospitals in the area. I can`t comment on what other hospitals were involved. HAYES: All right. That`s an update from Loma Linda hospital, where some of the victims of today`s shooting in San Bernardino have been taken. We have 14 fatalities, 17 injuries, 10 critical, I believe. Also, on top of that, one officer, who appears to have been wounded in the shoot-out with the suspects. That officer`s injuries sustained are nonlife- threatening, we are told at this hour. We are still awaiting a police press conference that we are hoping to find out more information. The latest is that two suspects are, quote, "down", meaning two suspects have said essentially immobilized in some fashion. There were earlier reports that one may be dead and one may have been injured in the shoot-out with police in an SUV that was, again, encountered just a mile or two from where all of this originally went down, which was, I think, surprising to a lot of folks, imagining that the people who had pulled this off and managed to get away would be far away. They were not. They were in the area. They were encountered by police. A shoot-out ensued. What you`re seeing is what happened after that shoot-out. That SUV having been riddled with bullets, being surrounded by various SWAT vehicles, which hold it in place, later on, a vehicle would come in with a shield on it and would essentially draw out what appeared to be a body out of that SUV. We imagine that body, you see it right there, was, indeed, of one of the suspects. A third suspect at this hour remains at large. And, of course, that is the priority right now for law enforcement and may explain why we have the delay that we have. We are recovering from a mass shooting just a few days ago that happened in Colorado Springs at a Planned Parenthood facility. There has been political debate about whether that assault should be labeled domestic terrorism. Three people shot and killed by a suspect, it appears, allegedly named Robert Dear, who is in custody. That is still in the headlines on this day that we have the worst mass shooting since Newtown Sandy Hook. We have had and there`s some debate over how mass shootings are classified in this country, but if you count them as shootings in which four or more people are shot, we have had over 350 mass shootings in this country. We are on day, I believe it, 336, more mass shootings than days in the year so far this year. Joining me now, Shannon Watts, founder of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, also part of Everytown for Gun Safety. Well, what`s your shooting on a day like today? SHANNON WATTS, MOMS DEMAND ACTION FOR GUN SENSE IN AMERICA: It`s shocking. It`s terrifying. I`m angry. But most of all, I`m angry that our lawmakers haven`t acted. How long can we go on as a country with a mass shooting every single week? It`s not a tenable situation and we will win this fight for lawmakers to pass gun laws. The question is, how long are we going to wait? How many lives will be lost? HAYES: What do you say to people who say, you`re still here right now, there are still bodies in the hospital, the situation is still at large, that this is essentially opportunistic to talk about gun legislation at this time? WATTS: I and so many other Americans in this country will never be silent again after Sandy Hook. The gun lobby wants us to be silent. They`re always saying, it`s too soon to talk about these shootings. It`s not too soon. It`s too late for the victims of San Bernardino. I had a mom whose daughter was a victim in the Sandy Hook shooting text me on my way here and say, please, beg them to act, in my daughter`s memory. HAYES: From the San Bernardino shooting? WATTS: The Sandy Hook mom saw this and, you know, these survivors can`t believe we`re letting this go on. HAYES: But we talk about gun safety legislation in the wake of something like this and the natural sort of question that ensues is, well, first of all, we have no idea how these individuals obtain these guns. It`s possible they obtain them legally in California. And California is a state with relatively stringent gun safety legislation, particularly compared to a place like, say, Alabama, or Georgia, right? Texas, for instance. You know, what do you say to folks who say, look, there`s just no matching the but-for cause and effect of whatever happened in this individual situation and whatever legislation you might be proposing? WATTS: First of all, the details are still unfolding, but guns can cross state lines, just like cars do. You`re only as strong and safe as the neighboring state. Nevada, for example, where we`re trying to pass background checks, they have very weak gun laws. So, this is a national problem that requires a national solution. And the fact that our Congress hasn`t acted in the wake of these tragedies is shameful. HAYES: I believe the Black Friday this year set a record for the number of federal background checks that were run for the purchase of guns. I want to let people know what they`re seeing. This is earlier today, that facility, the Inland Regional Center is a massive facility, 600 employees, a huge amount of people coming in and out. Took a very long time to evacuate. It was evacuated in a pretty remarkable fashion by law enforcement arriving at the scene. But there`s a golf course across the street, and at one point, folks were essentially taken out of that building, in that now chillingly familiar line, where people come out with their hands up. We`ve seen it at mass shooting after mass shooting after active shooter after active shooter situation, at one point coming out hands up. At this point, they were being searched by police, law enforcement officials, who still at that point did not know who the shooters were or where they were. So, that`s what you`re seeing from earlier today, as that procession was led out through the parking lot, some taken to the golf course, some given triage right there in the intersection, right out in front of there. But -- so when you think about the policy response, when you think about the Black Friday numbers, part of the issue here is the availability, part of it is just it strikes me that whatever you do at the margins, the sort of driving effect here is this country has a very profound gun culture where lots of guns are manufactured and lots of guns are bought and there`s lots of people with 20 or 30 guns and they want to have those 20 or 30 guns. There`s probably who shouldn`t have guns who do and there are people who probably are no threat to others and do have guns. What is the solution past these sort of low hanging fruit items like the ones you`re talking about? WATTS: Background checks, full stop. You`re talking about guns sold through federally licensed dealers. Millions of guns are sold every year with absolutely no background check, to very dangerous people. And it`s perfectly legal. You know, if more guns made it safer, we`d be the safest country in the world. In fact, we have 20 times the gun murder rate of other developed nations. So, it`s an experiment that failed. We`ve let the gun lobby write our gun laws. It didn`t work, it`s time to take our country back and to fight and say, you know, Congress, you`re going to do what we say or you`re not going to have your job. HAYES: It will be interesting to see if there is political momentum for that. Today, we should note, just to give a little sense as you`re watching live shots of the manhunt that`s still continuing as we await the press conference from the police and law enforcement officials there, just give you a sense, a little bit, of some of the political reaction that happened today. This was President Obama in the midst of a pre-scheduled interview with CBS` Norah O`Donnell, as this was unfolding, being asked a about the situation. Here`s what he had to say. All right, joining us now -- do we have from Loma Linda Medical Center in San Bernardino, where many of today`s victims are being treated, NBC News correspondent Morgan Radford. Morgan, we got a little bit of information in that press conference earlier, what can you tell us? MORGAN RADFORD, NBC NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Well, based on the press conference that happened just moments ago, we know that 17 overall were injured, but of those 17, 5 adults were brought here to the Loma Linda Medical Center. Now, of those five adults, two were critical, two were fair, and one is still being assessed. Now, at 2:30, there was a code yellow bomb threat that was called right here at the hospital behind me while I was standing here. But then a K-9 assessment team went inside. They realized that bomb threat was not, in fact, credible. It was lifted then at 3:30. The press office says that they are going back now to business as usual, although they do not expect anymore victims to come to this hospital after today`s shooting. The press office would not confirmed whether or not one of the victims was brought here was, in fact, an officer, but an eyewitness did say an officer suffered nonlife-threatening injuries from today`s shooting was brought here, just within the past two hours. So, we`re also waiting to hear from the family members. Lots of family members have come to this hospital, waiting, Chris, for any word on their loved ones. HAYES: Morgan, thank you very much for that. That`s useful what you said about the bomb threat. There were numerous reports throughout the day and it`s useful to know when those reports have been knocked down. Again, we are awaiting this police presser. I have to say, if you`re watching this, as we`ve watched this unfold all day, there`s a certain numbness that has set in, I think, among many people, many observers, people even in the news business on what we call mass shootings day. Those are days we come to the office and at some point during the day, we get word that someone has engaged in a mass shooting somewhere in this country, whether that`s in Colorado springs in Planned Parenthood, whether it`s at a community college in Oregon, as happened recently as well. Today unfolded in a particularly horrific way, and particularly baffling way. The initial report of multiple shooters were baffling when people didn`t think this target appeared to be any kind of plausible ideological or terroristic target and yet there were multiple shooters. The fact that this was a county health department that was holding this banquet in this conference call inside the Inland Region Center, which is a social service agency, who if you go on Twitter, was celebrating Christmas holiday party with the people they serve yesterday. These are people that do tremendously thankless and important work, working with folks, many who have developmental challenges. You can see some of the victim that was online, as they celebrated and sang yesterday at the holiday party. The target is just so inconceivable. And the fact that there were three suspects, the fact that those three suspects managed to escape the scene, also inconceivable. The fact that those three suspects then proceed to stay in the area, and were ultimately encountered by police, who then engaged in a shoot-out with them, one of whom remaining at this hour at large, as police continue a manhunt through the streets, block by block in San Bernardino. You can see there in the lower right-hand corner, we are preparing, hopefully, any minute now, for word from law enforcement to give us the latest update. The latest numbers -- 14 dead, 17 injured, 10 critical, one officer also injured. Although as Morgan Radford was just reporting from outside Loma Linda hospital, that officer`s injuries to be nonlife-threatening, though sustained during that prolonged shoot-out that happened with that SUV. It appears that we`re going to get the public information officer from law enforcement just any moment now to comment and tell us the latest on what is going on. Presumably, by the time this night is over, we will have the identities, at least, of some of the suspects confirmed imagine at this hour, law enforcement is tracing back their information. We have also with me now, for the latest on that manhunt, MSNBC`s Jacob Soboroff, who is in the area around which police are swarming, as they try to track down the individual that got away, apparently from that confrontation earlier. What`s going on there, Jacob? SOBOROFF: So, I don`t know if you can just see, Chris, but we saw another black and white cruise right by us. But this is a fluid situation, and as a matter of fact, this one block, which was, as you said, swarmed with police just a minute ago, the law enforcement presence has virtually evaporated from this intersection, just a block that way, I would say less than half an hour ago, two or three heavily armed tactical vehicles in addition to just an ordinary Chevy Silverado pickup truck filled with law enforcement officials with assault weapons in their hands were virtually going door to door looking for someone. One of them had said to me that I should quote/unquote, take shelter because of the potential for explosives to be in this neighborhood. Why there would be explosives in this neighborhood, we do not know. We cannot confirm.
But, you know, it is clear that law enforcement officials and agencies here on the ground are preparing for the worst.
HAYES: Jacob is out there in the streets near where that manhunt is happening obviously at this hour, a tremendously tense situation for the residents in San Bernadino and also law enforcement who are trying to apprehend this final suspect, final suspect who was, allegedly, was the person involved in this just absolutely terrifying and horrific mass shooting that happened earlier today and as yet completely inexplicable tragedy, but for, of course, the centrality of the fact of the long guns in their hands, the only thing we really do know for sure was that the bullets within the from the guns into the bodies of the folks they killed.
Jim Cavanaugh is an MSNBC law enforcement analyst, a retired special agent in charge of the ATF. And Jim, you spent years doing hostage negotiations with folks. And you got to be thinking law enforcement at this point is probably tremendously worried about the possibility of that being how this plays out, as they try to find that final suspect?
JIM CAVANAUGH, MSNBC LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Exactly, Chris, that`s the main concern right now, the on-scene commanders, is that this guy is desperate, he`s left the vehicle that he was in. He`s got a long gun. He might have, you know, a lot of armor and other handguns. And he might car jack somebody, break into a house, take somebody hostage. You know, he doesn`t have a lot of good options. He`s already been involved in a vicious mass murder. I mean, this is as violent as it gets.
And nightfall has come, so he has a little bit of darkness advantage. We`re probably going to hear of him trying to carjack somebody or get into a house, but he could do it. He could be inside somewhere.
HAYES: The images you just saw we believe people coming off the bus at the hospital that are also, I should say, this -- throughout the late afternoon, early evening local time, folks reuniting in a place called The Hernandez Center in San Bernardino County, where officials had told folks to go to go reconnect with loved ones. There`s -- obviously hundreds of people that worked at that building, thousands more who have moved through that center to use its services and a tremendous amount of worried calls and anxiety today throughout the day.
Folks reconnecting at the Hernandez center as the officials go through who exactly is accounted for. It appears, at this moment, that we know, or at least officials know -- the names have not been released -- who the dead are, who the wounded are, all of that had been accounted for.
What has not been accounted for, as Jim Cavanaugh was making mention of a moment ago, is that last suspect, as we await this police presser.
Jim, you were talking earlier today, talk a little bit about part of the strangeness of watching this story unfold. When we heard multiple shooters in the day, I think a lot of folks, both in law enforcement and people who have reported on these situations in the past, immediately had a skeptical reaction to this being possible, multiple shooters. Explain why that kind of skepticism was there in the beginning?
CAVANAUGH: Well, when you have a lot of these mass shootings by someone who is bent on revenge or is involved in a mental health issue, it`s hard, usually, for that person to get others to help them in their desire for mass murder. When you see -- it`s not impossible and it sometimes happen. Columbine is an example, the D.C. snipers. Sometimes we see it, but most of the time, those are single actors on workplace violence, on mass shooting events like Planned Parenthood the other day.
But when you get into more political motives, you can get multiple actors, because there`s a real dedication to murder here.
Now, I still think, Chris -- and you`ve discussed this earlier, but I still think the motives remain open, as they were earlier. Revenge or power. Power, which would encompass a terrorism or political motive, like, say, domestic terrorists, for example.
I agree with Pete Williams, that I don`t think there`s anything to indicate at all that this definitely does not look like anything that any kind of ISIS, Daesh, al Qaeda types would commit. So, I think that`s way off the table.
But I don`t think it`s out domestically, a domestic one, or a revenge motive.
When someone goes out and gets people to act with them on a murder like this, they may already be members of a criminal gang who can easily get help from other criminal gang members to do a murder. So, that`s one possibility, if you have a revenge, or you can have some family members who would help you exact revenge. Or you can have a political motive, a power motive, to attack a certain group of people for a certain reason...
HAYES: Jim, I`m going to stop you right there, because we are seeing law enforcement officials assemble at the microphones there in San Bernardino.
We have been awaiting, anxiously, a press conference and it appears it`s beginning now. Let`s take a listen.
JARROD BURGUAN, SAN BERNADINO POLICE: So this is the second official press conference we`ll do on this. I`m not going to go through all of the details that we went through in the first press conference. But I will say this: since that time, we are still working on the building here at the Inland Regional Center.
As officers were searching the building, we mentioned in the first press conference that there were some suspicious devices. One of those devices is believed to potentially be an explosive device. So they`re taking a very cautious, very slow approach to processing that building and rendering that safe.
So I would imagine we`re going to be here for several hours, as the bomb squad continues to work that part.
On the investigative side, we have followed up on some tips that took us to a residence in the city of Redlands. When officers were setting up on that residence to watch it, there was a vehicle that was seen leaving that was suspected of possibly being involved.
There ended up being a pursuit of that vehicle and eventually, that pursuit came back to San Bernardino Avenue between Mountain View and Richardson, here in the city of San Bernardino, where the suspect vehicle stopped and there was an officer-involved shooting.
We had multiple officers that were involved in the shooting. We have two suspects that are dead at the scene, one is a male, one is a female. We had one police officer that was wounded. He has injuries that are not considered to be life threatening and he is at a local hospital that is expected to be okay.
Of the suspects that were dead at the scene, one is a male, one is a female. They were dressed in kind of assault-style clothing, I think is probably the best way to term it. They were both armed with assault rifles. They were both armed with handguns. And there`s also some kind of sensitive stuff around the vehicle that they`re just not real sure -- they`re taking a very cautious approach to dealing with the vehicles in case there`s more explosives there.
With that, I`m going to turn it over to Dave Boditch with the FBI to talk about some parts of the investigation.
DAVID BOWDICH, FBI: Thank you, chief.
So, first off, my name is -- my name is David Bowditch. I`m the assistant director in charge of the FBI here in the Los Angeles field office.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Can you spell that?
BOWDICH: B-O-W-D-I-C-H.
First off, we want to extend our true sadness to the families of the victims. There are many, many victims who were involved here. Some are obviously deceased, others are wounded and being treated as we speak. This is truly a tragedy in our country, and we will continue to apply all the resources necessary to assure that both us, the sheriff`s department, the San Bernardino Police Department, as well as the ATF work this thing together to assure that we have chased down every lead to solve this case.
Secondly, we are bringing in FBI resources. We have agents on a house in Redlands, California, right now. That house, as we know, we do not know the contents of what`s in that house, but previous active shooter incidents have shown us that there are times when devices are left behind. We do not have any indications there are devices, to my knowledge, but we certainly are going to proceed very cautiously into that house to preserve life and limb of our employees.
We`re bringing evidence response teams in to work hand in hand with our state and local partners on the officer-involved shooting scenes, as well as the scene here, where we have multiple victims, as well as the house. We will continue to go down this road. This is a marathon, not a sprint.
I know one of the big questions that will come up repeatedly is, is this terrorism? And I am still not willing to say that we know that for sure. We are definitely making some movements that it is a possibility. We are making some adjustments to our investigation. It is a possibility, but we don`t know that yet.
And we`re not willing to go down that road yet.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: David, the relationship between the two dead suspects?
BOWDICH: Unknown at this point.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: How old, approximately, are they?
BOWDICH: I do not even know that.
UNIDENIFIED FEMALE: What about the third suspect, or the possible third suspect?
BOWDICH: There is a third suspect. And I don`t know the disposition of that suspect. I would defer that question to the chief.
What I will tell you on any indications of terrorism for this investigation, and I`ve told a few of you already, we will go where the evidence takes us. It`s possible it goes down that road. It`s also possible it does not.
We`re just not sure yet. And when we are fairly sure, we will let you know.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What gives you the sense that it`s -- possibly terrorism?
BOWDICH: There are a number of potential things -- there`s a few potential things, but we just don`t know. And I`m not willing to go down that road. This is a very fluid, active investigation. We are still gathering facts, we are still gathering some of these facts ourselves, because the scene is strewn throughout the city into and into another city and it`s incredibly fluid.
And that`s the way these things -- we`ll get there when we get there.
(CROSSTALK)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: ...information about the identity of the third suspect, a description, anything?
BURGUAN: I should have included that when I talked a moment ago. So, as I said, we had an officer involved shooting on San Marino (ph) Avenue between Mountain View and Richardson. There were two people in the vehicle, both people of those people are deceased.
There was a third person that was seen running away. We do not know if they were involved. We have that person detained.
I don`t have any information on who that person is yet, and we certainly do not know if they were involved. It`s possible that they were not.
In addition to that, and the reason we put things out on social media, that we asked for people to shelter in place in those neighborhoods is because there were some folks that called in and had reported that they heard somebody jumping fences and they reported some of that activity in the neighborhood.
We don`t know if that was possibly responding officers, but we took a cautious approach, we locked down the neighborhood, we asked people to shelter in place, and we searched that neighborhood extensively.
As of a couple of minutes ago, we just got word that that search has been wrapped up, no additional folks have been contacted or seen there, so we feel that that area is safe and we can lift that shelter in place order there.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Is the search over?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And why this location?
BURGUAN: We do not have a motive.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Approximate age of the suspects?
BURGUAN: We do not -- I do not have that right now, do not -- keep in mind that I said that there were some things that were causing the officers to take a very, very cautious approach in approaching those suspects. And so we just are not that far into the investigation yet.
(CROSSTALK)
BURGUAN: I`m sorry?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The possibility that these suspects might have been wearing suicide vests or something similar?
BURGUAN: I don`t know. I have not heard suicide vests, no.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you believe that this whole situation is all clear, that people are safe, or there`s still more shooters potentially out there?
BURGUAN: We feel confident about the neighborhood where the officer- involved shooting took place, that we have secured that and there`s nobody outstanding there. We`re reasonably confident on that.
On the broader scale of the investigation, as I said early on, we had information that there were potentially three shooters. We are still at a point where we are tracking down that information. We`re going to trying to continue to identify if there was a third person involved or potentially even more people that might have been involved in the planning. But we`re still pretty early on that part of the investigation.
(CROSSTALK)
BURGUAN: I can`t listen to all of them.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Chief, there`s a report out that at the holiday party, somebody left angrily, went out, came back with two other people, guns, and started firing. Any proof to that?
BURGUAN: So, there -- I have heard that they were in a meeting or a holiday party type event at the Inland Regional Center, somebody did leave, but we have no idea if that is the person that came back.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, so that`s a possibility?
BURGUAN: Somebody did leave. There was some type of dispute or something when somebody left that party, but we have no idea if those are the people that came back.
UNIDENIFIED MALE: do you have any idea of what kind of weapons were recovered at the -- you said long guns initially...
BURGUAN: They were assault-style weapons.
UNIDENIFIED FEMALE: Chief, are there...
BURGUAN: AK series...
BURGUAN: Yeah, that type of weapon.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Are there explosives, sir, near that black SUV? Currently?
BURGUAN: There was a report that they potentially threw what is identified as a pipe bomb. I think we`ve rendered that device safe. It was not an explosive. I think we`re working on the vehicle and making sure that is safe.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: can you give us anything on description of these suspects? Their appearance, anything, age?
BURGUAN: Just the way it was described to me, and I said this in the first press conference they came dressed and equipped. And I think the people we have at the scene that are deceased are dressed in that way. They`re dressed in dark, kind of tactical gear, I think is the best way I`ll put it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Ethnicity, anything like that? Do you have any information on that?
BURGUAN: I don`t know.
I didn`t say we served a search warrant.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK.
We understand you served a search warrant, is what we`re being told. So is it your understand thing they were holed up in the general area the whole time? They never left...
BURGUAN: There was information -- on the early part of the investigation, as we started to develop information, there was one particular focus area that we went -- there were a couple, but there was one particular focus area that we went to, and it was one of those follow- ups, focus areas, that led us to the house in the Redlands, that led to the ultimate pursuit, that led to the officer- involved shooting.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Did it appear they live there? Was that their house?
BURGUAN: The address was connected to the follow-up that we had. I don`t know who the suspects are nor do I know if that is where they live?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Chief, do you believe that the police killed the two people in the SUV?
BURGUAN: They were calling assault-style weapons. I don`t know the specific caliber, make or model of the gun.
UNIDENITIFIED FEMALE: ...killed those two people in the SUV?
BURGUAN: There were two people in the SUV and both are deceased.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: By the police?
BURGUAN: One male, one female.
While they were engaged in a gun battle with police officers and we had several officers that shot at them and into the vehicle. I don`t know what bullets caused their death.
We have a third person that was seen leaving the area. He is detained. We do not know the extent of his involvement, if any. It`s possible that he was not.
(CROSSTALK)
BURGUAN: He was -- the person was detained very close to where the officer-involved shooting. We don`t have an (inaudible).
I don`t know.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Did he have weapons on him?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There was an arrest on Colson (ph) Street.
BURGUAN: There was somebody detained. We have not identified them yet.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Chief, did that person have weapons on him, that third suspect that`s detained? Any weapons located o d on that person.
BURGUAN: I don`t have that information.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Were there any words exchanged during this gunfire that`s...
BURGUAN: I don`t know.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What`s (inaudible)?
BURGUAN: Don`t know. OK. We`re going to try to do another press conference some time around 8:30, 9:00. Hopefully we`ll have more information for you at that time. Thank you.
HAYES: All right, that was Jarrod Burguan from the San Bernardino Police, from the sheriff`s office, giving the latest.
So, there`s lots of information there to run through, in case you didn`t get all of that, and some of it correcting things that we`ve been reporting before.
So here`s what we know. Police followed a tip after the shooting, that tip led them to an address in Redlands, California, near San Bernardino. The two suspects were encountered as police moved towards that address in the SUV.
The two suspects were then in a shoot-out, outside or near that address. They were both killed inside or found dead inside that SUV. The suspects were, according to the chief, a man and a woman. There is no information about anything else, other than they were a man and a woman, that they had assault-style weapons, as well as handguns, and also were wearing what he called assault-style gear or tactical gear.
There was a third individual who was seen running from the scene. That individual was apprehended. However, at this moment, there is no definitive information about whether or not that individual is connected with what happened.
Area residents began calling into law enforcement to say they heard people jumping over fences and the like, out of a surfeit of caution. Local law enforcement then did essentially a search of the area, telling people to shelter in place. At that press conference, a law enforcement official announcing that search is now over. So it would appear to be, at this moment, two suspects who were inside the car are dead, a third person running away, though, not necessarily identified as a suspect, apprehended, and earlier reports that there was an active manhunt for a suspect on the loose, now appearing not to be true, that there was worry that there may have been people moving through yards, but that might have been law enforcement themselves, but they have now wrapped up that search.
Additionally, a statement from an FBI spokesperson who seems to be opening the door back up to the possibility of terrorism, which comes at a time where law enforcement officials through NBC News` reporting and other reporting seemed to be essentially closing that door a bit.
So, he said it remains a possibility. There are some things in the investigation that might take us in that direction, but as of now we just don`t know anything, nothing, nothing definitive about why two individuals would go into a conference room at a big social service agency, where the department of health, the county in San Bernardino was having a holiday party.
Joining me now by phone is the mayor of Los Angeles, Eric Garcetti, a Los Angeles, about an hour away from San Bernardino. And mayor, your reaction to what`s transpired today?
ERIC GARCETTI, MAYOR OF LOS ANGELES: Well, thank you, Chris. Obviously, my first reaction is with the families and the human beings whose lives were irreparably shattered today by this violence that we saw. We had, of course, helping our brother agencies, sister agencies in San Bernadino. We had a presence of Los Angeles police officers. Our SWAT team was on the ground.
And while this has resolved itself in terms of the violence today, I think it underscores for all of us just the vigilance we need to have in all of our areas, it`s homegrown or whether it`s foreign terrorism, we`re seeing that there`s clearly an ongoing threat in our cities.
This was very close to Los Angeles, and I think we feel very deeply the impact of what happened today, and we`re going to continue to provide whatever services for our friends in San Bernadino we can.
HAYES: Mayor Garcetti, a lot of talk about guns today. The one thing -- again, the one thing we know is that these two individuals had a lot of guns and they used them in this shooting.
Also, California not a place with particularly permissive gun laws. Do you want to see some movement on guns?
GARCETTI: Oh, absolutely. I`ve been a longtime supporter of, I think, the most guns that we can get out of the hands of those folks that are dangerous, by focusing on, you know, those bad apple gun dealers that are responsible for many of the illegal guns we see all over the United States, by having clear background checks, and making sure, too, that we have gun safety, education, all of those are critically important.
But this becomes so politicized. People point out that California has strict gun laws when we have a tragedy like that, but it`s easy to get guns across borders and illegal guns even in states where there are tough gun laws, like in California and Southern California.
We just can`t become numb to this, though. I mean, this happens too often. Each case is different. We can`t generalize them, but we also are one of these rare, developed countries where this just becomes every single week. And the ones that never make, quite frankly, the television, because it`s one or two at a time that happen on our urban streets, with often what`s seen as everyday violence.
But this one really cuts very deeply for us. This was folks who were celebrating the holidays, were it not for the individuals and the guns that they had, this would not have happened.
HAYES: All right. Mayor Garcetti in Los Angeles, thank you very much, I appreciate it.
GARCETTI: Thank you, Chris.
HAYES: All right. Jim Cavanaugh, I want you to sort of make whatever sense you can make of what information was given to us by law enforcement officials in that press conference.
Two people, a man and a woman in tactical gear with ton of guns.
CAVANAUGH: Yeah, well, you know, one thing we talked about earlier, revenge motive. You know, if you`re going to get somebody to help you in a revenge motive, you might believe able to get your spouse or girlfriend to do that.
So, you know, that just stuck out to me there. I don`t think that`s out of the realm of possibilities yet, this being a revenge motive.
As far as the items left at the scene that the bomb squad is probing, that could be an explosive device or a backpack full of ammo, you know, or some kind of equipment they dropped. It doesn`t necessarily mean it`s a bomb, but they have to treat it like it is.
The other part, Chris, I thought was interesting is, law enforcement got an address in Redlands, California, these people had come up some way in the investigation as someone they should surveil.
And if I`m not mistaken, the chief said they went there to surveil it. So while they were surveilling it, the target vehicle, the black SUV, moved. And, of course, they would follow it, but it moved back toward San Bernardino, and back toward the center.
HAYES: Jim, let me stop you there for a second. I want you to take a look at what we`ve got here on our air. It appears to be -- and this, I believe, is a live shot, some kind of vehicle with a huge pole in front of it, kind of battering ram, entering a house somewhere.
Do you have any sense of what`s going on there?
CAVANAUGH: Yeah, that`s a Bear Cat. It has a ram that you can affix to the front, and it takes a door down. You know, so that`s a pretty standard SWAT tactic. If they think somebody`s in a house barricade, they can ram the door down, if it`s a ram, or it could be a ballistic shield. It`s not real clear on the video there if it`s a ballistic shield. I can`t quite see it.
Sometimes they use a ballistic shield to move up. We saw that earlier on the black SUV that was in the middle of the street, where the two deceased actors were, where they moved up that tract vehicle called a SWAT bot or a SWAT robot, but it has a ballistic shield in the front. It`s like a little track vehicle, they can move it right up.
But the battering rams, all affixed to the front of the Bearcat armored vehicle, so you can ram a door, puncture a wall, so you can make access.
HAYES: We`re still awaiting word of what exactly is going on there. It is possible, I suppose, given the information we know that we know that there is at least an address that had been associated with some of the individuals that were in Redlands.
Although, I don`t know if the shot we have right now is of that address.
I want to bring in my colleague, Reverend Al Sharpton, who has been spending a lot of time recently working on gun violence. And one of the things you`ll hear, as we look at the horror of what happened today, is people will say, yes, mass shootings in this country are terrible, but that`s not actually where most gun violence happens. And you can`t focus on those as the means of solving the problem.
You`ve been spending a lot of time talking about gun violence that is even more routine than the kind of 14 people shot here, more like what we saw in Savannah today, where four people were shot and one was killed.
AL SHARPTON, MSNBC: What is constant is people will say, well, most people are not killed in mass shootings. But what is the same is in mass shootings or daily shootings, all of them are done by guns. And we need to deal with the fact that there are too many guns available to Americans.
Where do mass shootings come from? People having access to weapons, access to guns. And the NRA has never been confronted with that.
I was talking with Governor Andrew Cuomo of New York today, where you have the NRA fighting loopholes in New York State Law, that allow people that are suspected of terrorists or that are on certain lists...
HAYES: The watch list.
SHARPTON: Yeah, the watch list, that can still get guns, legally. And the defense is, they have their Second Amendment right.
I mean, we are in an absurd state when it`s Colorado one week, now today San Bernadino. Every day in many communities like Chicago, New York, et cetera, and we are not rising up, saying, wait a minute. We`ve got to get the guns off the street.
And how many times are we going to see this before we deal with the fact that whether people have mental problems, whether people have whatever motives, if they didn`t have a gun, they couldn`t do the kinds of things we`re looking at.
HAYES: We are looking right now, as Reverend Al is speaking, just so you know, would appear to be a robot going into that house. That house was first hit by a Bearcat battering ram. We don`t know why that house is being searched at that moment. We don`t know what his connection could possibly be, but it seems to have some connection to what has happened today in San Bernardino, which is the worst mass shooting in this country since almost exactly three years ago, I guess it was, right? December 14th, 2012, that Sandyhook happened in Newtown, Connecticut, a moment that people thought might galvanize a move for some sort of gun safety legislation. Since then, we`ve seen a spate of mass killings. We`ve seen, of course, tremendous amounts of gun violence in urban areas across the country. Nothing has moved politically.
SHARPTON: And when you look at the fact, when you talk about nothing has moved politically, Chris, when you look at the presidential elections and the presidential campaigns in both sides, Democrat and Republican, there`s no one really even running that is coming out with a strong, aggressive, anti-gun kind of campaign. And on the Republican side, it is almost the opposite, so it`s almost like we`re living in an alternative universes, between the politics at the top and the reality that we are going in almost a weekly mass shooting kind of diet, and daily in many communities that are under siege.
HAYES: Talk about the kind of ways in which gun violence traumatizes communities. I mean, I think we`ve all watched this and we`ve seen interviews with folks, we know what happened in Sandy Hook, they had to knock down the school and start over. We know what happens in areas where people have to cope with the PTSD that comes from losing loved ones or having been through this kind of thing.
There are neighborhoods in America where gun violence is so routine that entire swaths of census tracks are essentially living under conditions of PTSD.
SHAPRTON: And living with these kinds of stressed out conditions. And it frames the mentality where you literally have young children growing up, used to hearing gunfire, used to seeing people being buried, used to death in their immediate environment, which is totally unhealthy to grow up with that as the norm.
And we are seeing that every day now.
You have people in communities that I work in with National Action Network, that have young children that don`t know that this is not the way life is supposed to be.
SHARPTON: And what is and what is not normal is essentially at the fulcrum of what this political national debate is about gun violence and whether it will be accepted as normal.
My colleague, Reverend Al Sharpton, thank you very much.
As we approach the turn of the hour, I want to get you up to speed. We are watching what we believe to be a search warrant served on that house. Two suspects, dead, according to police at this hour, one man, one woman, with assault-style weapons, tactical gear, as well as handguns and a shoot-out in an SUV, another individual seen running away, who is not necessarily a suspect, but who was apprehended.
And as of now, no one else on the loose, no indication as of yet to the motive for this horrific event. The worst mass shooting in America over 350 just this year, the second in the day. And I now turn it over to Rachel Maddow.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED. END