CHRIS MATTHEWS, HOST: Good evening. I`m Chris Matthews in Washington. It`s happened again. In 1966, a student climbed to the tower of the University of Texas. Heavily armed, he killed 16 people. Three decades later, two students went one morning to Columbine High School. Death count, 13. Virginia Tech in 2007, death count 32. Sandy Hook Elementary, Newtown, Connecticut, in 2012, death count 26. And now it`s Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Oregon. Preliminary death count, 13. As I said, 13 people are reported dead now and at least 20 more wounded after a gunman opened fire on the community college in that small town 70 miles south of Eugene, Oregon. According to authorities, police responded to 911 calls at 10:38 local time, that`s Pacific time, 1:38 East Coast time. They located the shooter. There was an exchange of fire, and the shooter died in the melee. No officers were injured. The governor of Oregon has identified the gunman as a 21-year-old -- actually, 20-year-old man. One student witness told MSNBC that he was white. The white male armed with a small-caliber handgun, according to witnesses. NBC`s Pete Williams is reporting that federal officials believe the gunman may have been armed with multiple guns. Witness accounts, including posts on social media, paint a harrowing scene, including one woman who tweeted, quote, "Students are running everywhere. Holy God!" Moments later, President Obama -- or moments ago, President Obama showed anger and frustration as he addressed the tragedy from the Brady Press Room. Doesn`t that tell you something? He was shot by an assassin. Let`s listen. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: This has become routine. The reporting is routine. My response here at this podium ends up being routine, the conversation in the aftermath of it. We`ve become numb to this. We talked about this after Columbine and Blacksburg, after Tucson, after Newtown, after Aurora, after Charleston. It cannot be this easy for somebody who wants to inflict harm on other people to get his or her hands on a gun. And what`s become routine, of course, is the response of those who oppose any kind of common sense gun legislation. Right now, I can imagine the press releases being cranked out. We need more guns, they`ll argue, fewer gun safety laws. Does anybody really believe that? I hope and pray that I don`t have to come out again during my tenure as president to offer my condolences to families in these circumstances. But based on my experience as president, I can`t guarantee that. And that`s terrible to say. And it can change. (END VIDEO CLIP) MATTHEWS: Again, 13 are reported dead. But NBC`s Pete Williams is reporting that the death call (sic) may be revised lower, perhaps. I`m joined right now by MSNBC`s Jacob Soboroff, who`s in Roseburg, Oregon, tonight. Jacob, thank you for joining us. I`ve been watching your reporting. What is the situation now in terms of getting to the school? Is everyone being kept away from the crime scene? JACOB SOBOROFF, MSNBC: Chris, we`ve seen a couple of people being led in and out. And you hear the local police on the corner here. And I should add local police have this street blocked off, the corner of Umpqua College Road and highway 99 here in Douglas County in southern Oregon. And they`ll occasionally they`ll yell out "resident" and they`ll let a resident pass through. But other than that, it has been a steady stream of law enforcement vehicles. A local state trooper told me that the FBI, the ATF, Oregon State Police, Douglas County sheriff, you name it, they are all up here. And those are about the only people that are just one mile up this road right here, at the 100-acre campus of Umpqua Community College, where it is a very sad scene tonight. MATTHEWS: When you add up the casualty figures, 13 reported dead, 20 wounded, that`s 33 people who were shot. Then you look at the number of bullets in the bodies in the victims. Look at -- 18 to 34 bullets found in three victims. How many rounds could have been fired here, hundreds? It`s extraordinary, the amount of firepower and amount of rounds that went off here. SOBOROFF: It`s extraordinary to hear a statistic like that, Chris, and it`s extraordinary to hear the president of the United States from the White House talking about a place like this that, to me at least, couldn`t feel further away from the national news cycle or the political environment in Washington. And it really does feel like, when you see the logging trucks driving by or the bales of hay on the back of a truck, you know, or the river hawks (ph) shuttle bus for this university driving by, that people from around the nation are descending here, the eyes of the nation are descending here, obviously. But both law enforcement -- and you see people driving by with American flags on the back of Oregon green Jeep Wranglers. MATTHEWS: Yes. SOBOROFF: You know, the hearts are going out from the people here to this community. MATTHEWS: And look at the number of people that are killed by the dozens in big cities of Baltimore and Philadelphia and Chicago that we don`t even get reported on the front of our newspapers. They`re buried in the inside metro pages. Anyway, thank you, Jacob. We`ll be back to you -- Jacob Soboroff, who`s out there at the school. We`ll be checking back with him throughout the night, of course. Let me begin by bringing in now justice correspondent Pete Williams. He knows his stuff. Pete, thank for this. The number of rounds inflicted on these victims is just -- the amount of -- well, just bullets fired by one person at so many people. PETE WILLIAMS, NBC CORRESPONDENT: Well, we don`t know the number of rounds or the amount of ammunition the gunman had. We have heard that he had more than one weapon with him. Witnesses have told us that they saw him carrying a rifle. We`ve heard that in the police reporting, as well. And it may be that he had as many as four guns. We`ve heard from one source that he had three handguns and a long gun. We don`t know the specific weapons that he had or how many rounds that he fired. If he shot 20 or more people, that`s unfortunately not a large number of rounds to be expanded (sic) from that many weapons. You know, the president`s call tonight -- I should say one other thing before I get to the president`s comments tonight. On the number of victims, this number has been all over the place this afternoon. Understandably, the authorities out there have had their hands full. We haven`t had a lot of reporting back to the officials in Washington, which is the normal way we learn about these things. They had said earlier today that they thought the number of people killed was 13. Then they said that there may have been some double counting in that number. Perhaps it`ll turn out to be 10. We still haven`t, strangely enough, as many hours as it`s been since this incident, a definitive number of how many people were killed and how many were injured, but I suspect we`ll have that fairly soon. On this question of gun control, you know, after these events, there`s always these -- this debate about gun control or better help for mental health. But one thing that has changed over the time that the president has been in office is how police respond to these incidents, Chris, because it used to be that the rule was get to the scene, wait until the SWAT team arrives, the heavily armed, heavily trained SWAT teams that could go in and confront the gunman. That`s a thing of the past now. The rule is, get there, get in, engage the gunman. And that seems to be what happened here. This is, by our count, the 41st campus shooting, campus school shooting -- this would be college campuses, public schools -- just this year, the 41st shooting. Up until today, the number of people who were killed in those incidents, if you don`t count suicides, but the number of, so to speak, innocent victims shot and killed was nine. Unfortunately now, this incident is going to more than double that number. MATTHEWS: Explain the change in the protocol and the procedure. What do you think drove that, to go there, when you get there, do something right away? WILLIAMS: Well, I think they took a long, hard look, for example, at the response to the spate of school shootings in the last couple of decades, including Columbine, where the rule was get there, keep people from coming in, but wait until the real firepower arrives. And we`ve seen over and over that that just doesn`t work. And now the rule is, and what police are told and trained to do is get in and at least get the gunman so he can`t keep shooting. Pin him down. Try to find him. Isolate him so that he doesn`t just continue to control the situation. Recall the response to the Navy Yard shooting here a couple of years ago. As authorities waited for lots of reinforcements to arrive, it was park police, for example, who went in and confronted the gunman here at the Navy Yard in Washington, D.C., and were able to stop him from continuing to shoot. And we`ve seen that in other school shootings, as well. Interestingly, Chris, just in this little community, Roseburg, Oregon, they`ve been through this already. Nine years ago, there was a shooting at the high school. Someone shot -- one student shot another in the back. The victim survived. But it got the officials in Roseburg thinking about how they should respond to these things. The police have done some practice and training out there. The community college has thought about it, as well. So they are -- they have changed that plan. Now, one -- a couple of questions may arise as a result of the shooting. One is, do college campuses like this, small community colleges, have enough people on campus that are armed, have enough guards, law enforcement people on campus that are armed? The former president of this school has said that they didn`t have very many. Should that change? A second thing that they may look at here is the very controversial issue of whether college students should be able to carry weapons. And as you so well know, there are two sides in this debate, one who says -- one that says, No, let`s keep the amount of firepower on campuses small. The other side says, Yes, if you have more people with guns, they can confront these. The president talked about this a little bit tonight. In Oregon, the law is that if you have a concealed weapons permit, you can carry your weapon onto a school or college campus. Now, we don`t know how the gunman got his weapons. If he was 20 years old, he wouldn`t come under that law because I think you have to be 21 to get a concealed weapons permit. But it may reenergize the debate about that. MATTHEWS: Wow, you`re so good on that. You know, I was just thinking that the argument is often made by rural people that if you dial 911 and you live pretty far out from the county seat, or you`re just out there by yourself on a farm, you basically have to protect yourself. Whereas if you live in the big city, you can maybe lock the door of your apartment from an invader and have a pretty good chance that the cops will be there in time to help you. But this is an example where they -- how far were they from any kind of police force, authorities who were armed and could have come to their aid? SOBOROFF: Well, they`re -- in fact, they did come to their aid. They`re just a few miles outside Roseburg. This is just... MATTHEWS: Yes. SOBOROFF: Roseburg`s a small community, but they`re just on the outskirts of town, if you will, so the Roseburg Police Department and the sheriff`s office was able to respond pretty quickly. But it wasn`t -- you`re right, it wasn`t the kind of response that you`d get in a big city, certainly not the kind of response we`d see here in Washington, D.C., where we have dozens and dozens of different law enforcement agencies to respond. And the question is, you know, what sort of campus security should they have on their own? MATTHEWS: Right. Thank you so much, NBC`s Pete Williams. Becky Holm is editor and publisher of "The Douglas County News." Her daughter, Kayleen (ph), is a student at Umpqua Community College and was in the next building from where the shooting happened. Becky, I want you to tell us what you know about the situation and the reaction of the community there. Apparently, it`s a quiet place until today. BECKY HOLM, EDITOR/PUBLISHER "DOUGLAS COUNTY NEWS": It is a quiet place. And I was listening to the show before, and less than a mile away, or just barely over a mile, is the Oregon State Police station. And so they were also first responders to the situation. I heard about it -- actually, I was at work. I was not listening to my scanner, and I got a text message from my daughter, who was in the next building and it said there was an active shooter, and, I think I`m safe and I`m in the chem building or chem lab, and I love you. MATTHEWS: Wow. B. HOLM: And that was -- that was the alert that I got. And then I opened up Facebook and it exploded. MATTHEWS: Well, Becky, can you ask your daughter about how she felt about the situation, being so incredibly close to the horror. B. HOLM: They`re asking how you felt about the situation, being so close to the horror. KAYLEEN HOLM, STUDENT: At first, it was really terrifying. I didn`t think that it was an actual event. I thought it was just a drill. But then they said that it wasn`t a drill, it was real, and so we all got into a back room in the chemistry lab and we sat down. And it was all dark. And they told us that we needed to tell people that we were safe and that there was an active gunman on campus. MATTHEWS: How many shots did you hear yourself? B. HOLM: Did you hear any shots? K. HOLM: I didn`t hear any shots because I was in the chemical lab, working on a chemistry experiment. And one of the teachers said that there was an active gunman on campus. And everybody was really calm about it. And it was actually shocking how calm everybody was. MATTHEWS: Well, Becky, let me ask you about local attitudes towards gun -- not gun control itself but background checks and whether this -- well, what do people think about the importance of a waiting period, perhaps, or checking out whether a person is emotionally and mentally able to take care of a gun safely? What would be the politics of that in an editorial situation for you? B. HOLM: Oh, I definitely have my opinions. Right now, I`m being a mom and I am banding with other parents who also have their own political opinion on this. And frankly, ask me tomorrow, and I`ll spew the whole opinion. But tonight, I`m just being a mom and I`m just really glad that the situation is completely over. My daughter and many others are safe. The ones that were injured, we`re certainly praying for them. The ones that lost their lives, we hope that comfort and peace comes to their families, as well. MATTHEWS: Well, the time will come. In a couple of days or so, we would like to know your opinion. But thank you so much. I understand your feelings and situation tonight not to get political tonight. But it is going to be a debate across this country, including in Oregon. Anyway, thank you, Becky Holm, for coming to us. And Kayleen, take care of yourself. You`ve been through something, even if it was only next door, the next classroom. B. HOLM: He said take care of yourself. MATTHEWS: It was something. I`m amazed you didn`t hear the bullets flying. Anyway, we heard the anger today from President Obama, certainly, speaking from the Brady Press Room. Of course, that`s named after James Brady, who was shot when there was an assassination attempt on President Reagan. President Obama issued a ringing call for a change in attitude from our elected leaders, our politicians, on gun matters. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) OBAMA: Somebody somewhere will comment and say Obama politicized this issue. Well, this is something we should politicize. It is relevant to our common life together, to the body politic. And each time this happens, I`m going to bring this up. Each time this happens, I am going to say that we can actually do something about it, but we`re going to have to change our laws. And this is not something I can do by myself. I`ve got to have... (END VIDEO CLIP) MATTHEWS: Well, let`s bring in NBC`s Kelly O`Donnell -- she`s up on Capitol Hill, where she`s often found -- to find out how the president`s words were received. What do you think -- the people you cover every day, Republican, Democrat, progressive, conservative -- are they saying same old, same old? What do you think they`re saying when they hear the president being so earnest there about the need to do something? KELLY O`DONNELL, NBC CORRESPONDENT: Well, we`re already hearing tonight from one senator who is running for president, and that`s Bernie Sanders of Vermont. And he put out a statement not from his campaign but from his Senate office. And the last line is, "The shouting at each other must end. The hard work of developing good policy must begin." Covering members of Congress day in, day out, and seeing the lines of this division, you know, in calm moments, in sad moments, at times when family members of victims and survivors have come to Capitol Hill over the years that I have been here, have wept in the offices of lawmakers, and at times, others who have very strong feelings about their right and really the effectiveness of government. It is something that is very complicated to cover. And on a day when there has been this kind of tragedy, I tread lightly to talk about the politics of it while people are still learning about the tragic events. But I think what we can talk about is the fact that these are difficult issues. You will have both Democrats and Republicans saying more needs to be done to keep guns away from those who have a mental incapacity, whether it`s mental illness or some other deficiency that is physical or mental in nature. Then the question comes, how do you judge that? Is it someone who is put through a court process? How does that work? It gets very complicated. You`ll also hear from conservatives there are gun laws on the books that aren`t properly followed. And then, of course, you`ll hear from Democrats and others who might be more in the middle a discussion of, Is there a way to protect and honor the 2nd Amendment rights, but do more to try to tone down this culture of violence? So these are complex, tough issues. Now, the real practical reality over the next several days -- we may hear more on the campaign trail about these issues. Chances are, conservatives will speak very strongly against the president, saying that the rights are sacrosanct and cannot be tread upon. And then you`ll have people like Bernie Sanders, perhaps Hillary Clinton, who already made some comments tonight, talking about taking a new approach. Politically, Chris, getting something done -- it`s hard to imagine that`s going to take place anytime soon, when Congress has other matters to deal with, the budget, the debt ceiling, other things on their plate. There`ll be a lot of discussion, but there really seems to be a disconnect between recognizing the problem, grieving for the victims, seeing the complexities of competing rights and responsibilities, and then actually voting on something that can pass. And that`s where they seem to hit a stumbling block again and again to a point where they`re not really even trying right now. MATTHEWS: You know, except for Hillary Clinton, the former secretary of state, and former first lady, of course, former senator from New York, I don`t think I can think of anyone running for president today who is really concerned or shown a strong push for gun safety. I mean, Bernie Sanders is a pro-gun rights guy from Vermont. I mean, that was a nice statement he made about lowering the tone of the debate. But he didn`t come out for gun safety. He said let`s cool it in the debating period. But I think he is very careful in a place like Vermont. I grew up in Pennsylvania, as you know. You go after gun rights up in Pennsylvania, you`re in big trouble. Pat Toomey, the Republican senator from up there, joined with Joe Manchin from West Virginia for some movement towards checking out who gets guns, but certainly I wouldn`t call it gun control. It`s just an effort to try to keep guns out of the hands of crazy people. But isn`t it hard to find -- I think it is going to be hard, besides Hillary Clinton, to find somebody out there who is willing to say we have to reduce access to guns, especially to people who are emotionally or mentally disturbed. O`DONNELL: And on the Republican side, you will have people who will want to talk about the mental health aspects. MATTHEWS: Yes. O`DONNELL: But you will again have the discussion of, you know, this is a group of voters and a conversation in American politics that has a lot of anger toward government, where they`re not looking to give government more discretion over people`s rights and responsibilities. So, it`s fertile territory. It`s volatile. It`s emotional. People have different life experiences. When you mentioned earlier about if someone is in a rural community and has to defend themselves, that`s something that is eye-opening when you hear people talk about it. And then, of course, there`s been tremendous gun violence in Chicago, the president`s hometown, in a city setting, day in, day out, not mass shootings in the same way we saw today, but just the day in, day out violent culture and how that gets expressed through gun violence. And so it will be a part of the campaign trail. But it thus far has not been the most animating issue on the campaign trail -- Chris. MATTHEWS: Right. You know your territory up there so much, Kelly O`Donnell. Thank you from Capitol Hill, a reporter who does know exactly what the problems are of getting something done. Dan Gross is president of the Brady Campaign to End Gun Violence. I have something I like to say. I hope I`m informed on this. It`s not that the people who are in the NRA are law breakers or they -- I think a lot of them do take responsibility for their firearms. They load their own shells. A lot of them are environmentalists. My brother is one. But they control the laws of the United States in a way that puts guns in the hands of bad people and nuts, to be blunt about it, people with real mental problems. DAN GROSS, BRADY CAMPAIGN TO PREVENT GUN VIOLENCE: And convicted felons and domestic abusers, the people that we all agree should not have guns. Let`s not confuse the membership of the NRA, which are the people that you were just describing, decent, law-abiding people, and the leadership of the NRA that has a political agenda. (CROSSTALK) MATTHEWS: Let`s get to that. If you had a secret ballot of all NRA members, would they say we got to keep people with mental and emotional problems from having guns? GROSS: More than that. More than 80 percent of NRA members support expanding Brady background checks that have been proven to keep guns out of the hands of people that we all agree shouldn`t have them. MATTHEWS: You heard Jim Cavanaugh earlier in the afternoon reporting here that said they have kept a lot of guns away from people who went to buy a gun for a purpose, they figured out what it was, and stopped them. GROSS: Since the Brady law was passed and implemented in 1994, 2.4 million sales have been blocked to convicted felons, domestic abusers, the dangerously mentally ill, the people that we all agree shouldn`t have those. MATTHEWS: So, it works? GROSS: It works tremendously well. The problem is that those laws, that law doesn`t impact gun shows or online gun sales. All we`re trying to do is... MATTHEWS: Why would a gun show -- even that word is ridiculous -- why would that ever be exempt from government regulation at all? GROSS: Because the gun lobby wants it that way. And the only place -- we were talking before about how this is a complicated issue. It`s not that complicated as far as the American public goes. Ninety 90 percent of the American public support expanding background checks. (CROSSTALK) MATTHEWS: Suppose the leadership of the NRA -- this is almost like a liturgical question. GROSS: All right. MATTHEWS: Suppose the leadership of the NRA simply said we think gun rights are essential to this country. They`re in the Second Amendment. We`re going to fight tooth and nail, but we believe certain people shouldn`t get their hands on guns. We`re going to help this country keep those people from getting guns. Would it change the view of the country if the NRA did that? Would it change the rank and file member of the NRA? GROSS: If the acknowledge the fact -- first of all, like I said.. (CROSSTALK) MATTHEWS: Do leaders lead? GROSS: The rank -- no, our leaders are not leading us. (CROSSTALK) MATTHEWS: Could they? Could they? GROSS: Our leaders right now are not representing the interests of the American public. MATTHEWS: But could they? GROSS: They could if they would stop kowtowing to the gun lobby. (CROSSTALK) GROSS: And that`s the problem. MATTHEWS: Well, who is the gun lobby? GROSS: It`s the NRA and the National Sports Shooting Foundation. MATTHEWS: If the leaders of the NRA said, we`re going to change tune. GROSS: They would have to say it in closed doors to these politicians that are doing their bidding ahead of the interests of the American public. MATTHEWS: OK, to be believed. Anyway, thank you, Dan Gross. He`s going to stick with us. He`s with the Brady Campaign. We continue to cover this tragic shooting in Roseburg, Oregon, 13 dead. We will be right back after this. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) MATTHEWS: We`re covering the tragedy in Roseburg, Oregon, where 13 people are dead in a mass shooting on the campus of a community college. We will have more on that in a minute. But we have new information on another late-breaking story that came out late today. NBC News has confirmed now 10 Americans have been -- died -- have leader -- been killed today in addition to two Afghans when a C-130 aircraft -- there`s a model -- like the one that you see on the screen crashed this afternoon in Afghanistan. So far, the cause of the crash is unknown. NBC News national security producer Courtney Kube is with me now live from the Pentagon. Courtney, what can you tell us? Do we know if it was shot down? COURTNEY KUBE, NBC NEWS NATIONAL SECURITY PRODUCER: So far, there are no reports of any enemy action in the area at the time. So, that doesn`t look like that that`s the cause of this crash at this point. But, of course, it`s under investigation. Just telling you a little bit about Jalalabad, it`s in the eastern part of the country, sort of between Kabul, but closer over toward the Pakistan border. It`s a very mountainous area. There`s extremely high winds. I can tell you, when I have taken off or landed at that air strip in Jalalabad, you have tremendous crosswinds. I`m not saying that`s the cause, obviously, but as of now, there is no enemy fire. There`s no reports of bad weather at the time either, of any kind of inclement weather. We do know, as you said, there were five U.S. service members. They were the crew on the C-130 transport plane who were killed. There were also five contractors killed, and then two Afghan civilians who were on the ground when the plane went down were also killed in this. MATTHEWS: Do we have access and control of the crash site? KUBE: So far, the U.S. military is in control of the crash site. They believe that they have found and determined and secured the site and found all the remains of the victims. But, as I said, the situation is still under investigation. It`s possible. It`s within the realm of possibility that there are addition civilians, Afghan civilians on the ground who may have been hurt or injured or killed. But as of now, they`re saying just the two. MATTHEWS: How dangerous an area is that in terms of the Taliban presence? KUBE: It`s a tremendously dangerous -- it`s still a tremendously dangerous area. Jalalabad Air Base was actually supposed to close in October of last year. But they have maintained it. Of course, it`s the notorious base where the U.S. special operations forces took off for the raid that killed Osama bin Laden. It`s a heavy Taliban presence in the area. It`s very close to the Pakistan border. It`s close to the Torkham Gate border crossing into Pakistan, which is a frequent target of Taliban and insurgent strikes. So, it`s a dangerous area. But, like I said, at this point they don`t believe that the crash was hostile, related to any kind of hostile enemy action. But they`re still looking into it. It`s a dangerous area. And it is a -- just the terrain there is very harsh. MATTHEWS: Thank you so much, NBC`s Courtney Kube at the Pentagon. Now back to the campus shooting in Oregon; 13 people are dead there. Let`s go to the Roseburg area itself. Matt Jordan is a reporter from our NBC affiliate KOBI in Medford, Oregon. Thank you for helping us out here tonight. What can you tell us about the killer? MATT JORDAN, KOBI REPORTER: rMD-BO_Well, we just don`t really know anything just yet. We do know it was a 20-year-old male. And that`s about as far as it goes. It looks like there`s about to be a report from the Douglas County Sheriff`s Office. We`re out at Fire District 2 in Roseburg. And we`re just trying to get any details we can, for the time being, very scarce. We`re still waiting on an exact number of injured. I know people have been transported by helicopter as far away as Portland. That`s two-and-a-half-hours. The hospitals here full up. Also the clinics taking in some people with more minor injuries, but very, very hectic scene out here. My station, myself, one of the first people out here. And very, very hectic, chaotic, but a lot of emotions, also a lot of hope out here right now, Chris. MATTHEWS: Thank you so much, Matt Jordan, in Roseburg, Oregon. More now from President Obama as he spoke very emotionally. For us who have watched, very emotionally, we were surprised, and angrily about the congressional gridlock on gun control, in other words, nothing is getting done. Let`s watch. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Have news organizations tally up the number of Americans who have been killed through terrorist attacks over the last decade and the number of Americans who have been killed by gun violence, and post those side by side on your news reports. This won`t be information coming from me. It will be coming from you. We spend over $1 trillion and pass countless laws and devote entire agencies to preventing terrorist attacks on our soil, and rightfully so. And yet we have a Congress that explicitly blocks us from even collecting data on how we could potentially reduce gun deaths. How can that be? (END VIDEO CLIP) MATTHEWS: Let`s bring in FBI profiler Clint Van Zandt. He`s a law enforcement analyst for MSNBC. And Erica Lafferty is the daughter of Dawn Hochsprung. Dawn was the principal at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, who was killed in that 2012 shooting trying to protect those students. Let me go to Clint first of all. This pattern here -- I talked earlier in the program of going back to the Texas tower shooter back in Austin, who we thought was some weirdo, Charles Whitman. Nobody would ever do that. And it seems like they do it and somehow people get the idea I`m going to school and kill a bunch of people and I have got the firepower to do it. The number of rounds fired here, you were talking about it earlier today, 18 to 30 bullet wounds in people at close range, apparently, 33 shot all together, 10 of them -- well, 13 of them dead. How many people can you shoot at close range and just get away with it? It just stuns me. How does that look? What`s that look like if you`re watching with a video? What would it look like? CLINT VAN ZANDT, MSNBC ANALYST: Yes. Chris, we`re finding out a lot of things right now. Number one, as Pete Williams earlier reported, the shooter allegedly had four guns, a rifle and three handguns. In Oregon, you have to be 21 to buy a handgun, a semiautomatic pistol. So, he didn`t buy the guns. So where did he get them? Did he get them through his family? Did he steal them? You know, I`m watching you -- you put the clip of the president on. And I cannot imagine what it`s like to be that man and say, I am the president of the United States and I cannot get my legislators to put their heads together and pass legislation that will stop Americans from killing each other. And, as you said, you can`t stop everybody. You can`t heal everybody or fix everything. But there are some things you can do. And if you have -- if we`re doing gun checks, if we`re doing background checks -- 40 percent of the guns in this country are sold without a background check. That`s an easy place to start, America, before we go anywhere else. And, Chris, this particular shooter is active, just like they all are, on social media. Yesterday, according to some sources, he was on social media, suggesting, number one, he was going to do something like this, and supposedly there were people giving him ideas of how he might do it. And he writes, allegedly, on social media: I am so inadequate. This is probably the least significant thing I`ll ever do in my life. Well, when you take all this, when you take the mental health issues, when you take the poor self-worth, when you take the begging somebody to intervene on social media, when they don`t do it, and then when you take our gun laws that are "wholier" than Swiss cheese, we can see how things like this happen, when someone chooses to act out with violence for conflict resolution. Instead of using their head and their mouth, they use a gun because they can`t do it otherwise. MATTHEWS: Well, we haven`t been able to confirm that at NBC, but that may well be part of the story as it turns out. Let`s bring in -- hold on there, Clint. Let`s bring in Erica Lafferty. She`s daughter of the Sandy Hook Newtown principal Dawn Hochsprung -- Hochsprung. Thank you for coming on. What`s your thought about all this? ERICA LAFFERTY, DAUGHTER OF SANDY HOOK SHOOTING VICTIM: It`s way too familiar. The pictures are familiar. The fire engines in the background are familiar. The questions are familiar. And it`s way too familiar online, on social media, on the news, hearing people say it`s too soon to talk politics. It`s not too soon. It is way too late. MATTHEWS: Well, you know, that may be a one-sided argument. For politics, the word is used for those who believe in some kind of gun safety laws. It`s not used for those who don`t want them and have been fighting them. For some reason, the word politics only applies to people that want to do something. And the people that don`t want to have anything done are somehow removed from it all. What do you think it is the reason why we don`t have laws? We have a violence level in this country -- I mentioned it earlier in this program about the number of political people. I didn`t mention Malcolm X, George Lincoln Rockwell, Bobby Kennedy, Martin Luther King. The number of people that have been killed in public life is unlike any other country. But these are cases of innocent regular people, innocent to any public role, to put it bluntly. They don`t have identities in the newspapers. They`re not in bold print. They`re regular people, and they`re gunned down, it seems to me, almost promiscuously, kill people just because they`re in the room. It doesn`t matter who they are. If they`re within range, you shoot them. And I don`t know how we can justify giving guns or allowing -- why don`t we just give guns away to crazy people if we`re going to let them buy them? It`s just as crazy to let somebody buy a gun who is nuts is to give them a gun if they`re nuts. That`s my thinking. Yours? LAFFERTY: Absolutely. And people say the only way to stop a good guy with a gun -- or to stop a bad guy with a gun is to have a good guy with a gun. And it`s just arming more people, instead of people raising good people and to do everything we can to prevent guns from falling into dangerous hands. This is something that we see happen time and time and time again. And we`re always going to be attacked, saying that you want to take our guns away, and whatever crazy rhetoric they`re going to spit at us. But the fact of the matter is, people who should not have guns can get them way too easily. We have seen great successes on the state level. But on the federal level, absolutely nothing has been done. And the core of the issue is that we have a Senate that is largely owned by the gun lobby and we need to vote them out and elect a Congress that will vote on the side of their constituents and vote on the side of public health and public safety. MATTHEWS: Tell me about the memory you have of your mom and what she did and how she ended up. LAFFERTY: I was listening to news reports earlier today, and someone who was in the UCC building mentioned a woman saying that there`s a shooter, stay put. And I instantly thought back to the day that I found out that those exact words were my mom`s last words: "Shooter. Stay put." It`s horrifying. It`s terrifying. It`s disgusting and sickening that this is happening time and time again and I am living in a country where no one is doing anything about it. I fight every single day of my life to make that -- make change happen. And days like this bring me back to the worst day of my entire life and shake me to the core. But it does nothing but empower me to fight and motivate me to bring others along in this fight with me. I`m not going anywhere. I`ve said that close to three years ago and I`m saying it again today. MATTHEWS: We should all want a daughter like you. Thank you. LAFFERTY: Thank you. MATTHEWS: Erica Lafferty for coming on. And I want to thank Clint Van Zandt, as always, for his expertise. Our coverage of this tragic shooting in Roseburg, Oregon, will continue in a moment. We`ll be back after this. (COMMERCIAL BREAK) MATTHEWS: Welcome back. As we continue to cover the shooting in Roseburg, Oregon, where a gunman has killed 13 people in the campus of Umpqua Community College. We have the police audio right now, the scanner traffic, as officers radioed in reports of the shooting on campus, let`s listen to that. (BEGIN AUDIO CLIP) POLICE OFFICER: Exchanging shots with him. He`s in the classroom on the -- it`s going to be the southeast side. DISPATCHER: Copy. Gunshots right now. Male in the classroom on the southeast side of Snyder Hall. (END VIDEO CLIP) MATTHEWS: Let`s bring in now, MSNBC law enforcement analyst, retired ATF special agent in charge, Jim Cavanaugh. Jim, thank you. I would love for you to go over what I heard you talk about from your expertise, about how gun safety laws, not gun control especially, but keeping an eye on people who shouldn`t have guns. This isn`t about whether to go hunting or observing hunting laws. This is about going after people who shouldn`t have a gun in their hands to begin with. You talked about the effectiveness, actions taken by ATF over the years. JIM CAVANAUGH, MSNBC LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Right. Well, so many cases, Chris. I mean, we wouldn`t have enough hours in the programming to tell how effective gun laws are in stopping the mentally disturbed, the felons, the fugitives, the career criminals, people who want to hurt, murder and kill our civilians. So many cases are stopped. You know, when you enforce the gun law, when you get those people, that`s stopping the next murder. This is how we interrupt people like this shooter here today. In this case had he come to our notice, in law enforcement, that he might have been plotting something, that if he had some guns, maybe obtained them illegally, he would have been arrested, he would be charged with a gun charge. It wouldn`t make the news, maybe local news in Portland or the city where it occurred. He would maybe get some prison time. We stopped thousands and thousands of those. I can tell you, because I experienced it personally myself, as an agent, as a commander, as a uniform officer. So, they`re very effective. I was building on your comments earlier today about the history. This is the thing that`s changed so much. You know, across history, every time we had these things from the gangsterism in the `30s, when we passed the National Firearms Act in `34 to carefully regulate machine guns and gangster weapons after Al Capone and Dillinger and everybody who`s shooting everything up, the Congress acted and passed the law. After the `68 assassinations of Dr. King and Robert Kennedy, after John Kennedy was assassinated, we had the `68 Gun Control Act, the seminal gun control act in the country. After that horror, the Congress, country responded. After Reagan was shot, Jim Brady, they tried to push a Brady bill through t took them 15 years or more to get it through. It was the impetus to start it. And, of course, the assault weapons ban after shootings at schools like Patrick Purdy in Stockton, California, brought us the assault weapon ban. So, America used to respond. Our legislators used to respond and say we can tighten up, we can plug a gap. We can do something here that will change things. And what we`ve seen now is years and years and years of just no change. Just carnage, and no even moderate change to improve things a little bit. Mental health restraining orders, I`m a big supporter of that, seeing so many people that suffer from mental illness, should not have firearms and can be stopped and also responsible gun control laws that don`t hurt people`s constitutional rights but do help us to stop people from, you know, obtaining guns illegally or plotting a murder. Those are good, common sense steps. But nothing is going to happen unless the voters, who the president talked to today -- you know, your world is the political one. But when I watched him, he was talking over the Congress and over the lobby. He was talking right to the citizens and saying unless you do something, I can`t do anything. So, I`d say that after being involved with it for 40 years, no change in the Congress, no change, no movement at all on this for changes in mental health restraining orders, changes in -- moderate changes for background checks or sensible laws that will help us regulate -- what the young people don`t understand America is that gun laws used to be stronger. They don`t understand that. Gun laws have been walked back. MATTHEWS: Right. I know. Let me give you one thought since you gave me the credit for being the political guy here -- if you want a career in politics -- I mean, go in, in your early 30s, and survive until your late 60s, that`s the normal political career for a lot of the name as members of Congress. You don`t want to risk the animosity, the hostility of the NRA, because they`ll never forget, they`ll remember, they`ll act against you in every campaign. They will campaign -- they`ll raise money against you and most members of Congress would rather not have a risk to their career. If you`re in career politics for a living, that`s your career, I`ve seen people like Joe Clark of Pennsylvania go down forever and never seen again, very reformed minded liberal senator from Pennsylvania. Good-bye, Joe Clark, because you were for gun control. Tom Foley, former speaker of the House. It can ruin your career politically. That`s why they`re afraid of it, because the gun lobby is lethal. You know that. CAVANAUGH: Right. You`re exactly right. And when you do the right thing, sometimes you may lose an election. But really it`s up to the voter. You`ve talked about this, that the gun lobby responds to their membership. That`s who they are and what they do. They`re uncompromising. But does America need uncompromising groups to control how the rest of us can live? You know, we need to have some compromises in a civil society. Not anything draconian. Not to believe all these crazy theories about everybody is taking everybody`s guns away. MATTHEWS: I know. CAVANAUGH: But rather, let`s be pragmatic, let`s be logical. Look, your kids can`t go to the mall, movie theater, college without getting massacred. Now, if that`s not going to change something we do here and make us better -- and here`s one thing, Chris, it`s not just gun control. It`s mental health issues, it`s restraining orders, it`s security at schools. It`s thinking about how we about how we respond with security plans. There`s a whole lot to the picture, but if we could have the people that would allow us to do it in the country and states and cities as well, we can probably move the ball. We can`t eliminate it but we might have could improve it. MATTHEWS: Well said, Jim. We have to go right now to a press conference. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Here we go. SHERIFF JOHN HANLIN, DOUGLAS COUNTY SHERIFF OFFICE: Well, ladies and gentlemen, first I want to say that we are deeply saddened by the tragic events that unfolded today at Umpqua Community College. These sort of tragedies aren`t supposed to happen here. Yet they did. And it leaves tons of questions in our minds. And so, as this is a very active investigation and the investigation continues, there are a few questions I can answer for you but there will be more to come. It`s very early in this event. And we are still trying to confirm a great amount of information that is floating around and a great amount of information that we need to confirm. I want to say first and foremost that our victims and families of our victims are our priority. Everything that we do from here on will be for them. At this time, we are reporting and can confirm ten fatalities in the shooting. Seven of those -- seven additional injuries. Those that were injured were initially transported to our local hospital. And three of those that were critically injured were transferred to another hospital up in the Eugene area. We know there are conflicting reports of the numbers of casualties. And I can tell you that this number is the best, most accurate information we have at this time. The FBI has established a toll-free number for tips and families. That number is 1-800-225-5324, also can be remembered as 1- 800-CALL-FBI. When you do this, you choose option 7. Again, this number is to help reunite and provide information to the families of the victims. This event has been deemed a mass casualty event, which brings with it hundreds of resources to this small community. Along with those resources and the fact this is a mass casualty incident, brings specific protocols that we must follow. That includes specific processes by which the state medical examiner`s office may manage identification. And because of these protocols and the need to notify each family, we don`t anticipate releasing the names of the fatalities for 24 to 48 hours. The law enforcement investigation into the shooter and into his motivation is ongoing. We are not ready at this time to make any comments about him. Reunification continues at the Douglas County fairgrounds. Family and students should gather there. There are counselors at the fairgrounds providing assistance to all the folks that are down there. At this time, I`d like to have my public information officer, Corporal Dwes Hutson address some other issues. Thank you. COL. DWES HUTSON, DOUGLAS COUNTY SHERIFF OFFICE: So, we`re going to continue to use the hashtag UCC shooting on our Twitter account, which is DouglasCOSO. Further written updates will be posted to our social media accounts, our Web site, and to flashalerteugene.net. We have a number of agencies that have provided a lot of resources to this incident and at a future briefing we`ll walk through what those are and what that looks like. We also anticipate having another briefing later this evening, and we`ll notify you via our social media account and flash alert. And -- I have a couple administrative things to discuss, and that`s all the information I have right now. REPORTER: Is the shooter among the ten fatalities? HUTSON: I`m not taking any questions. That`s the end of the briefing. REPORTER: Just for accuracy, the ten fatalities, does that include the shooter? HUTSON: No questions. Thank you. REPORTER: Is there another briefing scheduled? MATTHEWS: That`s the news conference of course with Sheriff John Hanlin of the Douglas County sheriff`s department. The news from the sheriff is that there have been ten fatalities, ten dead in today`s shooting. The sheriff says the names of the victims won`t be released for 24 to 48 hours. He had no further information about the 20-year-old male shooter himself. Let`s bring in Peter Langman. He`s a psychologist who has studied school shooters. He`s author of the book "Why Kids Kill: Inside the Minds of School Shooters." So, it was unclear there whether that count of ten included the shooter. But let`s move on. What is it that drives these young men to do this? PETER LANGMAN, PSYCHOLOGIST: You know, there`s usually a combination of factors. There`s personality issues going on, but also a lot of stresses in their lives. Usually a combination of academic failures, usually romantic or marital failures, occupational failures, just overwhelming stress. MATTHEWS: Well, you know, high school is rough. And I think most people like me, most would say it`s not the best years of your life. It can be the most difficult years of your life. It`s puberty and onward and then there`s all kinds of stress in terms of dating if you even can get a date, and there`s a lot of competition in that social area, a hell of a lot of it. And some people get pushed aside, ignored, whatever, beat up. Why do some people go to gunplay, to gunfire, to killing? LANGMAN: You know, there`s usually three types of people that commit these attacks. It`s not always the same kind of profile. Some of them have a psychopathic personality, extremely narcissistic, easily enraged. Others have more of a mental health issue such as schizophrenia, they`re psychotic, they may be hallucinating. And the third type are really traumatized kids and these are young people who come from horrendous backgrounds of abuse and violence in their own homes. MATTHEWS: And -- well, let`s go through these cases. I was pointing out the case of the Texas shooter from the tower at the University of Texas at Austin killing all those people. Certainly, Virginia Tech, of course, and Columbine and Sandy Hook. What has been the prevalent condition of the shooter in these cases? Is there a commonality? LANGMAN: You know, those shooters were either psychotic or psychopathic but they also had a lot going wrong in their lives in terms of different kinds of failures, different kind of stresses, and eventually, they were full of rage, they often wanted to die, but before they died they wanted to take people with them as a way of getting revenge against the world. MATTHEWS: Why would you want to be famous in a world you were not in? LANGMAN: You know, for some of these people, they feel like they`re essentially a nobody, they have no significance. They feel worthless. And for some the idea of fame is very attractive and they might not be remembered for anything except their final moments, and for some of them, apparently, that is good enough. MATTHEWS: But that`s all they experience, of their fame, to be blunt about it, and to be horrific. They live for that moment in which they`re shooting people, knowing in that moment they`ll be famous for doing that. Is that it? LANGMAN: That`s right. In fact, Eric Harris at Columbine had written on his Web site, "I want to leave a lasting impression on the world." And that`s what he set out to do. MATTHEWS: What a tough business you`re in, sir. Peter Langman, thanks for that expertise. Let`s check back in with MSNBC correspondent Jacob Soboroff who`s at the scene in Oregon. So, now, we have the numbers. Do we know if that ten includes the shooter, the ten deaths? JACOB SOBOROFF, MSNBC CORRESPONDENT: You know, we don`t know from our post here, Chris. What I can tell you is I heard your conversation earlier about the law enforcement presence in this area, and there is a state trooper post. Maybe a football field length away from where we`re standing right here. We were also made aware of reporting by the associated press that said a former president of the Umpqua Community College had said there was only one campus security guard on campus, an unarmed person, and this is something that had been debated evidently on the campus over the last couple of years, Chris. MATTHEWS: OK, thank you. It will be debated again tomorrow morning I`m sure. Jacob Soboroff, thank you for that reporting from Roseburg, Oregon. Our coverage, by the way, continues now on "ALL IN WITH CHRIS HAYES". THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED. END Copyright 2015 CQ-Roll Call, Inc. All materials herein are protected by United States copyright law and may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, displayed, published or broadcast without the prior written permission of CQ-Roll Call. You may not alter or remove any trademark, copyright or other notice from copies of the content.>
Hardball with Chris Matthews, Transcript 10/01/15
Guests: Becky Holm, Kayleen Holm, Dan Gross, Erica Lafferty, Peter Langman