will commit additional acts of violence, it's more a question of when. welcome to thursday. this is "meet the press daily." i'm chuck todd. six asian women are dead when gunman aaron long went on a two-county rampage targeting spas in the area. while a motive has not yet been determined, the reality is this happened to have happened during a massive rise in asian american violence in this nation. a year after the prior administration referred to the pandemic as the china virus or the kung flu. now our leaders are being forced to recon with a ugly reality. two senior administration officials tell nbc news president biden and vice president harris will meet with asian american leaders when they visit atlanta tomorrow. flags are being flown at half-staff in honor of the victims and members of congress did something they said they have not done in more than 30 years, held a hearing on violence against asians and other americans. sitting and testifying about their experiences, it was an emotional morning of testimony. punctuated by an exchange between congressman chip roy, who seemed to take issue with the focus of hearing and democratic congresswoman grace may, who was invited as a witness to testify. watch. >> my concern about this hearing is that it seems to want to venture into the policing of rhetoric from' free society, free free, and away from the rule of law and taking out bad guys. so now we're talking about whether talking about china, chinese communist party, whatever phrasing we want to use and if some people are saying, hey, we think those guys are the bad guys for whatever reason -- and let me just state clearly, i do. >> so that was some of what congressman chip roy said. and here was congresswoman meng's response to him. >> we cannot turn a blind eye to living in fear. i want to go back to something mr. roy said earlier, your president, your party and your colleague can talk about issues with any other country that you want, but you don't have to do it by putting a bull's-eye on the back of asian americans across this country on our grandparents, and our kids. this hearing was to address the hurt and pain of our community, to find solutions and we will not let you take our voice away from us! >> nbc news correspondent jo ling kent is here with more on the house hearing, i have tom winter for more on the investigation and kimmy yen has been reporting on the rise of violence against asian americans. jo, i want to start with you. pretty emotional hearing today. this is surfacing the problem but what were some of the solutions discussed as well? >> yeah, that emotional moment from the congresswoman really reflects what so many people in the asian american community throughout this country feel right now, is that it's defensive invisibility despite the number of pieces of evidence showing a huge problem here. and some of the solutions that were discussed, chuck, inside the hearing were about visibility, about education and making sure hate incidents and hate crimes are better documented. there's a couple of pieces of legislation out there that are currently being considered to put forth, put some resources behind those requests right now. but i -- the issue of the debate between what the topic actually is at hand was reflected not just by congresswoman meng but other people who are testifying as well. listen to what a select portion of what they had to say -- >> last year when i heard the highest levels of government, people using racist words like china virus to spread xenophobia and cast light on innocent communities. comments like these only reveal a legacy of racism, anti-asian sentiment and insensitivity that seeks to divide our nation. >> combating hate is not a partisan issue. >> i'm asking you to please stop using racist terms like kung flu, woo han virus or other ethnic identifiers in this resident virus. i'm not a virus. >> now, as we hear from those who are testifying and those on the committee, chuck, one major theme rings true, this issue is not going to be solved by any stretch any time soon, and that's why members of the community are asking for an increased amount of investment in tackling the issue. if you take a look at the stop aapi hate tracking and data we have, we know of these hate incidents, nearly 70% are reported by women and are happening in front of our businesses, inside businesses, on public streets, all over the country. and so the hearing continues to go on and we're watching it but we're really seeing this theme ee merge of getting rid of invisibility first, education, tracking and creating policies that actually can foster a more equitable, fair, environment for asian americans. that's really what's jumped out so far. >> i want -- can you dive into the i visibility issue jo, which is this issue that many asian americans have been hesitant to report this stuff. and only in the last year have we seen a little bit but there's been almost -- is it cultural? what is it that -- there is so much he's he's tans to report about these incidents. >> there are oftentimes hesitancy because of the model minority missed. they do well, doctors and ceos and lawyers and go to the best colleges and universities when in our reality our community faces the biggest economic disparity of most racial groups and it's also an invisibility issue when it comes to the things that happen on a daily basis, that have been absorbed by the community. like, for example, racial slurs are getting shunned at a local business. according to pew research, 3-10 racial americans have experienced a racial slur, more than any other racial group and that's as of data last summer. when you have these issues compounded by a pandemic and compounded by what many business owners have told me a twin, a double virus, if you will. the issue of the pandemic itself, plus this pervasive racism, you just have a huge mountain to climb. and that's where some of the invisibility comes. i know kimmy yen can speak to much more on this topic but this is really the issue you see playing out on this hearing right now, is there's a disconnect and there's a plea for justice being acknowledged, and i think that's what you see daniel dae kim saying and representative meng and everyone who has spoken since then. >> kimmy yen, you were name-checked so i'm going to bring you into this conversation. do you want top expand upon what jo ling kent was saying? >> yes, jo definitely brought up a couple of issues we've been grabbling with throughout the pandemic. one thing that i did want to and expand upon is that there are several barriers to reporting a lot of these incidents. many of them include, you know, language barriers. there's also lack of access to a lot of these resources or there's lack of awareness that a lot of these resources do exist for these communities. i think that one really big barrier that isn't mentioned enough is in a lot of these low-income communities, there's a fear of retaliation that if they do report to law enforcement or other groups, that the perpetrators, the attacks will come back. so the fear in the asian american community is very real right now, and it certainly is not -- it's likely compounded by the events that we are seeing unfold. >> i want to delve a little bit more into atlanta. you write about in your piece you go into the long history of the roles asian women have been relegated to nut workforce. how do you believe that history potentially contributed to this attack? >> it yeah, i know thought suspect mentioned, he claimed there was no racial motivation involved. the issue here is that experts and activists also stress that given the way in which asian women have been seen in this country, historically fetishized, hyper sexualized, it's made them particularly susceptible to sexual and physical violence. and so, therefore, it's impossible to divorce race from this conversation. we've seen as jo had mentioned in the 3,800 incidents that were reported in the stop aapi hate forum, roughly 68% of respondents were women and that's compared to 29% that were men. and there's this idea that because, you know, we are -- we are stereotypes as weak or that we won't fight back, that we're easier targets. so many experts say that's likely playing into what we are seeing here. >> let me bring in tom winter with an update here on the investigation. so, tom, first of all, who's in charge of this investigation? i ask this because i think there's a lot of concern about the leadership in cherokee county. so who is the lead on this investigation, the folks in fulton county or cherokee county? >> right now, chuck, that's not immediately clear that anybody is going to be able to move forward and have a specific leadership because it is -- there's a series of crimes that occurred in one county, right, and a series of crimes that occurred in another. does this go to the georgia bureau of investigation, can they get involved? does the case get consolidated? those are all questions we have, quite frankly, we're trying to get answers on. unless some somehow becomes a federal investigation and to be clear, there's no indication at this point that's where this is going. so at the moment it remains -- >> i was going to ask about that. let me interrupt you there. there is potentially a way -- i mean, i don't think you and i would be shocked if maybe the president had an announcement when he got to atlanta tomorrow or that the attorney general was going to at least open an investigation on whether this was a hate crime. isn't that -- if it is a hate crime, does that bring in the feds? >> that would definitely change things. excuse me, that would definitely change things as far as where this bows from here. i think what they would have to -- they would have to find some sort of predicate information to open the investigation. i think the fact the vast majority of victims here are in fact asian, is that enough that allows them to open that case? and is the vast majority of the investigate here are women, is that enough? under the shepherd-bird jr. hate act of 2009. so i think there's a couple different ways for the federal government to investigate this. it's going to be difficult based on the statements of the person involved in the shooting or person who the authorities say did this, who is robert aaron long, they're going to have find at this point some additional information, whether it be victims' statements, information on his phone or devices that would try to push the investigation that way. we're just going to have to see, chuck. >> well, i was just going to say, they had his devices -- our colleague shep smith did an interview with the sheriff's office there. and i was amazed at what he didn't know. he wasn't sure what they had or didn't have. it was over 48 hours, that's not usually the case here, and maybe when this interview was done, it was 36 hours, but that seemed a little unusual to me, it seems like they don't know this information or they don't want to share it? >> from the device standpoint, it didn't seem odd to me, if you want to thoroughly go through everything, that takes a little time because we don't know how many devices of individual media this individual had. so with respect to that, i will give ut benefit of the doubt. but i think the mistake made at the press conference yesterday, you could have gotten up and attributed, look, these are the statements we're getting from the person we charged with murder in this crime, however, we still have an ongoing investigation and want to hear more from some of the people at these day spas. we want to hear some more information from family members or associated. we want to hear from people who have known him for a long time and make sure there's not a rogue social media account out there that can help us with motive. i think that's probably the tact they probably wish they had taken. i think that's the tactic the fbi would have taken if they were leading the investigation u . with that said at this point as we sit here 1:15 eastern time on thursday afternoon, i don't have anybody telling me that this is now veering towards a hate crime, but, of course, this takes time and we will see where the case develops. >> kimmy yam, is the asian american community ever going to see this as not a hate crime, no matter what the official word is? >> regardless of whether it is charged as a hate crime or not, i think as people of color, race always plays into nearly every interaction that we are in. and i think that in terms of what we are seeing in this case, i know not a ton of details have come out and emerged yet, but in what we are seeing and in the language that's been used, i know experts have even mentioned when he's saying, you know, that he's trying to get rid of temptation, for example, by eliminating these spas, that hearkens kind of back to these stereotypes of asian women being these temptresses and manipulative temptresses and that kind of puts the onus on victims, experts say, rather than on the perpetrator u so regardless of whether or not it's formally charged as a hate crime, race cannot be ignored in this, because of the ways american asians and american asian women in particular have been dealing with violence since entering the u.s. there are a confluence of factors going into this, legal codes, policies, american history of imperial domination, and the prevailing culture historians note that all of this has come together to really create an environment in which violence against women is possible. >> jo ling kent, tom winter and kimmy yam, thank you all for getting us started on this important story. kimmy, it's very nice to have you on this program. look forward to having you on again. still ahead -- changing the rules. as president biden opens the door to filibuster reform, senator mitch mcconnell threatens a scorched-earth reaction, and he may not be able to deliver on that. first, dr. fauci was back on capitol hill as new covid concerns are growing as the drop in new cases is, well, stalling. did you know that 70% of the soils on your clothes are invisible? 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but what have you been doing for the last two hours? ...delegating? oh, good one. move your xfinity services without breaking a sweat. xfinity makes moving easy. go online to transfer your services in about a minute. get started today. welcome back. democrats in favor of overhauling the filibuster as a way to potentially make it easier to enact president biden's agenda are feeling a little more helpful at president biden seemed to express support for changing the rules a little. take a listen. >> i don't think you have to eliminate the filibuster. you have to do what it used to be when i first got to the senate, and that is a filibuster, you had to stand up and command the floor. once you stopped talking, you lost that and someone could move in and say, i move the question of. so you have to work from filibuster. >> you're for that reform, you're for bringing back the talking filibuster? >> i am. that's what it was supposed to be. >> restoring the talking filibuster, this would force senators to actively hold the floor by talking for hours on end, holding up all other senate business in the process and potentially, publicly having to show opposition to potentially bills that are popular, i'm not saying all of the bills are popular but that's the only outcome. while the full democratic caucus has not coalesced behind any kind of plan, senator minority leader mitch mcconnell is this week renewing his threat of scorched-earth procedural tactics if the democratic majority alters the filibuster rules. >> this chaos would not open up an express lane to liberal change. it would not open up an express lane for the biden presidency to speed into the history books. the senate would be more like a 100-car pileup, nothing moving. >> joining me now is a former colleague of many of those democrats grappling with the filibuster question and she's grappled with this question, former missouri senator claire medications cass kill, msnbc political analyst and un-reporter trying to figure out whip counts and things like that. senator mccaskill, it's good to have you. let me start with the talking filibuster. it does seem to me before you get to eliminating the filibuster, there's going to be this show to say, okay, let's try this before you maybe get everybody on board to eliminate it. do you think this will have an impact? >> yeah, here's what has to happen, chuck, they have to pick out bills that are very popular and committee chairman have to mark them up and take a vote in committee. by the way, even if the vote is tied in committee because many committees are 50-50, those bills can still move to the floor and those popular votes have to be put on the floor for a vote. them you have to demonstrate to the american people, and especially voters in states where it is not bright blue and not bright red that there's real dysfunction in the senate. i mean, this puts tremendous pressure -- you want to know what makes mitch mcconnell uncomfortable, that is having to vote on something that is going to be hard for a republican candidate in pennsylvania to defend. a vote on something that's going to be hard for a republican candidate in wisconsin to defend. so we're spending so much time focusing on who's for and against the filibuster, let's focus on these republican senators that are not voting their constituents. they're not voting what their constituents want, they're just blocking the senate. and give me a break, mitch mcconnell, you broke the senate a long time ago. all of your threats are just luster. >> let me start with your plan here. i think i have heard a similar version, which is okay. because you've got to demonstrate to the public the system is broken, you can't just say it, right, you've got to show them. manchin/toomey, that background check bill that it 80% to 90% support, you put that up. before a filibuster just prevented -- and nobody quite knew what the rational was, just that oh, there's 41-plus that don't want to have it. oh, well, time to move on. in a talking filibuster, everything else stops and then they would be up there, for what, how long opposing -- and then there's a spotlight on their opposition, right? >> yeah, who's going to want to take the baton? who wants that spotlight on a bill that has 60%, 70%, 80% of americans supporting it? all they have to do now is send an email to t