Transcripts For KNTV Today 20170614 : comparemela.com

two capitol hill police officers who were shot according to our justice correspondent pete williams, and pete williams, those officers are expected to be okay. again, all of this unfolding just after 7:00 a.m. on the east coast in alexandria, virginia. this is just outside washington, d.c. the situation right now, though, according to law enforcement officials, stable. this is a situation that is under control. they believe they have the lone gunman in custody. a number of folks who were there at the field describing him as a middle-aged. we're told he was wearing blue jeans, a blue shirt, and he had a riechfle. we heard from congressman joe barton from texas a few moments ago. he said that it also appeared as if the gunman had a pistol as well. perhaps even a semiautomatic pistol, said that the shooting went on somewhere between five and ten minutes. a number of other eye-witnesses say at least 50 shots were fired. it would seem as if, as the morning has gone on, that 50 number may be a conservative estimate as well. but again, right now, steve scalise, the congressman from louisiana, in surgery. he is in stable condition. we just got that information a short time ago from his office. time ago from his office. >> we're seeing some of these images. we should set the scene a little bit. this baseball field which is in alexandria, virginia is said to be right near a ymca. we saw a shot of a pool, some shattered glass and we believe that's where those images come from. as i turn to you, tom costello at the scene outside the baseball field, many, many members of congress who were there, at least 12 or 15 by our count but possibly up to 25, they've come out and started telling their stories, and many of them, tom, are suggesting that this gunman was targeting lawmakers in particular, and at least one member of congress told nbc news this gunman was targeting republican lawmakers in particular. >> reporter: we've had a pretty consistent eye witness reports now for the last three hours since this went down and i'll tell you where i am. if you go down the street about a block to the left, that's the ballpark. that's where they were playing. about an hour ago this street was filled with fire trucks and ems ambulances and of course police. now the fire and ems response was pulled back and we just have a significant police presence. but this all went down just after 7:00. what's consistent about those eye witness reports is that almost everybody, including members of congress and eye witnesses all say, that there were dozens of shots fired. some members of congress even saying potentially hundreds. so those reports seem consistent. also, five people shot including the gunman and we believe that we have two capitol hill police officers wounded. one of them had to be medevaced out inel short time ago from his office. one member of congress's staff or staff member wounded and then the gunman. five people in total were wounded in this exchange of gunfire, and that's important. it was an exchange of gunfire. it was capitol hill police who were here because members of congress were here but most specifically, the gop whip, congressman scalise was here. he has a bigger security detail and because he was here, you had more of a robust capitol hill police presence. they immediately engaged the shooter, and then we believe the shooter was injured. at the last report we have from our affiliate here in washington, the nbc affiliate wrc, their sources are saying that that suspect is still alive. also, we should tell you that when the call originally went out, when ems first arrived on the scene, they reported back that they had of the five victims, three were code red. two were code yellow. red means a significant serious injury. yellow means not as serious. of course green would mean significantly no injuries, and black would be a fatality. so on the ground they had three code reds and two yellows and now we understand -- did you guys report at least a couple of them are in critical condition and in surgery? >> yes. >> at george washington hospital, yes. and tom -- >> reporter: so this is -- >> go ahead, i'm sorry. >> reporter: as for way of landmarking this, for those people out on the west coast who are watching us now as the today show begin is out there, we are about two miles from reagan international airport. if you were to drive right down that road, you would essentially he is in stable condition. and then be into washington d.c. on the other side. that tells you how far and how close we are from washington d.c. alexandria being a city where many people who work in the government, who work on capitol hill, even members of the media live and work in and around alexandria, virginia. this is really one of those bedroom communities, suburban communities that serves washington d.c. guys, back to you. >> tom, thank you. we'll keep an eye on what's going on at the scene which police have said is now stable. craig, as we've been reporting on this this morning, we've heard detailed accounts from members of congress. senator rand paul stands out in my mind, him talking about steve scalise, the congressman who was shot in the hip, basically dragging himself off the field. another member of congress said he used his belt as a tourniquet to stop the bleeding for congressman scalise who, as we understand it, was alert and able to speak even to his wife before going into surgery this morning. >> the house has cancelled votes today. vice-president pence has cancelled a public appearance. so has president trump. president trump was expected to make some remarks there at the department of labor. we're told those remarks have been cancelled. peter alexander standing by for us at the white house. peter, what else are we hearing from the president? >> reporter: craig, we have just also heard in terms of capitol hill, republican lawmakers obviously, many of them were at that practice this morning but we know there will be a meeting of all house members taking place this morning, expected in about an hour or so. so that's a new piece of information. you just reported on the president now canceling those remarks expected at the department of labor this morning. moments ago i hung out with an official here at the white house to try to get a better sense on whether the president will be making any public remarks, addressing the situation that took place this morning. they have yet to make a decision on that or certainly to communicate it to us. we'll pass that on when we learn it. the president did tweet early this morning specifically about steve scalise. he wrote, representative steve scalise of louisiana, a true friend an patriot, was badly injured but will fully recover. our thoughts and prayers are with him. earlier he posted a statement, the white house did, on his behalf saying that he was deeply saddened by the tragedy, directing his tlauts ahoughts a prayers to members who were there on that site. awful day that took place a short time away from here. the security situation this morning was a little different. they had blocked off pennsylvania avenue. it appeared for a while that lafayette park in front of the white house had been shut down as well. they are all open. security is at a heightened level today. we have seen many members of the secret service walking around with their weapons as they would normally have them but in their arms as they patrol outside the gates on this day. again, president trump here at the white house, the vice-president mike pence canceling remarks he was supposed to deliver this morning to the national association of home builders. instead there was a moment of silence. we are told he is at the white house as well today. craig and sa vvannahsavannah. >> thank you so much. this is texas congressman mike con away. he was at the field and spoke moments ago. >> tell me what happened. >> we were talking practice and a gunshot went off. it was louder than a normal gunshot. i don't know if it hit the fence or something. then people started reacting and running towards the dugout. more gunshots went off. steve scalise was in the right field on the grass just off the infield. we had a staffer down, matt michael was shot and one of roger williams' staffers were shot. a bunch of folks were in the dugout. i was behind the fence trying to help the capitol hill police sm spot the guy because he was moving back and forth. both of those officers started enga engagin engaging. one of them goes down. soon thereafter alexandria police shows up and they begin to engage the guy. he's down to a pistol at that point in time. they shot him and got him in handcuffs. >> did you ever think you would ever see anything like this? >> no. never ever thinks they're going to be involved in a circumstance like that. total shock obviously. >> did the police tell you anything when you were leaving, they know who it is? >> no, no. this is a guy -- big fat guy, probably5'10", t-shirt and shorts, had a long gun and a pistol. it was a semiautomatic rifle and it looked like a nine millimeter pistol. >> did police say anything when he was being taken away? >> i didn't get to him. he went down actually in the field. he was the only guy in the field that went down. so i was off the field and behind. >> thank you, congressman. >> sure. >> that was congressman mike conaway speaking from the capitol a few moments ago describing the shooter as a big fat guy. we know he's a middle-aged white guy. that's about all we have. although at this point it does seem as if his story is starting to jibe with a number of other witnesses. it sounds like two weapons were involved, this rifle according to witnesses and also a pistol. the congressman saying it looked like a nine millimeter. again, all of this very early. we've also just found out, peter reported on this meeting that's going to happen on the hill. that meeting set to happen roughly an hour from now, 11:15 eastern time, an all member house meeting with lawmakers in washington d.c. >> we also await a knew conferen -- news conference from the alexandria police department. they've been out with a very short comment but we do expect to hear from them again. >> kasie hunt standing by at the capitol. good morning, what do you have? >> reporter: craig, savannah, good morning. it is a very somber start to the day here on capitol hill. what i just saw transpire right in front of me and we can't show it to you because of many of the long-standing traditions here in the house of representatives but there are doors to the floor and you will hear bells ring overhead and then they will open the doors and bring the house into session. what they just did a few moments ago at the top of the 10:00 hour was bring the house into session, you heard the bells ring, the doors open, and then they promptly closed again. and that reflects the fact that they have cancelled all votes in the house for today. we're hearing basically event by event being cancelled up here on capitol hill. hearings have been postponed so business has really halted as these members take time to grapple with the terrible events that have unfolded today. this of course is a tradition that is very -- it's bipartisan, yes, it's democrats versus republicans on the baseball field but this is a major charity event. they play it down at national stadium just a mile or so from the capitol. i've attended it for several years. it's an event that has everybody of both parties sort of drinking beers together in the stands, watching other members play. their members' families will come out for the game. i was speaking to one congressman whose family was flying in this morning in order to be there to attend this game that was scheduled for tomorrow. so these practices have been going on for weeks now, and i actually play on the congressional women's soft ball team. they play the press. it's the press versus the women. and the schedules are similar in that regard. it is really a situation where they really are not under any protection, so there is a lot of appreciation today for those capitol police. if they had not been there this would have been so much worse. >> sorry to interrupt you. we've got tom costello speaking to a witness. go ahead, tom. >> crouching behind some -- >> reporter: start once again because we've just been joined live. what happened? >> i was leaving the ymca gym. someone said there was a man with a gun outside and i shouldn't go outside. i looked outside and saw the man with the gun. he was crouched behind a wooden piece of -- the stands, and he had an ak-47 in his hands. he was exchanging fire with police officers who were crouched behind a black suv. >> how confident are you it was an assault type weapon? >> fairly confident. >> can you describe his build, what he looked like? >> sure. he was shorter and stocky. he was a caucasian man with whitehair and white facial hair and wearing a blue polo. >> did you say anything? did you hear anything? >> i was too far away to hear. >> can you describe the exchange of gunfire with the police? what was happening? >> the officer that i saw was shooting over the hoods of a black suv behind the engine block and the gentleman was shooting from behind this wooden structure with the ak-47. >> did you see one of the officers hit by gunfire? >> i did not. i did see one person laying between two wheels of the suv behind it. i would assume that that person had been hit because it was a very odd place for them to be otherwise. >> how long did this exchange of gunfire go on? >> i would say under two or three minutes. >> then what happened? >> then i saw the suspect being handcuffed by police and swarmed in the way that they do. >> to be clear, the exchange of gunfire we believe was with capitol hill police and then you saw uniformed officers from alexandria show up? >> i didn't see that during the actual shooting incident. all i saw was one person shooting over the hood of the suv. i assume that's the capitol police. >> based on what you saw, did there seem to be extreme concern about any of the victims? can you describe the ems response or a helicopter brought in? >> a helicopter did land on the field at one point. i didn't get a very good look at it. someone said, look, there's a helicopter, and i managed to see the tail of it but i can't say anything other than that. >> you were in the ymca and i understand that some of the windows were shot out, is that right? >> they weren't shot out but they were shot through. one bullet passed through the front glass and to the pool area. another bullet lodged in between two panes of glass. >> your thoughts about having gone through all of this and first of all how close were you and then your thoughts about having to experience this? >> the ymca is maybe 50 yards from where the shooting occur d occurred. i was about 15 feet from where the bullet passed through the glass so depending how you measure, quite close. my thoughts are, having learned that these were republican baseball players, that we need to be very careful about our political discourse and let it not spill over into violence. i think we've all failed when that happens. it's tremendously upsetting. >> it was very close call for you also if you were that close to a bullet that went through the front door. >> yes, i suppose so. >> are you a combat veteran by chance? >> i'm not. >> thank you. appreciate your time. so as you would expect, there are a lot of people who are coming and hearing -- rather, talk background what they experienced in the immediate aftermath of this, guys, back in new york. most of these reports are pretty consistent, describing the suspect as a middle-aged white male with a short, stocky build who was apparently firing an ak-47 type of weapon. back to you. >> very well poised eye witness there. tom, thanks for that. also with perhaps a bit of a cautionary tale at the end of his recounting as well. >> he came very close this morning as we just heard. nbc justice correspondent pete williams has been working the phones, his sources. pete, what do you have for us? >> reporter: the best information we have now on the suspect who was shot by police and is in the hospital undergoing surgery is that he's in his 60s, and at this point there's not a great deal known that we're being told about him other than that the preliminary read from several law enforcement officials is they don't see any connection here to international terrorism. important to note in this day and age when there have been calls by overseas terrorist organizations, isis and others, urging people to use whatever they have at their disposal, whatever weapons they have, guns, knives, cars to attack people. and we have seen people following up on that. having said that, the early indication is this is not one of those situations. now, what led this person, this man to do this shooting, whether this is domestic terrorism, whether this is a criminal act, whether this is someone with mental problems, we just don't know the answer to that yet. i suspect we will know it relatively soon before the end of the day certainly. but we don't have any further information on where this person is from, what the motive was. you've heard at least one witness said that the man, as he was walking up to the baseball field this morning asked someone are these the republicans or the democrats playing. whether that, in fact, is correct, whether that had anything to do with this, we just don't know at this point. we're still trying to figure out precisely who was shot here. we know -- we believe two capitol police officers who we're told their injuries are not life threatening, congressman steve scalise, a member of the staff of congressman roger williams of texas, the gunman and perhaps another person because witnesses have told us that they saw a person who lived in the area who worked for a food service company running to try to give ai aid to one of the victims and that that person himself was shot but we're still trying to figure out the identity of the people who were shot and we're told that the authorities are going to have a news conference shortly, perhaps in 20 minutes or so, 10 minutes or so. but there's a number of law enforcement organizations involved here. there's the bureau of alcohol, tobacco and firearms. there's the fbi. there's the u.s. capitol police. there's local police from virginia who had helped respond to this today. so they're all comparing notes at this point and preparing for this news conference, which is one reason why we can't get through to them right now. >> one other fact, i'm just looking at a statement that came from the office of senator jeff flake of arizona who of course was there this morning and we've heard in him and perhaps we'll play that again in a moment. but he said that senator flake took cover in the dugout and while he was in the dugout his office says senator flake helped treat one aide who was shot in the leg near center field and that had managed to get into the dugout. so when you're talking about an aide, presumably they're talking about a congressional aide and as you mentioned, pete, congressman roger williams said that one of his staff members was shot. so putting all those pieces together, we know a little more, it sounds like, according to senator flake and congressman williams that this aide was shot in the leg and is being treated at the hospital right now. >> we know thwo of those shot ae in critical condition. we heard from the george washington hospital within the last hour but again, we don't know which two. we do know that congressman scalise, according to his office, is in surgery right now and is in stable condition. you just mentioned arizona senator jeff flake. let's listen again here to his harrowing account of how it all went down just after 7:00 eastern. >> we were doing batting practice and all of a sudden we heard shots and it was clear pretty quickly that there was a shooter there with a high powered rifle. many of us dove in the dugout. steve scalise, one of the members of majority whip in the house, was hit in the hip. he dragged himself off of the infield into the field. he was down the whole time. most of us got -- about 12 of us got into the dugout and then there was return fire from behind our dugout from the capitol police who were here as part of steve scalise's detail. it went on for about ten minutes. a lot -- dozens and dozens and dozens of shots fired. i got a look at the shooter. he came behind the back stop but he had a clear sight to the dugout so we couldn't stay up for long. when we heard an all clear, that the shooter was down, then i ran out to steve sa tut tweto put p the wound. >> where was he shot? >> in the left hip. >> what did he say? >> he was coherent and asking for water. he was obviously -- he laid out there on his own for ten minutes. we cut away the jersey and put pressure on. it was bleeding quite a bit. >> who else was out there on the field with you? >> i got out there first and then brad -- a member from ohio came out. he's a doctor. so we got some -- a shirt, put it on there, and then as far as the other members, steve was the only member shot. there was two of the capitol police shot. one staffer who dove into the dugout with a leg wound and we got somebody's belt and put it around there to stop the bleeding. so we were attending to him as well as trying to keep down away from the shooter. and then somebody was shot in the chest as well. i think six total including the shooter. >> do you know who was shot in the chest? >> i believe his name is matt, works for tyson foods. he helps out with the game. >> do you think this was targeted in. >> i don't know if any specific members were targeted. it's hard to imagine he didn't know what he was doing. >> senator jeff flake, republican of arizona, who was there and describing what unfolded this morning. >> nbc news law enforcement analyst jim kavanaugh is still with us. jim, as you hear that recounting there from senator flake, what goes through your mind? >> i thought he was very courageous and i thought the way he acted to help representative scali scalise. more important, craig, was i think tom costello's interview with that eye witness. he said some key things. one was, from all these eye witness reports, the shooter made his way behind the back stop and was in the field and he reported seeing a plain clothes person shooting over the hood of an suv. that's an important fact because it's likely one of the capitol police security officers, security detail, who made his way to their black security suv. inside that would be tactical rifles. it's standard procedure. secret service, capitol police, even state troopers that protect governs, they're carrying tactical rifles in their black suvs. they may not carry them on the ball field, but they're close. so if capitol police officers could make it back to that tactical vehicle, get that tactical rifle out, get over the hood, they could take the guy down at a distance and that's possibly -- we are area knnot s for sure but possibly how this guy got stopped. >> jim, this idea that he was crouched behind the stands, according to the eye witness, what, if anything, can we glean from that? >> he went there, craig, for mass murder. there's no doubt. we've had different descriptions of an ak-47 from that last witness, an ar-15 from or witnesses so we're not quite sure the make but we know we have a rifle. reports of semiautomatic gunfire, which means each time you pull the trigger one round is discharged. normally these weapons without any extra stuff come with a 30-round magazine. you can shoot that magazine in a few seconds, four or five seconds. you can then drop the magazine with a button and reload another magazine in two seconds. so it wouldn't be unusual for a guy to go with one rifle and one in each back pocket. that's 90 rounds and another handgun with 15 rounds. that's accounting for a lot of this shooting. i think time is compressed as well. i heard senator flake talk about techb minut ten minutes, some others talk about ten minutes. time is compressed. i've been in a couple of shootouts. you're the worst time judge of time when you're there. everything just slows down for you. so it might be that the alexandria police did get there in three minutes and capitol police got to their tactical rifle and they were able to stop this guy. one other fact i thought was interesting is the report -- i don't know how deeply pete has confirmed it or whatever, but we did talk about it on air. the gunman had asked who's on the field, is it republicans or democrats. that's a key issue because if he -- the people he wanted to shoot were a certain party and they were all in a dugout, this could be a really bad scene. when they're on a baseball diamond, they're spread out as individuals. so just the luck of the draw here, if the people he's targeting are out on the field and not in the dugout, that's a big thing. of course the rifle fire cracks, let me tell you how loud that is, it cracks really loud. it's extremely loud. all the people are hearing that sound. they're immediately reacting to the first shot. bystanders, people across at the y, people in the ball field, they're all scattering when they hear that rifle crack. >> no question about it, jim. we're waiting and i think just moments away now from a news conference from police. we do have some sound from the maryland congressman. let's play it and we'll break in for the news conference. >> it's a tragedy any time a violent incident of this type. the information i have now is that there was no loss of life. is that consistent? i hope mr. scalise is fine and the officers will fully recover and anybody else who was injured will fully recover. but it is, once again, a message that all are vulnerable in a time when violence is far too prevalent. >> are you going to have some sort of meeting with democrats today to discuss this about how to respond, what to do? >> i'm sure that we'll have discussions about what needs to be done and what security is appropria appropriate. we have significant numbers of members of congress of either party and both parties present, there is an opportunity for people to strike out against what they seem to be authority or something they don't like. >> back to business? >> i'm not sure what you mean by that question. it's not related to the incident i presume. >> votes are being cancelled -- >> i talked to the majority leader about an hour ago and he's going to -- he's delayed business for a little bit but i think we'll complete our business of the day today. >> that's house minority whip, steny hoyer there. tom is still standing by in alexandria where again we expect to hear from police any moment now. tom, any idea what we might expect to hear from law enforcement when this news conference starts? >> reporter: we're expecting to hear from the capitol hill police chief, the alexandria police chief. we believe governor terry mcauliffe from virginia will be here as well and we may hear also from other members of federal law enforcement. we are hoping for some sort of an upgrade or update i should say on the conditions of the people who have been shot, most specifically, how those two capitol hill police officers are doing, as well as the member of congress's staff who is going to be -- who we understand has also been injured. when you have a shooting involving a member of congress and what at this early stage looks like it was a targeted shooting at members of congress, you can imagine the world's media have suddenly now come down on this very small point in alexandria, virginia. we've now got dozens and dozens of members of the media who have converged on this point in alexandria, waiting for first word from the police chiefs to get an update on what the status of this investigation -- >> we have a shot -- by the way, tom, as you're talking, we have a shot of governor mcauliffe talking up now, accompanied by members of law enforcement. so i think we are moments away from this news conference. continue your thought. >> reporter: i was just going to say the one thing that's interesting here is that all of the reporting from the witnesses has been pretty consistent. and that is that, in fact, there were dozens or hundreds of shots fired, that some sort of a semiautomatic weapon looking like an ak-47 was used and that the response from the police was very rapid and thankfully capitol hill police were able to very quickly engage the gunman. i'm going to turn it over now to this press conference. good morning, everybody. i'm mike brown, chief of the alexandria police department. b-r-o-w-n. we're here today to give you an update on the incident that occurred here this morning in alexandria. let me repeat if i can some of the facts that we do know at this point. before i start though, i want to say that this is an incident that's not an active incident. the city is safe. we have an active investigation going on for the incident that took place this morning, but i want to reassure the community here in alexandria that this city is indeed safe. we will continue to work with the investigation as it moves forward. the facts as we have it this morning, again, at 0709, nine minutes after the 7:00, we received a call, a 911 call of an active shooter at simpson park here on monroe in alexandria. our units responded and were on scene within three minutes. the officers received fire from a suspect, and they returned fire. that part of the investigation is ongoing as we speak. we came find out that at this event was a practice session for a baseball team involving some representatives from congress or some employees from congress. there were capitol police individuals on the scene, and they all engaged with the subject, and i'll let the chief of the capitol police respond to that. the emergency medical personnel that responded to the scene from the alexandria fire department, as well as officers from the alexandria police department provided treatment to a number of individuals on the scene. those individuals, we know that five of them were transported by public emergency medical sources to hospitals within the area to deal with a variety of injuries and treatment. at this point the alexandria police department, because this case involves the assault on a federal officer, the federal bureau of investigation will be taking over the investigation. we welcome our work with the fbi. we are embedded and are assisting the fbi along with other agencies that are trying to deal with this particular scene in this investigation of this incident. that said, i would also like to say our gratitude to the allied agencies that responded to this scene. we had individuals from the alexandria sheriff's department, of course the alexandria fire department whose initial response helped us a great deal in trying to manage this thing. quite frankly, i couldn't be more proud of the men and women that were involved from the alexandria police department. they did an outstanding job, in my opinion, from what i hear so far. at this point i'd like to go ahead and introduce the police chief from the capitol police to talk about their efforts in this area and what they're doing. chief? >> thank you, chief. i would like to first start out by thanking the alexandria police, sheriff's office, fire department, the fbi, atf and all of our federal law enforcement and local partners who assisted in this response. certainly it's a very large response that's going to take a while to sort through all of the details. my units of our dignitary protection division were on site with congressional protecty when the incident occurred. they did engage in gunfire with the suspect, and we're assisted by the alexandria police, the officers, the united states c capitol police officers who were injured are in good condition and have not suffered any life threatening injuries at this point. as we get more information, we'll be working through the fbi and our local partners with the alexandria police to provide more details as they become available. at this point i'd like to turn it over to the fbi. good morning. tim slater, the sac, special agent in charge of the washington field office. i want to reiterate what the chiefs have said. this is a secure community at this point. it's an active investigation. however, the security of the community is paramount and i want to reassure you that that's the case. so we got involved around 9:30 this morning. initially we responded with our national capitol response squad from the jttf per our protocol, and they were assisting our state and local partners. once it was confirmed that we had a member of congress that was involved in the incident, we have taken the lead. however, this is a joint command and this is a joint investigation with our state and local partners to include who's been at the microphone already and our partners from atf and alexandria county and alexandria city and capitol police as well. i will take a couple questions in just a second but i want to turn it over to the governor for a second for a couple comments. >> thank you. first of all, thoughts and prayers to everybody affected by today's incident. i want to congratulate the efforts of the state, local and federal. we're all here together. early this morning state police and v dem were activated. i want to thank everybody who was involved but i specifically want to thank the first responders. i have been told that members of the neighborhood in the community came out to be of assistance. this is truly an extraordinary effort. i also want to compliment the u.s. capitol police for their quick action and through their heroic efforts and others, they saved a lot of lives today. we do everything we can to keep our communities safe, and i once again want to thank all the law enforcement personnel and first responders who were involved today. thank you. >> what can you tell us about the suspect? >> is it your feeling at this point that this was, by what you see, number one, a deliberate, planned attack, and are you investigating this now on the basis it could be an act of terrorism by an individual? >> ma'am, it's too early to say. it's really raw at this moment. we're just at the initial part of this investigation. it's too early to say. we're working in both ways right now. >> so is one of the angles you're exploring investigating that it could be an act of terrorism? >> we're exploring all angles. >> do you have any information -- it is said that there may be a tentative i.d. even if you can't say specifics, are you beginning to narrow down on the identity of the shooter? >> yes, we are. >> was this an assassination attempt? >> no, it's not an assassination attempt. >> do you know who he is? >> we're still working on it. >> is he american, former military? >> we will not confirm that. >> certain members of congress were being targeted, was this an intentional attack. >> too early to tell. >> has anyone suffered life threatening injuries? >> everybody was transported to the hospital and receiving medical treatment. don't know. >> a member of congress said that the shooter asked are these republicans or democrats. can you say whether you think there is a political motivation? >> no, not aware of that at all. >> any information on the weapon, sir? >> no information on the weapons. don't know yet. >> you think that this could have been random? >> don't know. it's really early in the investigation. >> you said it's not an assassination. how do you know that? >> i don't know any of those facts. it's too early to say one way or the other. >> can you give us the condition of the suspect, the suspect was taken to the hospital. do you know his condition and also the general condition of the officers who were shot? >> i think the officers are doing better. i'm not sure about the suspect at this time. >> is the suspect talking to law enforcement? >> say again [inaudible] >> no, ma'am. >> how important is it that the security detail was here? can you give us a sense of the importance of the fact that there were officers on the scene when this started? >> member of the dignitary protection were here, yes. >> and the difference it made? >> i'm sure it made a significant difference. >> sir, is that suspect talking to you at this point, cooperating, explaining? >> i do not know the answer to that. >> the security detail, were they secret service or capitol police -- >> anywhere else this investigation is taking place? >> we have secured the scene and getting it through the logical investigative steps at this point. >> you had said you don't think this is an assassination attempt and yet it would appear that members of congress were targeted. >> no, i did not say that. what i said is that we are not sure at this moment. it's still early on in the investigation and we're working through it. >> is your suspect a local man? >> don't know. >> even if he's from the region? >> no, ma'am. >> do you know if the suspect approached lawmakers in the parking lot and asked whether they were republicans or democratic? >> i'm not aware of that. >> you said earlier that it wasn't an assassination attempt. can you clarify for us, was it -- >> okay, if i said that i misspoke. it's too early in the investigation to say one way or the other. >> can you confirm his appearance. there are reports he had whitehawhit white hair, others he had dark hair. >> i'm not aware of his appearance. >> given the fact you've laid out obviously how much you don't know at this point, how much you're investigating, how, with all due respect, can you and the chief and the governor say that the community is safe and this area is safe, how can you rule out, sir, that there is not a broader threat situation? >> from early on in the investigation where we are right now, we think we have a really good handle on it. we just want to run out a couple details before we confirm other additional stuff. >> can you tell us about the weapon and whether there was more than one? >> i cannot. >> do you know what kind of weapon it was? >> i do not know. >> can we ask the capitol hill police chief, can we get an update on your officers. we understand that they were wounded. can you give us an idea of how they're doing. >> they're being treated at a local hospital and the injuries do not appear to be life threatening. >> can you say their condition? >> i would categorize it that they're in good condition. >> can you describe what they did, how they engaged the suspect. >> we received reports of gunfire through our communications and then we coordinated with the alexandria police. so obviously from the early incidents of this incident, shots were fired. >> where were your officers at when they started firing on the gunman? >> this is really too preliminary to go into the details of the investigation. suffice it to say that our officers acted, i believe, heroically today and they're in good condition and we look for a rapid recovery. with that said, i'll turn it back over -- >> one male and one female? >> i'm not going to comment on the names, numbers until i'm reasonably sure that next of kin are notified. >> what about the investigation tells you anything about the motivation and whether it was political? >> we're not going to go into that. too preliminary. >> any indication who he shot, what he was doing? >> again, it's too early on. when the facts come to light, we'll share what we can share. thank you. >> was the fifth person the shooter or the victim? >> we're not going to comment on that. like the chief said, it's significantly early and so -- >> the police department said -- >> four victims or five victims. >> -- the fifth person was the shooter. >> i'm not going to confirm that. >> five people were injured? >> i'm not going to confirm that. >> chief, you said that earlier. >> five people were trance porpportd to hospitals. >> was the suspect one of them? >> i'm not going to comment on that. it's an ongoing investigation. let me comment to the question about the safe community piece. we have several things going on. the police department after we secured the scene here did an awful lot of work in the community. we walked the community. we looked for secondary issues. we brought in additional resources and assets so that we could deal with any possible secondary thing. the question that was directed about the investigation, if in fact it reveals something else, then we will certainly respond to thacht. right now every indication in this city is that this is an isolated incident, that the investigation will indeed be long-term. let me also do a thank you to the agency thies that assisted s we canvassed the neighborhoods and looked around to make sure we were safe thach. a lot of folks in the neighborhood came out to make sure we were doing the right thing. >> five innocents injured? >> five people transported -- >> innocents? >> i won't go into that. i can't speak to the information that others are reporting. five people. >> anybody treated -- >> i can't speak to that. i'll refer to the fbi on that information. >> timeline of when the -- >> governor -- >> sir, are any of the other injuries life threatening? >> from your point of view on a broader level of your knowledge of the capitol area, your view about the safety of the area, did you have any information prior, any investigative detail that there may be a threat and how satisfied are you as you stand here that you have a handle on what has happened here that there is no further threat? >> i can tell you -- >> we have breaking news from pete williams on the identity of the shooter. pete, what can you tell us? >> reporter: savannah, several law enforcement officials have said the preliminary identification is that the gunman in today's shooting -- and we still don't know what his condition is. it's apparently pretty serious, not clear at this point whether he's going to survive or not. but he's said to be a 66 or 67-year-old illinois man from bellville, illinois named james hodgkin'son. james t. hodge kinson and the initial information from people who have been involved in this investigation and again this is all subject to later confirmation but the very preliminary read is that there does seem to be some kind of political motivation here, some kind of domestic motivation that this is not international terrorism. several investigators have told us what other witnesses have said that when he arrived at the baseball field this morning where the practice was being held he was asking people, are these the republicans or the democrats. they find that to be significant. they're now looking at his social media. undoubtedly they'll be getting search warrants to search his residenarresresidence to try to the motive. the preliminary read is that there's some kind of political motive, perhaps mental health issues, but that this is not what you would typically think of as some kind of act inspired by an international terrorist group. >> pete, bellville, illinois, 66 years old. do we know if he lived in the area or do we know whether perhaps he came just to carry out this mission? >> well, that question of where he's been, his travel is something that the investigators will be piecing together, going back to try to build a timeline starting from the moment of the shooting and working backwards. what we a're told is that he ha an illinois driver's license, so that would indicate presumably if he did live in this area, he hasn't lived here very long. i have not heard any indication that he lived here, so he obviously came here at some point. how long he's been in the area we don't know yet. >> we should mention another new piece of information, congressman roger williams who was at the baseball game this morning, pete says that the name of the staffer who was shot is zach bart. a legislative correspondent in his office, l.c. the congressman said that zach barth is receiving medical attention and is, quote, doing well and expected to make a full recovery and he asked for all of us to respect the privacy of his young staffer who was injured today. we now of course having, according to pete's sources, the i.d. >> earlier you gave us an update on the condition of some of the. others who have been shot. we're all concerned for stand by for us, pete. those injured. we senate majority leader mitch wr mcconnell is on the floor. let's listen in. we'll continuo send them every wish for a >> we'll keep them in our quick and full recov prayers and continue to send we're grateful them every wish for a quick ando stepped in full recovery. to we're grateful for all those whe practicing on the field, first resp stepped in to help those onderse capitol police officers on the practicing on the field, first scene. responders and of course the we're deeply capitol hill police officers onr the scene. their service. we again salute their continuing we're deeply indebted for their service. unfailing bravery we again salute their continuinf of the capitol community. and unfailing bravery on behalf the congressional baseball game is a bipartisan of the capitol community. charit the congressional baseball game is a bipartisan charity event. i know the senate will embrace that spirit today as we come together and express in both our concern and our gratitude. >> that was senator mitch mcconnell, of course, the republican leader on the senate side, offering his condolences and prayers after a terrible tragedy this morning where a man came in, a man we've now identified at nbc as james hodgkinson of bellville, illinois, and accused of shooting four possibly five people, including the republican leadership whip, steve scalise. >> i think we have senator which you can db chuck schumer as well. >> others including the staff. let us pray that they and any others yorp injured will cover quickly. this morning is the most sobering reminder of how thankful we should be for the service of the capitol police force who put their lives on the line day in and day out for us to be safe. i could not be more grateful that capitol police were there at a time to prevent this attack from being any worse than it was. i was with senator paul in the gym who had been there. and he told me, had these two capitol police officers who were part of congressman scalise's detail not be there, it might have been a massacre because there would have been no one to respond. but their bravery is exemplary of all capitol police force and we thank them. the entire senate family sends its thoughts and prayers those who were wounded and gratitude to the police and first responders who were at the scene. >> senator schumer offering his remarks about what unfolded this morning. a shooter identified is james hodgkinson of illinois and now of course officials are seeking to learn as much about them as he can and what motivated this. it does appear to have a political motivation. >> let's go back to pete williams. before we interrupted you, we were talking about how precisely investigators will go about tracing this 66-year-old shooter, the suspected shooter. >> reporter: well, several investigative steps will be taken here. first of all, they have the weapon that was used, and they're tracing it now, so they'll try to figure out when and where it was purchased. many witnesses have described it as a long gun or a rifle. they say that he had additional ammunition magazines or clips that he reloaded several times during this incident that went on for several minutes. so, that's one investigative angle. the second is they'll get search warrants from the authorities in illinois. they'll search his house. they will look at his social media. they will look at his phone calls, his e-mails. they will begin to look to try to trace a timeline of his travel, when did he come to the washington, d.c., area. he had an illinois driver's license. he lived in illinois. had he moved here recently? did he just come here? they'll look at gas station receipts, atm receipts, toll, you know, if he went on any highways where he paid a toll, and there are -- they'll get his car, they'll look at his license plate. they'll talk to his relatives. they'll talk to his friends. now, all of this is going to take a great deal of time, obviously, so we're not going to have by the end of the day a complete picture here, but this is the -- this is the sort of basic investigating that they'll do. talk to eye-witnesses, look for surveillance video that's in the area, try to -- so, try to build from a sort of a very coarse level over time when did he get here and then try to build minute to minute using surveillance video, for example, his movement. >> pete, stand by for me if you can, please, sir. we want to get o to a michigan congressman that was at the baseball field this morning. he joins us now by phone. congressman, good morning. >> good morning, sir. >> good morning, great to be with you. >> can you tell us a little bit about what happened shortly after 7:00. >> well, shortly after 7:00, i was standing by the batting cage waiting for my turn, and two shots rang out from the, if you will, the outfield side of the third base dugout. couldn't see anything but we heard it. people started to scramble. i turned from my position and my marine mode kicked in and went a low crawl behind the first base dugout. shots continued to be fired for another couple of minutes, and eventually moved around as the shooter -- it appeared as though might be moving around towards the backstop. he was outside the chain link fence. i moved and a couple of other folks moved into the dugout down on the floor with others and a couple minutes after that, jumped out when it was over and to basically assess the casualties. >> congressman, did you hear the shooter say anything? can you describe him? we heard reports that he had -- he had earlier asked about whether members of congress were playing on the field, whether republican members of congress were on the field. do you have any light to shed on that? >> no, i do not. i did not hear him say anything, and i did not see him until after he was found and i was just, again, checking on the wounded, and i saw out of the corner of my eye that the police officers had him down. i walked to about within 20 feet just to assess the situation and make sure he was secured and then i walked away and went back to tend the wounded. >> and we understand the shooter may have been injured quite significantly. could you tell where he sustained an injury, where the gunshot was? >> no, i could not tell from my vantage point. again, he was surrounded by three or four of the security folks and so i could not tell. >> congressman, any idea how many folks were there on the field, at the field, when all of this went down this morning? >> yeah, i'd say give or take a few, probably about 25. >> and to be clear, we've heard reports that you guys had been practicing at this same field for several weeks, is that right? >> yeah, we have. we did. we had a routine, 6:30 to 7:30 in the morning practice three days a week for the last two months. >> congressman, were you able to see your colleague, congressman scalise, who we understand was shot in the hip or any of the others who were injured and assess how they seemed to be doing? >> yeah. well, i only saw him -- the last time i saw him was when dr. wenstrup and senator flake were attending to him. i assisted just for a second to help get his belt out of his baseball pants as dr. wenstrup decided whether or not to apply a tourniquet but at that point, i went on to check on other folks because he was in good hands with dr. wenstrup. >> and dr. wenstrup is a congressman, member of congress, but a former iraq surgeon, is that correct? >> he's in the army and has served in iraq and medical doctor, and a fellow committee member with me on veterans affairs and quite a fantastic gentleman. >> congressman, again to, go back to your accounting heerks it sounds like the shooter was in the outfield along the third baseline. as he proceeded to fire, could you tell which direction in which he was moving? did it also appear as if he had a clear target? >> well, he started firing from the, let's say, just about the third base side, third baitlise, if you will, equivalent to if you drew a line down from second to third, he was in that area, concealed by the dugout from those of us on the home plate side of the field and then he moved from that position down the third baseline, again, outside the chain link fence, and where he was finally subdued was pretty much in the middle of the backstop, so right behind home plate, give or take a few feet. again, outside the chain link fence. >> congressman, again, for folks who aren't familiar with what was happening, you guys were practicing for a big charity baseball game tomorrow, the annual congressional baseball game. i know it's -- i know it's early. do you know at this point whether there are plans to continue to play that game? >> i do not know. there will be some talks. but you know, this is a great charity fund-raiser. it's raised over $600,000 for kids who need help here in the greater d.c. area. and let's put it this way, if i get a vote, the game will go on tomorrow night to benefit those kids. >> congressman bergman, what a morning for you, sir. we're glad you're okay and thank you for sharing your time with us and your story. >> thank you so much. thank you and keep all of those folks in your hearts and prayers. >> we will, sir. we will indeed. and we should mention the white house now says that the president will deliver a statement on this shooting, expected to happen at 11:30 eastern time. we will of course bring it to you live. right now let's go back to the hill. casey hunt, our correspondent on capitol hill is joined by illinois congressman rodney davis who as i understand it was also there. good morning to both of you. >> hi, savannah. yes, congressman davis was just telling me he was actually at the bat when this happened. congressman, what happened this morning? >> well, i was up to bat, batting practice, and i heard a loud bang, it felt like a construction site dropping a large piece of metal and then the next thing i heard was, run, he's got a gun and i immediately ran into the dugout and dove in there, and since i was up to bat, i was one of the later ones, so i was on top of people and i ended up moving out and dispersing to other safer areas but i never thought i would come to baseball practice for a charity, local d.c. charity, and have to dodge bullets. >> did you see the shooter at any point? did you come face to face with him? what happened in the aftermath? >> i did not see the shooter. i was running away from where the shooter was. but the aftermath saw my good friend steve scalise laying in the outfield, and i saw other staffers and former staffers dealing with gunshot wounds, and i saw the heroism of the capitol police officers that are part of steve scalise's security detail who engaged with the shooter and saved everyone's life. these are the true heroes of what happened today. those two members of his security detail are the ones who made sure that there were no casualties. >> it looks like you were a little banged up and the -- just from diving into the dugout to take cover? >> i don't remember. just did the monty python, slight flesh wound. >> i spoke to a couple of your other colleagues who have something similar to that. is this and we come together adds republicans like me and as democrats to come together for our country. and that's why i'm here today. i came back. i came down to talk to you because i want to send a message that this rhetoric that we see in today's society over policy differences has got to stop. the if this is the reason why members 0 congress were shot at today, today has to be the breaking point for both party to say enough is enough. >> reporter: what about security for members of congress. do you feel you're going to be safe going about your daily business or does something else needs to change? >> we'll let that play out. i'm going to take security under consideration a lot more than i have. i will never go back to that park again, i can tell you that. >> reporter: congressman gaifda thank you for speaking with us. >> thank you so much. this is a time that underscores that political differences are one thing but we need to remember that we were all americans and our hearts go out to all of those injured today. >> well that conversation was happening two bits of information gcame in. we heard from kevin mccarthy telling us that steve scalise is out of surgery and he is doing well. that again according to kevin mccarthy. we're getting from our investigative team right now that the atf, alcohol, tobacco and firearms conducting emergency traces on two separate firearms, one rifle and one handgun. that would jive from what we've heard from a number of folks at the baseball field. >> and pete williams of nbc able to confirm the identity of the shooter,hodgkinson. and we want to show again a video with a word of caution. it shows congressman scalise in the moments after he was shot. this comes from our colleagues at cbs. we know he was shot in the hip. we know he was alert and describeding a being in good spirits and able to speak to his wife from the hospital moments before going into surgery. and kevin mccarthy who is the republican leader in the house has said mr. scalise is out of surgery, the congressman is doing better and we looked guard and are anxious to hear from him about what happened today. >> throughout the course of the morning we've found out that apparently the congressman, quite a baseball plan as well. played second base, took the job very seriously and throughout the course of his campaigning was known to actually hand out bats to supporters. our justice correspondent pete williams continuing to work the phones, trying to gather some new information. do we have any new information at this juncture? >> i thought one of the strange things about the news conference is they didn't tell us how many people were injured and what the extent of their injuries were. perhaps there were more shot than were nushlly told and perhaps some of their injuries were minor. but we're still trying to -- remarkably still can't tell you with certainly how many people were wounded here. so we're still trying to nail that down, in addition to try to find out more about the nature of the suspect. but as i said a little earlier, they were apparently on to the identity pretty quickly because the suspect, we're told, had an illinois driver's license, a name on it. normally in a situation like that we would hear about that pretty quickly. but we didn't because we've had some experience here of shootings in the washington area where a suspect had an identity card that -- not just in the washington area, an identity card that turned out not to be his but was someone else's. they've now confirmed that. as i say, we're told he's a 66-year-old, born december of 1950, a 66-year-old man from bell view, illinois named james t. hodge kinton. and as i said a moment ago, the motive here does not appear to be what we would conventionally think of as a terrorist motive, certainly not internationally inspired. whether this is a local problem, someone with mental problems or a political grudge, we'll have to wait a while to be certain about that. everyone has said they don't see signs of international terrorism. >> do we know if this man has a record at all? was he known to police? >> he may be known to the police in illinois. there's some indication that he had some run-ins with the police but nothing, if i understand your question, nothing that would indicate any kind of a danger like this. >> pete, stand by. i know you continue to work the phones. a little earlier tennessee congressman chuck fleischmann spoke to our casey hunt. let's listen to their conversation. >> he and i decided to make a run to the dugout. that's where a lot of the members got hurt like myself trying to dive into the dugout to find a safe place. unfortunately when we got to the dugout we realized we were still under attack, the shots were still coming. the capitol police fortunately were there because of our chip, steve scalise. they returned fire and they saved our lives and the lives of other people because bewwe werel sitting ducks. a lot of people were bleeding. one gentleman was shot in the leg. one local law enforcement arrived and subdued the shooter, we were realized to get up and then we regularized the magnitude of the carnage, our members who had been shot, staff members who had been severely wondered. one young gentleman got shot in the chest. it was horrible. he was just in my office yesterday. >> reporter: who is the young man. his name is mica. he plays with us every day. a lot of the hill staffers and folks come out and volunteer for both teams and lend their talents, their support in preparation for the game. it's an annual event. suppose to be a happy uplifting thing for both sides. today was a tragedy. >> reporter: what was it like for you personally. you said you walked right by the shooter. >> as it turns out i was walk right past the third base side, said hello to trent kelly, exchanging niceties about how well we had both played. the reason i know that, when i walked around, that's where the first shot came from and the barrage of shots came from. i was just lucky he chose not to shoot me. >> reporter: what do you think should happen next now? >> obviously we don't know the motives of the shooter. innocent people have been shot, have been hurt badly, including members of congress and their staffs. when we go to a baseball field, we think baseball is safe. we think we're safe. i've played seven years. i have never ever feared for my security. now i fear for any security. after seeing the carnage there today and the fact that somebody could come up and do that with a rifle, it's shocking, it's sad and my thoughts and prayers go out to the people that were injured a lot more than i was. >> reporter: and this dirt on your shirt was hitting the ground? >> absolutely. >> reporter: and your hand? >> we were down on the field laying down flat hoping not to get hit but we realized as the bullets keep flying that if somebody were to see us, we were still easy targets. so we made a run for the dugout, as did several other people. fort naughtiunately i made it. i was a few scary moments in the dugout. i stayed on the inside wall of the dugout, as did many members, many of who were bleeding. >> reporter: give us a sense of how many were wounded or hit. is it just steve scalise that was hit? >> yes, he was hit. one of our coaches had a broken ankle. mica, the staffer, sadly was apparently shot in the chest. he was being attended to. they brought in helicopters very quickly. two of the capitol police officers who basically saved or lives were shot. these folks are heroes. i don't know who they are personally because this is part of whip scalise's detail, security detail. but for the fact that they were there, the carnage would have been worse. >> reporter: thank you so much for taking the time to tell me your story. >> casey hunt and congressman fleischmann a few moments ago. we haven't had a confirmation officially on the number injured. now we hear congressman fleischmann saying he knows of a staffer by the name of mica shot in the chest. we thought there was one congressional aide that was shot but roger williams said he had an aide by the name of zack park who was shot. we just don't know at this point if perhaps there were additional people shot and we're waiting for the authorities to give us the answer there. we know two capitol police officers were shot. we heard the police chief say they're in good condition. steve scalise was shot, he's out of surgery, said to be doing well. we'll continue to get the best information to you. >> we know two are in critical condition at the george washington hospital. but what you just said could explain precisely why the field rep from the fbi was so reluctant to talk about how many were shot and wounded. >> shouldless mention the shooter himself, identified as james t. hodgkinson was also shot and unclear of whether he'll survive, according to pete williams. >> we've heard from a lot of lawmakers, republican and democrat over the next hour or two. we're going to be hearing from house speaker paul ryan at noon and also word from the white house a short time ago that president trump is going to be addressing the nation at roughly 11:30. peter alexander standing by for us at the white house. any indication what we might expect to hear from the president? >> reporter: he'll punk wait the remarks he delivered this morning say heg was keep lhe wa saddened. we're getting information from the white house about what the president has been doing over the course of the last several hours. he had an event, a speech to the labor department scheduled for later today. that has been canceled. but he's had an opportunity to be notified about the situation in alexandria and to speak to many lawmakers this morning. among those, paul ryan and the wife of steve scalise and the chief of the capitol police. mike pence was scheduled to be out this morning. that was canceled. he was rerouted to the white house. and the president this morning, the marine guard is standing outside of the west wing which would signify that the president is inside the oval office preparing his remarks from the public address he'll be making in less than 30 minutes from now. >> roughly 15 minutes away. maybe a little longer, from president trump addressing the country. just four hours, a little over four hours now since that shooting at a park in northern virginia during a practice for congressional baseball game set to happen tomorrow at nationals field. >> we have a shooter identified as a man in his late 60s with an illinois driver's license. unclear where he was living. he was shotly police in an exchange of gun fire. that bring us to jim cavanaugh who joins us. you've been listening as we've gotten bits and pieces of what transpi transpired here. what are you thoughts this morning? jim cavanaugh, are you with us? >> i'm sorry. i didn't get you were talking to me. i thought it was a very very important interview there. because what he described was the capitol police officers keeping the shooter at bay, the two officers. one was wounded in the ankle. and so when they're engaging him, he's not able to shoot the members of congress and the staff aides and a the people in the ballpark. he has to focus on the gun fire coming from the two police officers. and then alexandria police uniform arrives and they start engaging him and they take him down, a combination of capitol police and alexandria police. critic critical. and you heard the witness say how loud it was, how loud the rifle fire was. it sounds like a crack. when you're at a ball field like that or in a closed in area where trees around it, it's very very loud. any type of a semi automatic military style rifle. you're not going to not know what that is. you're going the hear that. people start scattering. so the distance is critical, too, because that's probably what saved representative scalise and the third base member because the distance -- the guy is not quite as accurate to be able to do it. if he was good with a rainfall it could have been a lot worse or if the people were in the dugout when he confronted them, it could have been a lot worse. >> everybody thanking their lucky stars that the capitol police were there and alexandria police following so quickly. we want to go to pete williams who is working the phones. >> we've been trying to get a clear picture of who was shot hereby. we know two capitol police officers who are said to be -- going to be okay. congressman scalise, roger williams of texas and now we've confirmed that a lobbyist was also shot. he is named as matt mika who is director of government relations for tyson's food in the washington area. his company says he's been taken to the hospital. they're awaiting word on his condition. he's worked for tyson foods for more than six years and the company says they're deeply concerned about him and his family. we don't know how serious his wounds are. but this would be a sixth person, a fifth victim plus the gunman for six people shot. anwe' we and we're still trying to determine what the condition is of the gunman to know whether he's going to survive the wounds and whether they've been able to talk to him and get any information out of him about why he did this. >> and pete, i'm not sure if you heard it, but we had congressman fleischmann on a couple of moments ago what mentioned someone named mika. and the congressman said that he saw that this individual was shot in the chest, which is very disturbing. we'll continue to follow that. >> and i think you get some sense of that because of the statement of we're deeply concerned for him and his family. >> pete williams standing by for us. we should also note that this congressional baseball game that's set to happen tomorrow, it was actually set to start with the british ambassador who was going to throw out the first pitch to honor the victims of terror in london and in manchester as well. this is an annual, as you indicated earlier, an annual rite of passage for the beltway crowd. we heard from a lawmaker saying last year they raised $600,000. at this point no firm indication as to whether the game will go on. but we've heard from a number of lawmakers, several of whom who, at the field this morning saying that the game should in fact go on, perhaps with a renewed sense of purpose. >> we're awaiting remarks from the president in a matter of moments. we expect at noon to hear from the house speaker paul ryan and nancy pelosi. and i just received an e-mail that went out to all members of congress saying come to the house floor to hear their remarks at noon today. let's go to hans nichols. he's at the hospital where congressman scalise underwent surgery. >> reporter: he's out of surgery, according to two congressmen. some of who have spoke within majority whip scalise. you can see the emergency room entrance right here. this is likely where he came in. and this is a hospital in northwest d.c. where they do a lot of specialty work. they're not necessarily focused on trauma here. the main trauma hospital in d.c. is george washington hospital, down towards the white house a little more where there are also two victims of the shooting attack. now what the hospital is confirming is that the majority whip steve scalise is here. they're not saying anything about the status of his condition, where he is right now in terms of the surgery. but we can confirm, according to two congressmen who have spoken with scalise that he is out of surgery and in good spirits. >> thank you so much. we're pleased to say he's said to be doing well. peter alexander, as we look at the scene here, the familiar yellow crime scene tape. we know that the president is expected to speak in a few minutes. what more are you tell us. >> reporter: you can see the picture. this is the diplomatic room here at the white house where we're expecting to hear from president trump. the timing is set for 11:30 today. he should be speaking within the next ten minutes or so. it's been a somber scene here at the white house over much of this morning for my colleagues up in the west wing earlier trying to reach out to the communications staff. the communications staff held their early morning meeting as they would and then the priority was making sure that everyone was safe and everything was being done to make sure this wasn't a wider threat. then the focus on what the president might say. we've confirmed that he's spoken to the wife of congressman steve scalise, his chief of staff, to paul ryan and mitch mcconnell. he's been huddling with members of his team over much of this morning including the vice president. what's striking is how close to home this tragedy hits so so many individuals who work here at the white house. rinse priebupriebus, sean spice before president trump brought them on board. the relationships between the white house and many of these republican lawmakers go back quite some way. it's why president trump himself today, who has had steve scalise and some of these other lawma r lawmakers in for meeting was quick to point out that he considered him a true friend and patriot. this will be a striking moment. was president obama of course preceding president trump was put in this undesirable position on too many occasions of speaking about following situations where gun violence often took the lives of too many innocent americans. we hope and pray of course today that nobody loses their life as a result of the tragedy. and at this point it appears that everyone who was hurt was only wound wed not killed. but you get to see the president at a time of crisis help soothe the anxieties that americans are feeling and may capture a moment of bipartisanship as they try to bring americans together, not republicans and democrats, just americans in the wake of the awful tragedy. >> that would be certainly called for in this moment where i think a lot of people are hurting and just so sad to see what's happened at what should be a very happy collegial event leading up to this baseball game in d.c. it's hard to fathom that we're talking about that. >> six people shot. our justice correspondent pete williams confirming that just a few moments ago, six shot, that's including the gunman. this is a facebook post from a staffer who was shot this morning. his name is zack barth and i believe we have the post that we can put on the screen here. i got shot this morning at the baseball fields but i am in the hospital and okay. thank you for the thoughts and prayer. >> this was the aide to congressman roger williams in texas. >> yes. >> and he had mentioned that his staffer had been shot but was okay. it's nice too hear from him directly on his facebook page. i'm sure he's got so many people worried about him. as we understand it, he's going to be okay. >> apparently. he's already able to fas bike post. >> he's already facebooking. but we've learned of another individual who wu shot this morning, said to be a lobbyist by the name of mike mika. we wait to here about his condition. we have the two police officers who were shot and said to be in good condition by the police chief. >> the lobbyist is a lobbyist for tyson foods. we're maybe seven minutes or so away from president trump addressing the nation. at noon we here told that house speaker paul ryan and than so pelosi will be addressing, not just lawmakers in this situation but also addressing the nation as well. we've heard from a number of people this morning. there was one eyewitness who was in the ymca who detailed just a harrowing account of how it all went down shortly after 7:00, the bullets piercing the glass at the y. he talked about being able to see the shooter crouched down, appearing to take aim at these folks on the baseball field. and he ended that account by calling for civility and calling for an end to the sometimes heated political discourse and rhetoric that has come to define our politics in this country as of late, but it hasn't been as of late. it's been for some time now. >> as far as the investigation is concerned, we're told by our producer that the atf is now doing an emergency trace on two firearms, one rifle and one handgun. and that comports with what we've heard from witnesses at the scene, several witnesses, members 0 congress thought that the shooter had two guns. let's look at this news conference, joe barton among those speaking. let's listen. >> -- security detail. otherwise it would just be a bunch of guys out practicing. >> 22 members there. >> they have been something. [ inaudible ] >> the alexander police who arrived very quickly who attacked -- i can't emphasize this enough. they attacked the shooter and saved our lives. >> as a result ovf that they endangered themselves. >> they were out behind the dugout. the shooter was not on the field and never got on the field. he stayed behind the third base dugout, came behind home plate, the utility shed, darted out in front of the utility shed and that's when he got shot. >> reporter: did you see the shooter and the weapon? >> i did not until after the fact. >> i was getting down, protecting, making sure my son was down. i did not see it when it was abactive shooting situation. >> but we just left jeff duncan, and jeff jwas leaving with another member who would have all been positioned in the in-field. as is customary, we all have responsibility to get back to. sometimes people will finish what they're doing and leave a little early. as jeff was walking out he saw the shooter and spoke to them and said who are those guys, and he said that's the congressional baseball team. and he said what are they, republicans or democrats. he said they're the republicans. and the that was the conversation that they had. >> and they said he acted a little weird. we need to go inside. thank you. >> reporter: how long did the firefight go on for? >> that was congressman patrick me on, along with congressman joe barton from texas. also with the congressman from texas, his 10-year-old son jack who was at the field. >> two of his sons were there. >> with him this morning. but again it sounds like we heard another corroboration of the story we've heard from a number of folks this morning, the gunman apparently, before opening fire, asked whether those with republicans or democrats on the field playing baseba baseball. so there's that. >> we've heard various accounts along those lines all morning long. and then the account that senator paul mentioned that morning, that they have been practicing there for the last couple of months. this was presumably, if someone wanted to target particular individuals, they would have known this is where the members of congressary their staff play baseball all leading up to the congressional baseball game for charity that was supposed to take place tomorrow. it's almost 11:30 on the east coast, coming up on the time that we're expecting to hear from president trump from the white house. that's the live shot that we have from inside the west wing. and we'll hear at noontime from the house speaker paul ryan and the democrats' leader in the house, nancy pelosi. the call has gone out on the hill to say if you're a member of congress, come listen to what the leaders have to say as we await further word of how the injured are doing. >> we're learning more about the shooter. the suspected shooter at this hour. his name is james hodgkinson, 66-year-old old, an illinois driver's license. at this point it is note clear whether he was living in the area at that time. >> let's listen. >> -- to have a tragedy like this thrust upon it is a terrible thing. >> reporter: who do you work for. doesn doesn't matter. w >> we only caught the tail end of what that witness was saying. >> reporter: we're now life. talk to me a little bit about once again what did you hear and see? zb >> i was out for a run this morning. i was going right up past simpson field, happened to glance over and see the fact that folks were playing baseball at an early hour in the morning. not recognizing they were members of congress. didn't think about it, ran and not a second later heard 12 or 14 shots go off, took another step and heard another volley of shots. i decided it was a dangerous situation, had to get cover in the parking garage and called 911. the situation looked like it got under control pretty quickly. i came up out of the granl and saw two members of congress i was familiar with and went over and spoke to them briefly. you can tell knowing what we know now about what unfolded on that baseball diamond, you could see in their eyes that they were concerned about mr. scalise and all involved. >> reporter: he did not see the gunman by the way, back to you. >> we're going to interrupt because we have ron desantis who was there this morning. and sir, as i understand it, you believe you spoke with the gunman in the parking lot of the field. what did you hear. tell us your experience. >> well, we were out there practicing with everybody else, we was playing third base, jeff duncan was playing short, steve scalise was playing second. jeff and i looked at each other, we've got a good workout. let's get on the road so we can beat the traffic. we left five, ten minutes before it started. when we were in the car, an individual came up to us and asked us whether they were republicans or democrats on the field. jeff told them it was republicans. he kind of turned and walked toward the field. it was a little strange but he didn't think necessarily anything of it. by the time we got to the field jeff and i immediately talked to each other, we've got to report this guy. now that he's been identified and his photo, both congressman duncan and myself believe that yes the individual that approached us was the same individual who has been identified as the shooter. >> so you spoke to this individual and then you've subsequently seen a picture of the suspect and you believe the person that asked you, is it republicans or democrats, is the person who is the shooter. >> that's right. i think the photos that we've seen match the description of the individual that approaches duncan's vehicle. >> did law enforcement show you those photos and ask for you to confirm the identity of the person you spoke to? >> no. i reported to capitol police. once his name was identified, i typed his name into google images. he has a twitter account from the town in illinois that he's been identified from. i immediate hi sent it to duncan and say this is him, right? and jeff was like, yeah, that's him. we're both in agreement that that was the ge guy who approac our vehicle. >> had now not left when you did, is it our understanding that you would have been in the line of fire? >> i would have been at the third base. i would have been much closer to the shoot per. joef would have been closer too. it was the obvious thing that we were trying to beat the traffic. had we just decided to stay a little longer, who knows what would have happened. i still haven't come to terms with what has happened yet. >> to the extent that you can, what was the demeanor of the shooter? at the moment you didn't think anything of it. but when you look back at it now and run it through your mind, does anything stand out? >> it was a little odd. this is a public field. people walk their dogs and everything. but it's not the type of thing that anyone necessarily goes and watches. and he was really interested in whether it was republicans o democrats and then he immedia immediately turned to the field. i just thought it was odd. i didn't think it was dangerous or anything and neither did jeff. once we heard the news of it, it clicked and we thought, this guy could be it. in hindsight once something happens, you think this fits. >> and i think we have an image that we can share. >> our first picture. >> i don't think you can see our signal. can you? >> i cannot. >> we're showing a picture of a man, looks to be in his late 60s. he's been identified as james hodgkinson. but presumably that might be close to the picture you saw and you and congressman duncan having interacted with him. how do you feel, i guess is the question now, congressman desantis. i mean when you know what happened, you know your colleague steve scalise was shot, you know other staffers were shot, a capitol police officer. what is going through your mind right now. >> one, thank god for the capitol police. steve scalise as a member of leadership travels with a security detail. had steve not come to practice this morning, you would not have had any security at all. and i think this guy would have injured and killed a number of people. i think it would have been very ugly. those capitol police saved a lot of lives together. i also think about steve personally. he's a really good cheerful guy and he loves this congressional baseball game. we've already raised $650,000 for charity. he dresses up in a nice uniform every practice. he was happy with me that i was playing this year. and every time he'd see me it was like, thanks for coming out, you're ripping the ball. stay with it. he was looking forward to play in the game. it looks like he's going to be fine, thank god for that. i don't know if they're going to play the game tomorrow night. i'm willing to play if they do. but it will be a little sad if steve is not able to play given how much it means to him. >> president trump expected to address the country at any moment now. what do you want to hear from the president? >> the president just needs to let the american people know that steve is a great guy, ask the american people to pray for a full recovery, as well as the others who were injured there. i don't draw any major conclusions -- >> congressman -- >> shortly after 7:00 a.m. this morning a gunman opened fire on members of congress and their staffs as they were practicing for tomorrow's annual charity baseball game. authorities are continuing to investigate the crime and the assailant has now died from niz injuries. the fbi is leading the investigation and will continue to provide updates as new information becomes available. congressman steve scalise, a member of house leadership, was shot and badly wounded and is now in stable condition at the hospital, along with two very courageous capitol police officers. at least two others were also wounded. many lives would have been lost if not for the heroic actions of the two capitol police officers who took down the gunman despite sustaining gunshot wounds during a very, very brutal assault. melania and i have grateful for their heroism and praying for the swift recovery of all victims. congressman scalise is a friend, and a very good friend. he's a patriot and he's a fighter. he will recover from this assault and, steve, i want you to know that you have the prayers not only of the entire city behind you but after an entire nation and frankly the entire world. america is praying for you and america is praying for all of the victims of this terrible shooting. i spoke with steve's wife, jennifer, and i pledged to her our full and absolute support, anything she needs. we're with her and with the entire scalise family. i have also spoken with chief matthew. she's doing a fantastic job. of the capitol police to express our sympathies for his wounded officers and to express my admiration for their courage. our brave capitol police perform a challenging job with their skill and their sacrifice makes democracy possible. we also commend the brave first responders from alexandria police, fire and rescue who rushed to the scene. everyone on that field is a public servant. our courageous police, our congressional aides who work so tirelessly behind the scenes with enormous devotion and our dedicated members of congress who represent our people. we may have our differences, but we do well in times like these to remember that everyone who serves is our nation's capital is here because, above all, they love our country. we can all agree that we are blessed to be americans, that our children deserve to grow up in a nation of safety and peace and that we are strongest when we are unified. and when we work together for the common good. please take a moment today to cherish those you love and always remember those who serve and keep us safe. god press them all, god bless you and god bless america. thank you. >> president trump speaking for a few moments from the white house and sounding a note of bipartisanship, offering his condolences and his well wish to steve scalise and the others who were injured and announcing that the suspect, this james t. hodge k k kinson had died. >> i think actually he probably died about an hour, a little over an hour ago. he was taken, we're told, to george washington university hospital here in washington, d.c., along with i think some of the other shooting victims. and we had heard an hour ago, beginning to hear from law enforcement officials that they thought he had died in the hospital and we had been waiting for a third source on that when the president announced it. so it seems doubtful that they ever got any information out of him, whether he said anything when he was transported to the hospital that was useful, we don't know yet. but just a few minutes ago a law enforcement told me that obviously a big question now is what was his motive. he's got social media in which he's express some political view. you heard from the members of congress that he asked are these the republicans or the democrats that are playing. but what role that is, law enforcement can't go merely on what's on his social media and that kind of a comment. they're now pressing to find out exactly what the motivation was here. they will be searching his house, talking to relatives, trying to get a better picture of why he came here, what he had in mind, whether he told anyone when he came here. but it's obvious that they knew who he was or felt they had a pretty good idea who he was shortly after the shooting when all of the shots were fired and they could get to him. they found an illinois driver's license in his pocket and that's what started the urgent work to figure out who he was, where he came from and why he did this. the second line of inquiry is the weapons. two weapons are being traced. there's an urgent trace under way by the bureau of alcohol, tobacco and firearms to figure out where he bought the weapons. if it was recent, that might help them to understand this. obviously the investigation takes a different course if the there's not going to be a prosecution it goes in a different direction. now the question is was anyone else involved, did anyone help him, did anyone egg him on, did he tell anyone of his plans. they're still trying to figure it out. no way to answer those questions yesterday. but something to emphasize that we're been saying all morning, only because of the times that we live in, there's no indication that this was inspired by a terrorist group. >> pete williams there. pete, thank you. it was also interesting to hear president trump only speaking for a few minutes there, we may have our differences but everyone is here in washington, d.c. because we love our country. casey hunt at the capitol where members of congress are about to be briefed on today's shooting. casey? >> reporter: craig we have moved from where ywe spoke to you las down to outside of the congressional auditorium where is where this all hands meeting will take place to talk about what happened today. you may see some members of congress walk behind me to go in that meeting. congressman jeff duncan just stopped to speak to reporters about his experience. pretty remarkable. he was with congressman desantis when a man that seems to share the same description as the man who has been identified as the shooter here spoke to him and asked, are these democrats oar are these republicans practicing on the field. and they gave him an answer. mr. duncan looked up at his clock to see how long it would take them to get to the capitol as they were departing. that was 7:02, just a few minutes before the events unfolded today. we're now hearing the congressman who representing the district where gabrielle giffords was hurt. on a personal note, we work every day with the capitol police officers who of course many of the congress people have said are the heroes. they're down here handing out pens with the capitol police shield. >> president trump saying that the officers were able to take down the gunman despite being hit themselves. >> the story of heroism on the part of the capitol police officers is something we've heard again and again this morning. we want to go to tom costello. he's been at the scene all morning. good morning. i know you've spoken to a lot of witnesses. >> reporter: what's really remarkable is how consistent the stories have been. you know, as you cover news events over the years, very often the initial reports turn out to be not so true or maybe the initial impressions end up morphing into something that's different by the time the facts are sorted out. but at the moment, most of the facts stated by these witnesses, most of their descriptions of what happened have been consistent. and that is they dealt with or rather they heard dozens or hundreds of rounds being fired, that they thought that it was at least a semi automatic weapon and maybe also in addition to that a handgun, that this individual who is described as a shorter stocky middle-aged man. we now know in his late 60s. that he approached people before this whole thing went down and said is that the republicans or the democrats practicing for the game. and they said republicans. and then shortly thereafter the shooting began. i arrived really very quickly on the scene, i would say within 40 minutes. and immediately i ran across -- i came across a witness who said that she was there on the field when this whole thing went down and that in fact she didn't know that they were capitol hill police officers but that officers were engaging and returning fire with the suspect and that one of those officers was shot and down. they braulought in an ems chopp. we now know there were two police officers shot, the congressional staffer, the suspect as well and congressman scalise. those reports of how it went down, how many shots were fired, the type of weapon that was involved, the description of the suspect, the condition of the victims. we heard there were three red quite sirius and two yellow. not as serious. the suspect has died. all of that has been consistent throughout the morning. the other important headline for the people living in this immediate community is that the police have gone out of their way to say this is, they belief, a lone gunman. they did a complete sweep of the neighborhood in the immediate aftermath of this incident and they scoured the area to make sure that there wasn't another suspect at large and they were convinced that there was not. isolated one gunman taken out by capitol police. i'm curious what you would hear from casey hunt. but as it relates to capitol hill police, the fact that you had the gop whip here, obviously meant that there was a little bit of a higher level of security. if this had only been junior members of the house, i'm not sure you would have had the same level of capitol police presence here on this baseball field. back to you. >> or any presence at all. >> we've been hearing that same thing. members of congress as you know, we've been covering washington for a long time, they generally walk around without any security whatsoever. but because scalise is in the leadership, he had a detail with him anobviously those officers performed heroically. i just saw a tweet from swalwell that the congressional baseball game will be played tomorrow obviously for charity but it will also be for the victim as ten heroic officers who took down the shooter. >> here here. jim cavanaugh is standing by for us now. jim, word from the president that the gunman is dead. besides in the on yus way, how does this change the investigation, other than not being able to talk to the suspect. >> you want to interview the shooter to hear the motive directly from his mouth. we don't know if he was killed from fire from capitol police, alexandria police or may have put a bullet in his own head once he was wounded. clearly he knew he was on a mission that likely wouldn't end with him escaping. we could find a suicide note from this guy. it's likely a guy -- it has to be investigated. now there's not going to be a prosecution of this guy. so if he's a lone actor, there will be no prosecution of him. so it has to be looked at like he's a man choking on an empty grudge really. when you look at the motives for violent crime, greed, power, hate, revenge or escape. it's not going to be greed or es ta cape. it's going to be power, revenge. it's hard to get somebody else in your grudge, even if it's a political grudge. but this clearly d lly -- the s of the fbi couldn't say it but i'm retired and i'm an analyst and i could say it, this is clearly an attempt to assassinate members of congress. no question about it. he's from illinois. he went outside of d.c., he asked the questions, we heard the congressman say it directly. he was clearly there to assassinate members of congress. so when you look at a suspect like that, you got to look at the motives for assassins and look at why they're doing it. and that's going to play a role in the investigation. and it's going to be -- it's not going to make sense to any of us but it's going to make sense in his mind and it's going to be similar to other grudges and things that assassins sometimes act on. they collect all of the grievances, they think they were wronged. sometimes they shoot up their employer, sometimes they shoot at politicians, leaders, preside president, congressmen. >> we want to get back to casey hunt on capitol hill. you've got some new information for it? >> reporter: members are coming out of the all members briefing on the shooting with some news about the congressional baseball game itself. that game that raises money for charity, speaker ryan telling this group of members that the game will go on tomorrow as planned. and he received a standing ovation at that announcement. and i have to say i've spoken with several members today who were at this practice and they have almost to a person said the same thing, that they do want the game to go on. there are some members who suggested that maybe they should switch up the teams a little bit. typically the democrats play against the republicans, all in good fun. some suggestions, maybe they'll figure out a better way to split up the teams. but either way the game is going to go on. >> all right. casey hunt with some breaking news. >> we've heard of course congressman scalise, his colleague was telling us who a fan he was of the game and it was his hope that the game would go on, and of course with special purpose now. congressman scalise is still in the hospital but out of surgery and we're told doing well and in good spirits. we're waiting on a condition of the man by the name of mika. we've got a facebook post from one of the people shot today, a young man who was a congressional aide to congressman williams. >> congressman scalise playing second base for the republicans. peter alexander is standing by for us there at the white house. and peter, a lot of folks were waiting to hear president trump, waiting to hear precisely in which direction he might go. it was a message of unification saying at one point when we work together for the common good we are at our best. >> reporter: i think a lot of americans will be appreciative for those words of unity. for a little color behind the scenes, here at the white house, the president was joined by his vice president who was just behind the cameras, as well as ivanka trump and jared kushner and his speech writer. we did hear from ivanka trump a little bit ago as well. she just posted the following, saying our thoughts and prayers are with representative scalise and others injured in this morning's terrible incident. grateful to the first responders. this is a different day at the white house. the president had a public schedule. supposed to head to the department of labor this afternoon. instead they're going to have some meetings as planned taking place but it's certainly not going to follow the plan they had for the day. tomorrow, as you were talking with casey, is going to be one of those unique moments where there's an opportunity really after a divisive campaign season and first few months of this administration like we've rarely seen in this country's history for all members of all sides to gather together at a big baseball stadium and try to come together in agreement that we're all americans before we're republicans and democrats. we have not found out whether the president will be attending tomorrow night's game or the vice president mike pence. we've reached out for more information on that. >> peter, thank you. >> hopefully a moment of unity. hans nichols is at the hospital where congressman scalise underwent surgery. >> reporter: we don't have an update on congressman scalise. we do have an update on matt mika. he worked for ten years at tyson's food. before that for a lawmaker from michigan. he's been shot four or five times, according to friends of his, four to five times including chest wournnds. he's between critical and stable condition. i know that washington in the news is about the partisan conflict. it really is a small village. there's a chance you can bump into one, a republican, democrat or a reporter. this is one example of the shots affecting a broader group. all trying to pull together for someone they knew. there's a mixture of shock and outrage. a lot of people i talked to work for scalise or know him or passed him in the hall, other congressmen and staffers. they're outraged that something like this could happen. everyone's thoughts and prayers are with everyone affected. behind me you see the entry into the emergency room here. this is one of two big hospitals. they do trauma here. they're really known for their specialty work. the other trauma hospital is george washington university a little further downtown where some of the other victims have been taken as well. >> hans nichols there for us. earlier this morning we heard from texas congressman joe barton. he's actually the manager of the baseball team. he actually brought his young son with him as well. let's listen to a portion of that interview. >> look, we were at batting practice. we have a congressional baseball game we play every year. a shooter came out to practice, starting shooting. he shot at trent kelly, our third baseman, sot az steve scalise, our second baseman, he hit steve scalise. scalise's security detail and capitol hill police immediately began to return fire. and alexandria police also immediately came and began to return fire. they shot the shooter and i think the security detail saved a lot of lives because they attacked the shooter. the heroes are the capitol hill police, alexandria police and steve scalise's security detail. >> reporter: do you know what the shooter looked like? >> he was a middle-aged man, blue jeans and a blue shirt. i think he was anglo. and he has a rifle and i think he had an automatic pistol. >> reporter: can you tell us what it must have been like in the idealic setting to suddenly have this kind of thing -- >> look. there's going to be all kinds of -- i'm the manager of the team. several people, security people were hit, one of our staffers were hit. scalise was hit. i've talked to the speaker, i have talked to capitol hill police. i'm sure there will be a general statement later on. luckily no one appeared to be killed. and again i just want to thank the security the suspects home in illinois. that's the scene. then we see a member of law enforcement standing out there. let's bring in pete williams. hi, pete. >> you can see atf folks there. there are lots of agencies involved with this. you may well ask yourself, why are they just standing there? may guess would be they're waiting for a search warrant. that's the way these things normally go. the authorities, when they get someone's identity, although they've had this identity now i think for probably four hours, but how long it will take them to get a search warrant and since we're just getting these pictures now perhaps they've already received it and these are people outside protecting the area but this is going to be the standard response here to get -- once you have the person identified and, as we've been saying they moved pretty quickly on this because there was a driver's license the suspect had in his pocket and that allows them to begin to get information on where this person was from. this person has been identified as james t. hodgekinso of bellville, illinois. he'll turn 67 in december, he would have turned 67 in december but presumably that's the house. they're looking for information on how long he planned this. if other people were involved. in terms of the motive, i should emphasize as we begin to discuss his past there's been no official word on what the motive is because, frankly, they don't know. they're aware of what we can see publicly which is that he had strong political views, he had expressed them on facebook, he was a prolific writer of letters to the local newspaper, he often showed up at political events, was a kind of a protester, had very strong anti-republican views and there was a 2006 complaint of assault from his girlfriend. she plain complained to police she pulled out his hair but the charges were dropped, we're told. but as far as we know there's no extensive violent criminal record here other than the domestic assault complaint that was never prosecuted. so the question what is are were his motives, when did he come to the area, where did he get the weapons which are described as an ak-47 type assault weapon. people say he reloaded with additional magazines or ammunition clips so he camed well armed to the baseball game in washington. >> justice correspondent pete williams there filling in some of the gaps on the suspect. again, the suspect, according to president trump, the suspect is dead. house speaker paul ryan and minority leader nancy pelosi expected to speak any moment. kasie hunt is standing by at the capitol. kasie, let's start here. i'm curious to know whether lau makers this morning have been talking about how they feel in terms of their level of security. do lawmakers on capitol hill generally feel safe? >> reporter: well, craig, i think for the members i've spoken to who are at this event the answer this morning to that is, no, they felt very surprised, very shaken, congressman davis told me, well, i'm never going back to that field again and i think he needed to stop and kind of digest to see how he felt generally about the security situation. and we're just learning more about this closed-door meeting with all members but i'm sure many of them will have thoughts going forward. if you think about the level of resources it would take to individually protect each one of these members, there's obviously 535 total, 100 in the senate, 435 over here in the house. that's a significant commitment and one thing many members of congress pride themselves on, it's sort of a hallmark of covering this building and the way it operates is its openness. many of these members walk freely through the halls. it in many ways would be a very different life if they had individual security all of the time so i'm sure there are a lot of factors at play here and there are only a handful of members of congress that have regular security details that travel with them all the time. the house speaker is one of them in the presidential line of succession in addition to holding a very important job then you have the other top leaders in both chambers that will travel with smaller-sized details. so scalise, for example, has fewer people that protect him everyday than speaker ryan, for example. so this is going to be a conversation that starts today and evolves with time. you may see behind me some of these members of congress coming out here to talk to us so i think, craig, this is the beginning of a conversation that will take a while to work out. craig? >> kasie hunt standing by ahead of comments from the speaker and nancy pelosi as well. >> they're planning at noon eastern time to have nancy pelosi and speaker paul ryan come out and address the members of congress. obviously they're running a few moments behind but we'll keep our eye on that building. tom costello has been at the scene since early this morning. 7:09 is when this started. tom i think you were there about a half hour afterward and had been hearing from witnesses all morning long. >> reporter: do you mind if i bring in julie carey from our local affiliate wrc news 4 in washington? let's preface it. this is one of the best reporters in washington. you have been talking people in alexandria, what have you heard? >> this is a community ymca, i work out here many mornings a week, so does the former mayor, of alexandria, bill ewell. here has had conversations with folks that work inside the y in the mornings and they believe they know this man. they say he's been coming to this y for some time, he was a low profile man, kept to himself, would maybe offer the form erma i your a greeting but would come to the y, set up shop on his laptop in the front lobby and the other observation that the staffer at the y gave to the mayor is that he canceled his y membership on monday. now, again, law enforcement not confirm i confirmi confirming. >> reporter: these are people in the y and right next to the ballpark. >> right. in fact, another conversation that the y staffer relayed to the form erma i your was that some time ago this man that they believed to be the shooter was the men playing in the ballpark across the street. and the alleged gunman was told that those were members of congre congress. >> reporter: so he was aware days, weeks, prior to the shooting that members of congress were practicing. >> there's no secret members of congress are there, they're driving their cars with congressional license plates. >> reporter: you know this community well in part because you live close by, you report on this community. this is really earth-shattering for the folks who live around here. >> it is. it's a real jolt. this park, this ymca, the coffee shop across the street, this is really a hub of community activity. i mean, del rey is seen as one of the most popular areas in this whole region and while we have had some bad crimes in alexandria, including a serial killer that was on the loose, this is an attack at the heart of the community and members of congress many of whom are our neighbors in alexandria, it's filled with journalists and members of congress. but when we're out here we're functioning as neighbors so it's a surprise. >> thank you, julie. julie carey from news 4 wrc in washington. we are so lucky to have her as a resource. i call her all the time to ask her what she's hearing. can i it rate a point julie was making? >> please. >> reporter: for people living in the greater washington, d.c. area and who have been covering politics or are employed within businesses that deal with the government, yes, this is a political town. but i can tell you firsthand 23r conversations you have with neighbors and friends and at the gym or bar, people have been awfully discouraged about the level of rancor, about the level of animosity because we do -- everybody in this area does live with republicans and democrats, members of both parties, members who work on the hill, you know people of both parties have been concerned about the level of animosity and i think julie did a nice job of summing that up. >> we know julie well from our time as local washington reporters and appreciate her perspective and expertise. i want to read from our capitol hill producer, bernie sanders, who, of course, ran for president as just given a statement or is about 20 deliver it but this is the written statement that says "i have just been informed that the alleged shooter at the republican baseball practice is someone who apparently volunteered on my presidential campaign." mr. sanders says "i am sickened by this act, let me be as clear as i can be, violence is unacceptable and i condemn this action in the strongest possible terms. real change can only come about through non-violent action and anything else runs against our most deeply held american values." the statement goes on and offers prayers and condolences and hopes for congressman scalise. but that's the first -- there's been rumors going around that potentially this suspect had been a supporter of bernie sanders. there's social media posts that said that but this was the first official confirmation. senator sanders saying he himself has been informed that this shooter had once volunteered for his campaign and obviously senator sanders is disturbed and saying that that has no place in our society. >> this contributing to the picture that's emerging of 66-year-old james t. hodgkinson and, again, according to president trump, he is dead, he was killed in that shootout with law enforcement at the baseball field or died perhaps shortly thereafter. but julie carey just also reporting on folks at the ymca and she mentioned mayor ewell says he's been working out at the y, knew republicans had been -- knew members of is -- congress has been working out there. we saw minority leader nancy pelosi just walk by cameras a short time ago. we heard from president trump a short time ago, peter alexander is at the white house. >> reporter: good day to you and savannah. we heard the president speaking from the white house, besides his effort to draw americans together on this day, he also broke the news of the shooter's death. here's the president. >> authorities are continuing to investigate the crime and the asal hasn't has died from his injurie injuries. the fbi is leading the investigation and will provide updates as new information becomes available. >> reporter: the president would go on to say that we as americans have our differences but we share one things which a love of this country and demonstrative of that resilience, you're seeing it within this administration on this day as well. i'm told the gentleman by the name of francis brook, one of the coaches for the republican congressional baseball team was there at the field. he's on the vice president mike pence's policy staff. he was there as the incident took place. fortunately he was uninjured, returned to work and is back trying to conduct the business of the american people. back to you. >> peter alexander has been with us all morning from the white house as this unfolds. let's go back to pete williams, our justice correspondent, who has been working his sources on the phone. pete, anything more you can add? >> reporter: remarkably, given how long ago this happened, we still don't have a clear picture of how many people were shot. we know about congressman scalise, we know about roger williams from texas, we know about matt mika, the lobbyist for tyson foods, zach barth the name of the staffer. we're showing on our screen two capitol police officers have been wounded but all day, frankly, i've been hearing conflicting figures on whether it's two or three. capital police officers who were wounded so we're trying to get a better read on that and what their conditions are and i'm sure this will all become clear right now but with people taken to different hospitals, with different law enforcement organizations involved in this. different local emts and fire departments responsible for transporting people who were shot, i don't think there's a good clear 100% nailed down picture of how many people were wounded and what we do know is that these are the folks who were transported to hospitals. what we still don't know is whether other people received minor wounds and we're treated at the scenes or were walk ins or chose not to seek medical attention. >> house speaker paul ryan is on the house floor. let's listen. >> oh, mighty god on a day when violence has come to this assembly, we ask your blessing on our brother, representative steve scalise, the two officers and the staffer who have been shot. bless the hands of those who tend to their injuries. we as americans are blessed by a free and open society with rights secured by law and the constitution. but once again we are reminded that there is a vulnerability that comes with that openness. may we all be vigilant in being good citizens, neighbors, and defenders of our way of life at a time when so many challenges to our way of life and government seem under siege. we thank you for the men and women who respond to the crises that befall us, especially the capitol police and all first responders. may their heroism and generosity of spirit be an inspiration to us all and may they be assured of our appreciation of their service. and in this great silence, as we are gathered most dramatically as this assembly at the people's house may republicans and democrats be mindful of the rare companionship they share, men and women who have taken very public responsibility for our country that carries so many burdens and today the remind er shared danger. may this day be characterized by kindness, good will and compassion one to another. god bless america and may all that is done this day be for your greater honor and glory, amen. >> the chair has examined the journal of the last day's proceedings and announces its approval thereof. pursuant to clause 101 the journal stands approved. the chair will lead the house in the pledge of allegiance and invites the members of the gallery to join. >> i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. for what purpose does the gentleman from wisconsin seek recognition? >> i ask to revise and extend my remarks and speak for one minute. >> gentleman is recognized. >> my colleagues, there are very strong emotions throughout this house today. we are all horrified by this dreadful attack on our friends and on our colleagues and those who serve and protect this capital. we are all praying for those who were attacked and for their families. steve scalise, zachary barth, matt mika, special agent david bailey, special agent crystal griner, we are all giving our thoughts to those currently being treated for their injuries at this moment. and we are united. we are united in our shock, we are united in our anguish, an attack on one of us is an attack on all of us. [ cheers and applause ] [ cheers and applause ] >> i know we want to give our thanks to the first responders and the alexandria police department who were on the scene in minutes and i know this house wants to state unequivocally that we are, as ever, awed by the tremendous bravery of the capitol police. [ cheers and applause ] >> i spoke with special agent bailey and special agent griner this morning. one was being treated and one was about to go into surgery. i expressed our profound gratitude to them. it is clear to me based on various eyewitness accounts that without these two heroes agent bailey and agent griner, many lives would have been lost. [ applause ] i know we all want to learn as much as we can about what happened. we just received a briefing from the sergeant at arms. i have complete confidence in the investigation that's being conducted by the capitol police, the fbi who are also working with local law enforcement. i know we want to extend our gratitude for the outpouring of support that we've received from throughout the capitol and from throughout the country. and now, knowing steve scalise as we all do, he is likely really frustrated that he's not going to be able to play in the baseball game. [ laughter ] i also know steve wants all of us to commend the bravery of those who came to the aid of the wounded. in the coming days we will hear their stories and we will have the chance to hold up their heroism. my colleagues, there are so many memories from this day that we will want to forget and there's so many images that we will not want to see again. but there is one image in particular that this house should keep, and this is a photo i saw this morning of our democratic colleagues gathered in prayer this morning after hearing the news. you know, effoveryday we come h to test and to challenge each other. we feel so deeply about the things that we fight for and the things that we believe in. at times our emotions can clearly get the best of us. we're all imperfect. but we do not shed our humanity when we enter this chamber. for all the noise and all the fury, we are one family. these were our brothers and sisters in the line of fire. these were our brothers and sisters who ran into danger and saved countless lives. so before this house returns to its business, let's just slow down and reflect, to think about how we're all being tested right now. because we are being tested right now. i ask each of you to join me to resolve to come together, to lift each other up and to show the country, to show the world that we are one house, the people's house, united in our humanity. it is that humanity which will win the day and it always will. god bless, i yield. [ applause ] >> speaker paul ryan addressing the house floor in emotional term this is morning saying we stand united, this is the people's house. republican, democrat, doesn't matter at this moment in time, everyone united and hopes that those who were hurt today will recover fully and in gratitude to the capitol hill police officers who act so courageously. we've learned their identities now. "an attack on one of us is an attack on all of us." here's house minority leader nancy pelosi. >> mr. speaker, i rise to join the distinguished speaker in paying tribute to the brave men and women of the capitol police force and also in sadness for the assault that was made on our colleagues and members of the staff. to my colleagues, you will hear me say something you've never heard me say before -- i identify myself with the remarks of the speaker. [ laughter ] they're beautiful remarks, mr. speaker, thank you so much for the sentiments that they represent. thank you so much. [ applause ] again, we are not one caucus or the other in this house today, but we speak for each other in saying that we send our thoughts and prayers to our colleague, steve scalise. personally, we have our italian american connection so as soon as i heard his name i was filled with concern as i would be for anyone here but we have that special connection so our hopes and prayers and i said to the speaker i'll be asking you every five minutes how is steve coming along? and also for zach barth in congressman roger williams office, matt mika who was a former staffer and, of course, as the speaker acknowledged, crystal griner and david bailey. and acknowledging their sacrifice and how far gnat we all were that they were on the scene because other lives would have probably been lost, i want us to remember that every single day the capitol police protects all of us, takes risk for us and while a day like this is a time where we can focus on it so sadly, it doesn't mean that other days aren't as challenging. and especially i want to call attention to detective john gibson and officer jacob chestnut who almost 19 years ago, 1988 it was, in july, lost their lives protecting the congress, the capitol. and not just the members of congress, the staff, the press, and our visitors, people who come to see this capitol, this great edifice to democracy known throughout the world. so they are protecting a great deal and it is an attraction and that makes it all the more risky. you may not know this, my colleagues, but every time i pray -- which is very frequently and certainly every sunday -- i pray for all of you. all of you together. in earlier years, i used to pray for your happiness, for the fact that we would working together heed the words of president kennedy in the closing of his inaugural address when he said "god's work must truly be our own. how do we view what god's will is for us? how do we come together to if give confidence to the american people?" as our founders intended, we would have our disagreements and debate them and have confidence in our beliefs and humility to listen to others. but in more recent years, i have been praying not only for that but for our safety anyone in here -- i can say that quite cle clearly have been probably the target -- i'm the political target and therefore the target of more threats than anyone perhaps other than the president of the united states barack obama. and so i prayed for barack obama. and now i continue to pray for him and i pray for donald trump that his presidency will be successful and that his family will be safe. because it is about family. we are called for a purpose to this body. it's a great thing. and we know what it means to each of us to serve and we recognize that in others. and we also recognize you have your constituents and we respect you and your constituents who sent you here. all worthy of respect. but we do have our differences. and so i pray, my prayer is we can resolve our differences in a way that furthers the preamble to the constitution, takes us closer to ple. pluribus unum. today, again, it's an injury to our family. as i mentioned just a minute ago in the fuller thing, sports are a wonderful thing in our country, probably one of the most unifying, i think the arts, we like to say music or plays or whatever but sports really bring us together in our cities. you see people have the biggest differences of opinion on politics and yet when their team is on the field, people come together. people come together. so when this team was on the field practicing with such camaraderie and brotherhood, i don't know if you have any sisters on your team, we have two on our team, for this person to take this action was so cowardly. so cowardly. we all learn more about motivation and the rest of that but it seems particularly sad, although any violent death, of course, is sad, but particularly sad that at a time when people want us to come together and we're prepared together-to-come together tomorrow night that this assault would be made. but we cannot let that be a havingtory for the assailant or anyone who would think that way. so tomorrow we'll go out on the field, we'll root for our team, we want everyone to do his or her very best and we will use this occasion as one that brings us together and not separates that further. and with, that again, i want to thank the speaker for bringing us together and, again, with endless gratitude to our capitol police and particular today, of course, crystal griner, david bailey, but never out of our prayers detective john gibson and officer jacob chestnut. thank you my colleagues for the opportunity to share some thoughts with you on this sad day. steve and others, you are deeply in our prayers. we count the minutes until you return. please convey that to him, mr. speaker, thank you all. [ applause ] >> house minority leader nancy pelosi there also striking a chord of unity on the heels of house speaker paul ryan's comments there in the lower chamber. >> saying this is an incident in the family.==anchor//2 shot== we are following breaking news -- reports of an active shooter near the area of 17th and we interrupt that special report to bring you a special report right here from the bay area where we're following breaking news this morning. reports of an active shooter near 17th and vermont in san francisco. >> an extremely active scene. we're going to show you from nbc bay area sky ranger. you see heavy police presence at this moment. we are seeing police cars, fire engines, a swat truck out there. this is at the corner of 17 thr and vermont. this is on the eastern side of 101 there, and we're looking at ma seems like a swat truck and personnel surrounding it. this is in front of or very clees to the ups building in that part of san francisco, essentially the dogpatch area of san francisco. >> very active situation. there is an auto body store very close to there, and we're joined on the phone by xavier lanier, i believe. xavier lanier, i apologize for that. are you there? >> yes, i am. >> tell me what you see, what is going on. >> what is going on now is that the area is locked down. there are dozens of police officers, highway patrolmen and sheriff's deputies locking down the area. you cannot get past underneath the highway. there are literally hundreds of residents that have been evacuat evacuated. i see police disaster units pulling up in their long trucks in a staging area. the staging area is picking up a -- blocking all four side streets so there's no way to get past. i saw tactical units responding. the tactical unit is three blocks away. they have headquarters with fbi and other law enforcement agencies. so as i was driving and trying to get home into the west side of the city, i thought i was being pulled over by a police officer, but they zoomed by me and they were followed by a dozen other vehicles coming out of the swat officer headquarters. now, as i saw this, there are dozens and dozens of ups employees walking and running down the street. the ups depot is not a normal ups store. it takes up an entirety of a city block. and that block has literally dozens of trucks coming out of it. a heavy, heavy center for city employees. >> xavier, can you still hear us? >> yes, i can. >> xavier, we saw seconds ago our chopper going over this area. we saw tarps covering a couple bodies there. obviously there are at least multiple injuries. that's the initial information we received from san francisco police. what have you seen on the ground by way of people injured or what have you heard? >> we have seen at least two fire department and ambulance loading up victims. we cannot see their injuries. they are keeping us in our store. if your numbers are right, that would make at least four victims from the ups store. we are hearing there have been, quote, countless gunshots in or around the building. >> okay. did you hear anything at all? you were actually headed to that area. >> i was headed through that area immediately after dropping off my kindergartner at summer camp. this happened at a time when people are delivering their kids around this area. the dogpatch area is a hot spot for summer camps. you cannot hear a gunshot in this environment right now through the number of sirens, helicopters and general activity. this place is abuzz. i've never seen this like this in several years here. >> as we continue to hold you on the phone and talk to you, we are taking an aerial shot over the sight of the scene, and it does describe accurately police officers, tactical gear that they have out there responding to this area of 17th and vermont. xavi xavier, you've been told to shelter in place, and where exactly are you? >> i'm at the corner of 17th and vermont. there is an auto parts garage there. there are a lot of businesses around here. unfortunately, the schools are a couple blocks away. but like i said, police officers here are doing a great job, but there are people that are frantic, trying to ask questions of them, asking what's going on in the neighborhood, but they just do not have time for it. it is still a very active situation. as i said just a minute ago, we saw more swat officers run in and carry tactical gear and tactical weapons. this is by no means a calm situation, this is by no means a complete situation. we are seeing some people on bikes, on foot, trying to get closer to the ups store, but you really do need to stay away from those neighborhoods. it does affect quite a big area as they shut down the offramp off the highway. i would even avoid 101 if possible. >> just to orient all our viewers right now who are watching from home, this is on the eastern side of 101. you can see the highway, actually, if you look on your screen on the right side of it, and all that police activity surrounding the ups building, and we're getting a pretty good look right now at the roof as well. as we take these photographs, i want to show you a picture from one of your viewers that actually shows ups employees with their hands up. this looks like it was shot from a nearby apartment or so. looking out onto the roof you see maybe a half dozen or more people with their hands raised. xavier, i would go back to what you were describing a second ago. you said you saw ups workers or someone running out of the ups building. it also looks like there was something going on on top of the roof as well. can you describe this kind of duality? >> here's the deal. in a normal situation -- i don't want to say normal, but in an isolated situation with a number of victims and an assailant or two, it can be managed. this building, the sheer size of it is unmanageable. it's not a normal store. there's only a couple loading docks and a couple entrances. the building is absolutely huge. i don't know what the square footage is, but i would imagine it would take several hours for any number of officers to clear. there is some confusion here. you have several agencies cooperating together, including the san francisco fire department, the sheriff's department and the highway patrol. i imagine communications on the outside of the chaos, i can't imagine what's going on inside the building. >> it will take some time for teams to get in there and we don't know if it remains to be, whether they have captured the shooter at all. we are told it is an active shooter situation. once again, if you're just joining us right now, this is at 17th near vermont in san francisco. this is reportedly near a ups facility, and we have multiple crews on the scene there on the ground. we also have our own crews headed there to bring you more information as we take this live look from nbc bay area sky ranger overhead. >> laura, obviously we know there was a shelter in place that have been issued by san francisco police. as you mentioned, as soon as we broke into our coverage, that was in the last 15 minutes. and xavier laying out that there are tactical units, at least from where he's standing, that went into that ups building recently. the question whether there is an active shooter at the moment seems to be the case. by all signs there is an active shooter in place right now and i know we've been tracking the traffic situation as well. >> it still looks like there is traffic moving through that area, mike. >> as xavier, the caller, said, maybe you want to avoid 101. if i can talk over that chopper shot in a second, i may call for it. let me know if you can get that into the wall here. we're looking at vermont street just off highway 101 and just a short distance off the vermont offramp is 17th. 17th and vermont is where we originally heard about the activity. on the other side of the freeway, the western side is where folks referenced the ups building. that's what you can see from the freeway and that's where the activity is that we see. now we're showing you the chopper. that's the southbound portion of 101. here's northbound coming into the city. avoid the offramp. that will take you right into the activity. go to chavez or plan on going past that and heading into san francisco. this is the building xavier was talking about, the building we're seeing all the activity. that is the ups building and as you can see it occupies a city block. there is 17th, the san bruin building, utah and the ups building occupies the entire block. as xavier said, you cannot travel underneath the freeway on 17th, either. as you can see, the freeway is moving well, but the surface streets throughout that area will be a problem. again, avoid the northbound 101 off vermont street because that takes you into all the backup. take chavez as an alternate. we'll be following this but the freeway moves well. all the activity on the city streets are crazy. avoid that and let the officers do their work. >> we take you live from nbc bay area sky ranger overhead. it kind of gives you an overview of the facility itself. at 17th and vermont on the ground is where all the activity is taking place. there are dozens of patrol cars, swat teams all lining up in that area. we saw photographs of what we believe to be ups employees on top of the building with their hands up. it remains an active police situation right now. people in the area are being told to shelter in place. >> on one side of the freeway, laura, you have 17th and vermont. it actually seems to be between vermont and san bruno where that building is. on the other side of the highway, the mission side, that's where police are holding a staging area right now. we have folks headed there at this moment trying to get some more information for you. but as laura just alluded to, there are a variety of first responders on scene. you can really get a better picture of that as the sky ranger pulls out. beer going back in here for a second, but we have seen fire engines, police cars, swat units and other sorts of first responders. so an extremely heavy presence of all sorts here for blocks in this area of san francisco. again, it is 17th and vermont. now, what's interesting is some of the police officers over here have the area cordoned off, they're walking around. you don't see a lot of running, alacrity. we just heard from xavier they were running into the building, and all of this comes after reports of an active shooter and a shelter in place. >> we keep referring to xavier. that is xavier lanier who is still near this site right now. you're giving us a real great description of what you saw in this area. in fact, you mentioned you saw dozens of people running away from this building? >> yes, that's correct. now, just after this traffic report, things have calmed down just a bit. they have let news crews stage right behind a couple of tactical units, and the officers appear more relaxed that are on the perimeter. of course, i can't see what's going on directly inside. but it's a slightly different tone than when i first got on the call with you. that's obviously good news for the surrounding neighborhood, and the officers do seem to be, like i said, a little bit more calm. that doesn't mean anything is over, but it's a good sign to see that they don't have the same tense look on their faces, you don't have officers loading their rifles out here anymore like they were just a few minutes ago. >> that's good to actually set the tone for us, xavier, because clearly it is fluid and changing very quickly. i want to go back to something you mentioned a second ago. when we asked about victims, you said the ambulance was loaded with victims? how many people did you actually see getting treated? >> i did not see firsthand how many people were being treated. i was told by the ups employees that there were at least two ambulances being loaded. i cannot have a visual of them or see exactly what was going on. it could be anything from somebody getting a band-aid on the back or somebody critical. we just cannot tell on the screen right now the site of the staging area. we are not seeing right now any further ambulances leaving the area, which is a good sign in terms of having an unlimited number of casualties. before they were rushing them in this direction. so long as they're not rushing any more in this direction, that's a very good sign for whomever is inside or around the building. >> we're just getting reports right now that five people, in fact, have been shot. two have been killed. so that coincides with what we're seeing on the ground right now at 17th and vermont near -- not too far from patrero. shelter in place remains in effect since we had an active shooter in the area. five people confirmed shot. two, in fact, have died. >> we have this from andy blankstein from nbc news, investigative unit there. he says at least five people shot. what we're looking at right now, a minimum of five people shot, and as you mentioned, laura, two people killed. you're not looking at this on your screen right now. we're trying to censor some of what we're showing you, but there are two bodies lying in the street covered with a yellow tarp. we know this has been a fatal incident now. as you see on the bottom of your screen, at least five people shot. two are dead. xavier was just telling us a second ago he's actually noticed an appreciable change in the demeanor of police officers on scene right now, because you can see the yellow police tape and investigators and firefighters all on scene gathered around, huddle i huddling, talking. at one point it did look like they were frantically moving around trying to find someone. their physical demeanor at this point does seem a little different. that said, we do not have any sort of confirmation at this point about the active shooter, what the status is of that shooter. so it is entirely possible that they do not have the person who did this in custody at this point. and just to rewind for a second, we know that there were dozens of people running out of this building, 17th and vermont street, a ups facility, dozens and dozens pouring out of it as the situation played out. we also know there were at least half a dozen people standing on the roof of the building with their hands raised. that is the picture, kevin wood, i believe, is the viewer that submitted this to us. we'll have it on the screen in just a second but another vantage point of what was going on as people from blocks around in this area -- there it is, kevin wood, of the dogpatch area of san francisco watching this play out in realtime, and on a day when there was already a major shooting in washington, d.c. we are interrupting that coverage because of the severity of this situation and what's going on right now in san francisco. >> of course, exactly, we interrupted that special report going on in washington, actually, in vermont. now take a look at you're screen right now as nbc bay area sk bb ranger is overhead. it looks like they're escorting people out of the building. we cannot confirm at this point if these are actual employees of the building, but these are live photos you're seeing right now over the scene at 17th near vermont. this is near the ups facility. you see police in the front escorting these people out of the building. we are told from witnesses near the scene, it is a very large building, in fact. it's got a couple of loading docks, a couple of entrances, but the building itself is many stories high in that it is a huge facility for police to be able to go through and look through piece by piece. we know it was an active shooting situation. we don't know if there was one gunman, several gunmen. we do confirm so far five people shot, two people confirmed have been killed, in fact. and it looks like -- i'm trying to take a look at these pictures as we bring them to you live this morning. yes, you can see several ups employees in their kind of infamous brown outfits they have there. this is supposed to be a pretty major facility that they use to sort and distribute packages there. most likely they're taking these people aside to question them, to get accounts of what they saw, what they heard. this all developing within the last 45 minutes or so out of san francisco this morning. >> yeah, and i want to actually add here, laura, that you're right, we don't necessarily know active shooter or shooters. i'm looking now at the timeline of tweets that the san francisco police department has sent out here in the last 30 minutes or so, and at no point does it say active shooter, singular. it says avoid the area of 17th and vermont and said they're responding to the scene of an active shooting that occurred near 17th and vermont. it is not clear how many people they're looking for, although at least one person has inflicted horrible, tragic damage today.xd two people have died and we know at least five others have been shot. as we watch these employees file out of the building now and seemingly get moved to safety, dozens and dozens of people -- this was a major facility. i mean, just from the last 30, 40 seconds that we've watched, you're looking at probably over 50 to a hundred people that were just moved. so we're looking at a huge presence, a huge population of workers in san francisco, which is not to even get into how large of a space geographically this is taking up in the city right now. sky ranger is focused on a very particular corner here, and again, this is 17th in between vermont and san bruno, but it is blocks and blocks that are cordoned off right now. >> and a lot of this, as you mentioned, sam, happening right there on the city streets. because we can obviously see they're shut down, they've got people in there, they've got officers, they've got tactical units. on the freeway itself, which is very close by, traffic appears to be moving, but you should avoid these areas. >> our speed censors continue to show slow traffic getting up into san francisco, and normally we would see that with folks getting into the city by the bay. the activity here, all the activity above with the chopper and see below with all the emergency vehicles is clearly a distraction right near the vermont street offramp. i'm seaying avoid that even if they have not closed that. do not use vermont street off the 101. we're seeing more traffic seemingly ahead through the area. avoid 101 again and that area. the police activity originally reported at 17th and vermont, but we're saying the whole area there on 17 and vermont over toward patrero, avoid that area. it's on 17th and 16th and san bruno and utah. that's the perimeter on the western side of the freeway. but again, the vermont street offramp appears to be the one affected, so use chavez street on the bottom of our screen. we'll continue to follow this. that offramp is open so far, but avoid that jaiarea if at all possible. >> i received a text alert from emergency sftervices in san francisco telling me to avoid this area in san francisco. to go back to the language we just heard, countless, countless gunshots. those were the three words xavier lanier just gave us ten minutes ago as we show an account of people laying on the ground there, so we know there were a lot of gunshots. ambulances, at least two of them loaded with victims. a very, very serious and tragic situation here in the dogpatch area of san francisco. >> as we zoom in from nbc bay area sky ranger up above, you actually see the police activity on the ground. they've been patrolling that area from bringing multiple people out. just moments ago we saw police escort, it looked like, almost a hundred ups employees, many in their brown outfits, many that probably worked behind the scenes as well. this picture shows you right here, this is taken from what looks like an apartment or whatnot nearby from viewer kevin wood with actual employees on the roof of a building, with their arms extended, almost surrendering in a sense that, we are the innocents, help us get out. and that's exactly what we saw san francisco police do. as you take a live ook at thesee pictures as well, as they take more and more people out, more people working in this ups facility which we're told is very, very large, and it might take some time for police to actually be able to go through this building. as you mentioned, we don't know if this is an active shooter, one person, numerous people, but we do know so far five people have been shot, two people have been killed so far. so still it remains a very fluid situation. >> certainly. let me just also add that we see all these employees being filed out. this is all next to the ups building so it seems unlikely if they were looking for an active shooter in this block or blocks that they would be moving en masse. 100-plus employees out in the middle of the street there. xavier lanier has stayed with us the entire time. xavier, you were describing for us the change in temperament between police officers and fire department. what are you seeing now? >> we're looking to see what looks like a de-escalation of how intent the officers are, and at this time we're seeing more and more brass show up, we're seeing people from both the fire department and the police department and unmarked cars, and it looks like the ups employees are a bit safer. there was approximately two dozen ups employees in one of the employee parking lots which is directly under the 101 highway and they were in sort of a holding pattern there. that's just some ups tractors. they were escorted down san bruno back even closer to the ups facility than they were, and so as you mentioned, i can't imagine they're searching for an active shooter outside the building moving that large of a group of people directly across the street from the facility. and they are cordoning off more streets with yellow police tape, and we're seeing a slowdown in the number of units arriving on scene. officers are actively engaging the public now. they're simply trying to calm the neighbors a bit. every minute here it does seem to get a bit calmer. that does not lift from the tragedy that happened just a half hour ago or so. >> exactly. five people shot, two dead that we've confirmed so far. we don't know the situation of the shooter or shooters so far. we're working to get you that information right now. our assignment desk people working the phones right now and trying to get you any new available. but these live pictures overhead from nbc bay area sky ranger really painting quite the story this morning that remains a very active situation at 17th and vermont at the ups facility in san francisco this morning. >> all of this clearly hugging the 101 corridor there that's bakely t basically separates the spine from the staging area and the east of the ups building. again, looking at san francisco police department's twitter account, they have not made any sort of update or even suggestion of a change in that active shooter status. so we do not know by all appearances, from witnesses on the ground there. it does not seem that they're pursuing an active shooter in that part of the city, but we have been given no indication, zero indication at this point, that things are safe. so there is a shelter in place that has been in effect for close to an hour now as the situation continues to evolve. >> that's right, and it's quite a big corridor that we see. you see all the cars and the remaining streets around it remain pretty quiet. to the right that center building is the ups facility we're talking about. underneath as the chopper zooms in, you can see the streets cordoned off and blocked off by police. we saw the swat teams out there as well. they were fully armed, all in their gear, ready to go and explore in this area. but in the time that we've been on the air since we first got news of this breaking news, we came on air as quickly as we could to bring you this information, to bring you these live pictures as well. we have seen the situation deescalate quite a bit, but still very active as it remains. >> it was interesting to just get a fuller view of all of the police and emergency responders that are around that building, because it is not just officers, as you would expect, obviously, in a situation like this, but you had fire engines, you had medical responders, certainly ambulances. we've detailed the fact there were people who had to receive treatment on scene, not to mention the fact, again, that there have been two fatalities in this shooting, two people killed, at least five others injured. we did find out the swat units are actually stored just a few blocks away from where this building is here in the dogpatch area of san francisco. that may just be a function of why we're looking at a swat unit right now of the fact that these were the resources that were close by when the situation broke out. that said, again, a huge diversity of sort of first responders and we are taking a live look right now, live images from sky ranger showing us that police seem to be walking, tr s traipsing around the area but not with the level of p phoneticism that we saw earlier. >> this is at the ups facility at 17th near vermont. we saw police holding these people. they were in the building and they're kind of going row by row, many of them in their ups gear, many most likely worked behind the scenes. we're told this is a ups sorting type facility with a couple loading docks, a couple entrances. not so much like the ups store that you would go into, but where they get and obtain all the packages to sort through them and send them out. so as you can well imagine, they would have many, many employees at this point. we saw police escorting them out, taking them to a safer area. we don't know much about the shooter or shooters involved at this point, what the motive was behind this as well. so most likely in this area of 17th and vermont in san francisco this morning where we're seeing so many streets cordoned off there on the ground, this investigation will go late into the day as they try to figure out what exactly sparked this, what exactly happened and how did we come to the results of at least so far five people shot and two people killed. >> there are some reports out there right now that this could have been a ups employee. we know nothing confirmed to this point in terms of the background of who is responsible or the people responsible for this shooting. as we just look at really a remarkable scene right now on a day where much of the country is already rattled based on what happened in washington, d.c. this morning, an active shooter situation. at least, that's the last we heard from san francisco police. we are monitoring this again live at that massive ups facility. as mike mentioned, it takes up an entire city block there on 17th and utah right off 101. we are just watching and waiting to see when police will give the all clear, because there has been a shelter in place for about an hour right now, and clearly we do not have resolution in terms of who the person was that committed this horrific act and whether or not they're in custody. >> that's right, and whether they have accomplices as well. as we continue to show pictures from bay area sky ranger, police have been coming and going from that building itself. that white building is what we're talking about as well. you can see it's so large, there is even a parking structure on top of the building. but as our bay area sky ranger pans around the area, you can see all the other streets cordoned off. ambulances on standby nearby, police officers really have the entire area surrounded as we see cars stopped in place, some undercover units you see there as well. we're talking about many streets cordoned off in that

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