stage. >> i think cruz wants to be the nominee in four years and wants to opportunity to set an ideological vision. >> great panel, you guys. see you tomorrow morning bright and early. i'm maria bartiromo. this is a fox news alert. deeply troubling breaking news out of baton rouge, louisiana. associated news reporting authorities say more than one police officer has been shot there. police have closed streets near the baton rouge headquarters. we're closely monitoring the situation and will bring you the latest as soon as we find out more about it. and we're live in cleveland this morning as donald trump and mike pence are ready to launch their convention with 15,000 journalists streaming into this crucial swing state. the media excitement has been

palpable, not so much about the coming convention but about the veep stakes with the press corps trying to define trump's choice. >> just getting word now that donald trump is meeting with another of the men on his list of potential running mates. >> folks around trump are saying, don't count christie out. >> so far all my sources say that ultimately trump is going to pick somebody he can get along with. that's not to say pence is out of the running. >> on thursday, pence flew to new york and news outlets said they had confirmed or sort of confirmed the choice. >> chris christie and newt gingrich haven't been publicly ruled out but indications are trump has apparently decided on indiana governor mike pence as

running mate. >> then came the heartbreaking terror attack in france, a truck driver killing 84 people in nice, prompting trump to postpone his news conference and insisting to fox news that he hadn't made a final, final decision. pence sat down with sean hannity before a new york rollout that was panned by the pundits because trump didn't talk much about his running mate. >> are you ready for the political onslaught? the clinton campaign has said you are incredibly divisive, the most extreme pick in a generation. doesn't surprise you, right? >> i'm a conservative, but i'm not in a bad mood about it. >> governor mike pence was my first choice. i've admired the work he's done. >> i'm a christian, a conservative, and a republican, in that order. >> we have an all star lineup with many of your fox favorites. joining us now in cleveland, the senator political correspondent

for "usa today." steve hayes, a fox news contributor. kerr t kirstin powers, a fox news analyst. >> gone are the days of just waiting for the announcement. this is what reporters do, they all want to break the story. there was something really unusual that made it neurotic-seeming, and that is trump's plane broke down. >> i have to interrupt because of what's going on in baton rouge, i'm sorry. a fox news alert. we are going to talk by phone with rod wheeler, a fox news contributor and former homicide detective in the district of columbia. rod, it's amazing to me, we're sitting here in cleveland, about to begin our convention coverage, yet these reports of another shooting of one or more police officers in baton rouge,

louisiana. it is sort of getting hard to escape the conclusion that there is something of a pattern here. your thoughts. >> that's right, howard. just to kind of give you an update, and i've been monitoring this for the past 15 minutes, the shooting happened, according to multiple sources, not far from the baton rouge police headquarters, which is off of airline highway there in baton rouge. now, so far the police in baton rouge are calling this an active shooter situation, which means they do not have an individual under arrest and charged with this situation yet. it's still a very fluid situation, and there are multiple reports of multiple officers obviously shot. we don't know the status of those officers in terms of their condition. but i can tell you that there is a massive manhunt under way right now with the baton rouge police, and the fbi has been notified to try to search down and track down this individual, howard. >> you're looking at live pictures right now from wafb in

baton rouge as we're talking about rod wheeler about this news, heartbreaking news, and we've had to do this again and again, it seems. rod, no accident, it seems to me, without jumping to conclusions, that baton rouge is the place where this is happening, that of course is the city in louisiana where alton sterling was killed by police in a confrontation that was captured on video that sparked a lot of anger, perhaps helped inspire the fatal shooting in machi dallas, the shooting of five police officers. you're a police officer. are you more on edge, more worried now that it does seem to be that there are a lot of people out there with anger against police officers or white police officers, as was the case in dallas, and that this has changed the situation for every police force in america? >> oh, absolutely. i can tell you, howard, that police departments all across

the nation are under high alert right now, because of threats such as this. now, just to add insult to injury, the baton rouge police department, ever since the shooting of alton sterling, they have been under an extremely high alert, and they received many, many threats by way of social media. so they've been kind of preparing for the worst. they've had individuals actually sending e-mails to them, making threats. so for this shooting to occur this morning, to many, it's not that much of a surprise. however, the police, because of their massive response, hopefully they'll be able to identify this individual, if it was just one individual, they haven't said yet. but again, they continue to tweet out, and i'm just reading one right now, where they are asking the community to stay away from the area near the police headquarters, and they are looking for at least one, maybe two subjects, they just don't know yet. again, howard, police departments all across the country, including there in cleveland where you are, are on

high alert because of this potential threat. >> all right. let me bring in some of our guests here in cleveland where we're obviously planning to cover the consequentiavention. steve hayes, i don't have anything to say than here we go again. >> as a country, we're so divided. i think the coverage makes it very difficult for journalists to cover, because on the one hand you need to provide the minute by minute coverage we're doing now, you need to provide as much context as you can, but you want to do it in a way that doesn't inflame the passions on both sides. and there are very passionate views on both sides. you have on the one hand the videos that we've seen in many cases have been horrific, of these police shootings, these police actions. on the other hand, you know that it doesn't represent all police officers. so i think, you know, it's an important to find that balance. >> right. and kirstin powers, i thought in the wake of dallas, because the country was so shocked by the senseless killings there, that the media were taking a more

restrained approach, not being more inflammatory. hang on. we'll get you on the other side. we're going to go now to local affiliate in baton rouge, link to a police spokesman, i don't have his name right now, we'll put it up on the screen as soon as we get it. >> the scene at this point in time we feel is -- we're asking everyone to stay out of the area, as we learn more we'll be updating. >> give us an idea of that area, because we have several people watching now that live like in the broadmoor community. who and where are we talking about? we know i-12, how far does it go on the other side? >> it's going to extend through the area. again, there are several, multiple agencies out here.

again, we feel the scene has been contained. again, we ask individuals to give it some thought and remain from the area. >> when you say the situation is contained, something that mean the suspects are in custody? >> i'm trying to learn more on that. i'm trying to get some info on the suspects, suspect, not sure if it's more than one. but at this point in time, again, we feel the scene has been contained, and i'll update you as i learn more. >> the area there, i don't know if you're a part of this, from time to time i'm in that area, i have noticed officers hang out in that direction. do you know if they were on duty, were they actively working, does that have anything to do with what we've been dealing with the last week and a half in baton rouge? >> that information, as far as what brought this on, we're still trying to get the details on.

it is believed that these officers were on duty at the time this occurred. not exactly sure if they were policing or responding to something. again, you know, we're trying to get the details lined out to learn more about this and what brought this on. >> what happens when the call goes out, shots fired? just kind of walk our viewers through what happens, especially when you hear that officers have been shot. >> well, at any point in time that a shots fired call goes out, it is frightening for any citizen, because you don't want anyone to experience that, especially if you hear that an officer is involved, or just a regular citizen of baton rouge,

there's a family tie there too. it's very scary and you just hope for the best. >> we haven't heard any more on the conditions of these officers and/or deputies? >> at this point in time, i have not. >> i have a couple of quick things for you, i know you need to go. do we believe it's just baton rouge police or is it sheriff's officers? >> we're hearing it may also include some deputies. but again, that's preliminary information as far as i'm waiting on confirmation for. we can definitely say the word has been made -- >> thank you very much. i know you have north of 500 or so police officers and very possible that you may know who was involved in this. i appreciate you taking time to get us the information.

i know that's part of your job, but i know you also have a heart, and it hits home. thank you for taking the time for us. we'll try to get more information from you when you feel it is necessary. >> all right. you've been watching a live feed from wafb, baton rouge. this is live television, folks, we don't have a lot of information, we don't even know how many police officers reportedly were shot. we'll come back to our panel in cleveland, kirstin powers was just talking about the dallas shock to all of us journalists, citizens, americans, and how that affects the media climate and really the political climate, as donald trump gets ready to begin his convention here. >> i think we do have to be careful because we don't know who shot the police officer. you know, we need more information about it, and i think what we'll tend to see is everybody goes to their corners, and some people will be blaming, you know, police for the brutality, some people will be blaming black lives matter people. it's actually a more complicated

situation than that, i think. as steve said, most police officers are not gunning down innocent people. at the same time, most black lives matter people are not gunning down cops. we need to remember that, even if this person says, like the shooter in dallas said they're angry about police brutality, it doesn't mean this is part of the black lives matter movement. somebody who goes out and shoots an innocent person is a different kind of person than your sort of average protester, in the same way that the police officer who brutalizes somebody is different than your average police officers. >> heidi, particularly in a fluid situation, we don't know the motivation, we don't know much of anything right now, but as time goes on, it becomes an issue or fodder for a political campaign, the fact that this is happening just at the start of the first of the two party conventions, that could happen again, could it not? >> certainly, because we're just in such an on-edge period right now in american politics.

i mean, it just seems like we're constantly living in the aftermath of some kind of civil unrest or some kind of terrorist attack. and those fears absolutely will play into people's emotions and maybe even their preferences for a presidential candidate. now, i don't think either hillary clinton or donald trump is going to overtly politicize any of this. as a matter of fact, as we saw in the aftermath of the recent terrorist attack in paris, they were very restrained, at least initially, and hesitant to kind of politicize this. and i think the media for their part as well, in the aftermath of some of these shootings, has also been very restrained, like you said before, i didn't get to mention this on the show last week, but both the "post" and "new york times" were putting the same images on their front pages of a young african-american girl signing condolences on the cards in

dallas, and you compare that to a protester at a trump campaign sucker punching someone, when is not representative, as kristen said, of the broader groups. >> if you're just joining us, we have reports of a police officer being shot in baton rouge, louisiana. we had the awful truck attack in nice, 84 people killed, many wounded, the coup in turkey, friday night our time. i was going to ask you all about what impact that has when the attack happened in france on thursday night, donald trump called in to "the o'reilly factor," hillary clinton called into "the o'reilly factor," she doesn't usually do that.

the candidates can't avoid the bloodshed being carried into americans' living room. >> no, they can't. they'll be trying to make sense of all this chaos. it's easy for media types to lump it all together, because it's a series of sort of blows on the american polity. but in many ways, they're not related. there is this chaos, but what's happening in nice isn't necessarily related to what's happening in turkey, which has nothing to do with what's happening here. what you'll see is probably an argument about how we explain these things. i mean, between the candidates and the reporters covering it. >> let me go back by phone to former d.c. homicide detective rod wheeler. do you believe, as somebody with long experience in this field, that there is a copy cat nature to this, leaving aside the terror attacks overseas, that when there is a fatal police shooting in baton rouge, when there is a fatal police shooting within 24 hours in suburban st. paul, minnesota, and then the killing of the five officers and

the wounding of others in dallas, for people out there who have access to weapons and maybe already have hatred, maybe already are radicalized, maybe radicalized by isis or another terrorist group, does this make it more likely that they will act? >> oh, absolutely, howard. not only is this a copy cat type situation, we'll start seeing mother of these. and we in law enforcement realize that, and that's why we're on high alert. we also have individuals who are inspired, and they receive this propaganda from groups like isis by way of social media. and what happens is that inspires these people to go out and commit these atrocious absolute like what we saw in dallas. right now, from what i'm being told, down there where this situation is in baton rouge, the police may have contained the situation. and what does that mean? that means some reports right now are stating the suspect may be down. we don't know that. i want to caution the listeners to be careful when you hear a

lot of information like that. but right now, some reports are saying that the shooter may be down. the mayor of baton rouge is saying that there is multiple police officers shot. he isn't saying anything about their condition. but again, this is a very fluid investigation right now. >> that's critical information, rod, and thank you for updating our viewers on that, because the first thing you want to know is whether or not there's an active shooter. mayor of baton rouge, we'll listen in right now on what he has to say about this unfolding situation. >> as this is sunday, we're asking people to pray for the families, pray for those officers in general who put their lives in danger every day, and pray that there is a city that comes together. and i guess the other thing that really pains me greatly, after you're watching all this rhetoric back and forth and venomous stuff spilling out of people's mouth about officers and everything else, just think about it, you have somebody

breaking into a pawn shop with the sole intent of getting weapons to kill officers. then what happens this morning. common sense needs to prevail. the city needs to be the great city it is. i'm not, and a lot of people are not, going to let people take this city over their personal agenda. >> there are plenty of those going on, mayor holden. you kind of mentioned it, there are a lot of 11:00 services that unfortunately this is going to make the sermon. what do you say at the folks out there who might still be mad at police, might still be mad at the suspect involved earlier last week. what do you say to people who are just flat out angry right now? >> i would tell them to go back today, especially in the baptist or christian church, this is communion sunday, for example, at my church. that's done as members of jesus christ who died on the cross.

yet still on the cross, god forgave the sinner. i'm not saying officers are sinners, but we have to learn from the spirit of forgiving as building blocks to move on. we have children who are misbehaving, how can we go out and advocate to our children when we see a city of adults who seem like they can't control their own emotions in terms of violence? this is an all call, to say to people throughout baton rouge and other areas in general, sit down, relax, take a deep breath, get on your knees, analyze what's going on, and use it as a building block instead of a stumbling block. >> we had some video earlier of your former chief showing up at the hospital, he looked very emotional and upset, he obviously lost an officer, as you did, under your watch, several of them. are we at the point now, have we

lost officers in this? >> well, i tell you what. you know, right now, hopefully, because we are now trying to make sure that we're getting more and more officers. but i mean, the thing is right here, this is a very dangerous job. i mean, i cannot even tell you the magnitude, i worked public information for city police, and also i've been mayor for 12 years, you see it from a totally different perspective. when they kiss their daughters and sons and wives goodbye, you know, the bottom line is that those families aren't sure whether that person is going to come back to the door. we can alleviate some of the fears by showing a spirit of brother should and sisterhood instead of drawing a line in the sand and saying, you stay on this side of the line, i'll stay on that side of the line, and we'll never shake hands. so right now there is a call to everybody, regardless of how you may feel, there is still a poor city and a great place that we

live in. don't let it be defined by what happened today or what happened last week or anything of that magnitude. it is an urgent call for us to come together. >> mayor holden on this situation here, and we appreciate your time. what can you tell us on the officers' conditions? have we -- do we have anything more on maybe any officers who may have passed away? >> no, sir, they have not confirmed yet. they have three of what they're describing as very seriously ill. that's what i'm waiting on now, a confirmation from city police. but i can tell you, it's a very, very fluid situation as we speak. >> sure. we've heard from mayor kip holden, thank you very much, sir. i know much of this can change. i thank you for your comments. anything else you wanted to add? i know you're very busy. >> let me thank you all. there has to be a community dialogue here, not with bitterness, but saying, yeah, there have been some things that have happened in our community,

but my god, look how far we've come over the last decade plus. we're going to have to find those granules of success. they're not lost. take the things that we have done to build this into the city that it is, and move forward. talk, have conversations, have dialogues. don't go into shells and not express yourself about things that you think need to happen in order for this city to continue to move forward. >> mayor kip holden, again, thank you. you're telling us you have heard three officers are in very, very bad shape at this point. >> yes, sir. yes, sir. >> okay. thank you very much for that. we appreciate it. if you hear anything else, please pass it on to us. thank you for talking to the citizens of baton rouge. >> yes, sir, thank you. >> we have been listening to baton rouge kip holden, providing the first hard information that three officers were at the least seriously wounded, he has not said they're dead, we're happen to have that.

he is asking that people keep their spirits up in the wake of what is becoming an unfortunately frequent occurrence with either police being shot or other kinds of violence. we'll go now to washington and my fox news colleague leland vittert. leland, it seems like we in the press just bounce from one tragedy to another, whether it's fatal shootings of police, whether it's protesters getting out of control, whether it's radicalized people getting access to guns and going after police officers. >> we've certainly seen how over the past year or so, from the time in baltimore, this progression of violence against police officers, and the calls by some activists to target police officers, be it we heard in baltimore the anger towards police officers, then the chants of some of the folks at various black lives matter protests about pigs in a blanket, fry them, those kinds of things. then we saw the shootings in dallas. now what appears to be another

situation of police officers being targeted in baton rouge, louisiana. we know there were police officers targeted in baltimore a couple of days ago. these are live pictures right now from louisiana, wafb, the local affiliate down there. the area that this is happening is called the old hammond neighborhood. you can see it's a relatively suburban neighborhood there. a number of police cars set up with a perimeter. here is what we know right now. allegedly there were three officers shot and in grave condition. whether or not they have passed away or they are still being worked on by medical professionals trying to save their lives, we don't know. there was an interview earlier with a spokesperson for the baton rouge police department who says that they believe the situation has been contained. and as you see the police officers walking around in this scene, in this picture that we're getting from baton rouge, you do get the feeling that there is less of a sense of urgency than there was a little

while ago when there was potentially a gunman still on the loose. obviously still at this point they are keeping folks a long way away from these scenes. according to the television station whose picture you are looking at right now, wafb, they are saying that senior law enforcement officials are confirming to them that two law enforcement officers have died. obviously here at fox news, we cannot confirm the number or if indeed there have been fatalities. bringing back in rod wheeler now, rod, this really seems to be a seismic change in the world, that police officers now aren't necessarily caught in the crossfire or perhaps in a shootout with one deranged criminal, but are now really targets as they simply walk around and do their job. >> absolutely, you're right. every police officer in this country realizes now that we are

targets. and we do have a target on our back. it's unfortunate, leland, because when you look at all of these police shootings and situations across the country, the police have not really done anything wrong. they're just trying to enforce the law. there may be one-off incidents were police actions were questioned, but at the same time the police get up each and every day, put that uniform and badge on, and they go out to protect our nation. as a matter of fact, let me just add to that. >> rod, i want to interrupt you quickly, we have some bad news. according to the local cbs affiliate there in baton rouge, at least two baton rouge police officers have been killed and are confirmed dead in this shooting. it started about 9:00 there, baton rouge time. that would be 10:00 eastern, roughly an hour and a half ago, the shooting began there in baton rouge. there have been some reports of perhaps a masked gunman, perhaps an unmasked gunman, we don't

know. as we're looking at this scene, it appears as though we're looking down a two-lane divided highway there in baton rouge that may be near the baton rouge police department in this area of baton rouge called old hammond. and we heard from the mayor earlier, rod, who said this is sunday morning, folks are heading to church there in baton rouge, and asking for his community's prayers. at the time it was prayers that the officers might come through. sadly we know that two officers will not be pulling through this. >> that's right. >> and have passed away. what i'm interested in from your perspective here is, as officers are now going about their day, we're now going to listen in, wafb now has a witness there on scene to this shooting. >> kobe burrell -- sorry, you have something else? >> that's it. >> thank you very much for joining us, i appreciate it.

that gives us perspective of someone living in the area. people may be thinking, can i get out, can i get in, i have an older father or mother in the area, can i get to them. he lives in the neighborhood behind, off of old hammond, close to the walmart market. we're learning that the officers were taken, graham, we're getting reports that two officers have died in this. what can you tell us from the hospital? >> reporter: gregg, the very latest outside our lady of the lake is that a coroner's vehicle went inside. there is an armed officer with a pretty big rifle stopping all vehicles coming into the emergency department here at the main entrance of our lady of the lake. the flag here has been lowered to half-staff as well as outside our lady of the lake. earlier, as this situation was developing about an hour ago, all of the entrances were blocked completely to the hospital, as those officers and possible deputies were arriving here by ambulance.

there have been all sorts of police vehicles speeding in and out of the hospital right now. we know the former police chief was seen coming in and out as well. we've been in touch with hospital staff and we're working to get some numbers. we requested those numbers, as to how many patients they're treating, and those patients' conditions. still waiting to hear back on that as of course this is all developing very rapidly. but still, all cars being stopped going into the emergency room entrance, the main entrance here on esen lane. certainly a big presence around the hospital as we await updates on the officers gravely injured. >> the police officer standing behind you, the african-american guy holding the rifle, guarding the hospital, you have to think about what's going on through his mind. he probably has the information that we have now that two officers have been killed. you can only imagine what he's thinking about, with his city, having to be a police officer in this climate -- >> as we continue to watch the pictures coming in from

louisiana, the hospital there where conceivably the two police officers who passed away were taken, we're hearing that a coroner's van is pulling there into that hospital that is now being guarded by what is being described as heavily armed baton rouge police officers. i want to bring in our own will car who has been in baton rouge, covering the unrest there. my understanding is you're a little bit closer to the scene, the baton rouge police department, and then this walmart neighborhood market that's not too far away on that main highway that has seen so many protests; is that correct? >> reporter: that's right, leland, we're about five miles east of downtown baton rouge right now. to give you a perspective, this is about seven miles away from the convenience store where alton sterling was killed on july 4th. the best way i can describe this right now is that it's a chaosic, fluid situation. police officers are racing around us, just flying by, going

to the scene. we're being told the scene is contained, but officers are still everywhere at this point. we've confirmed, as you've been reporting, multiple officers have been shot. but as i mentioned, a very chaotic scene at this point. >> as of now, the latest we're hearing is at least four officers shot, two are confirmed dead. and that's coming to us from the cbs affiliate there in baton rouge, wafb. two things for you, will. number one, give us a sense of the feeling in baton rouge. had things sort of calmed down after the violence we saw last weekend, or was there still really a lot of tension between the police and a lot of the protesters and agitators? >> reporter: things have calmed down over the past week, so much so that we were talking to people who live and work in and around this area yesterday, and they thought this had really

passed. but last weekend, you may remember that officers came out and said that there had been a burglary at a pawn shop, where four people broke into a nearby pawn shop very close to where they are right now, they stole eight handguns. authorities said they would use the handguns to shoot law enforcement across the area. with that in mind, law enforcement in southern louisiana have been on guard all throughout the week while the community was calm, they had been keeping a close eye out for potential threats. this appeared at 9:00 a.m. here, these officers have been keeping an eye out for any type of threat going on. obviously the worst has just happened here today, leland. >> very clearly the worst has happened. to give you a sense, will, of what we're looking at, we're looking at down a two-lane divided highway, that should be

airline highway there in louisiana, near the baton rouge police department and near where the shooting took place. as we look at the scene, will, it doesn't appear that police are everythimoving in what you y their sort of tactical response, it seems as though things have calmed down at least in the past 15 minutes. we don't see officers with ar-15s out and those kinds of things. obviously the police officers have the knowledge that four of their own have been shot. you would think if the person who did that was still on the run, as we look at what appears to be some type of either surveillance video or perhaps there is other video from wafb, we don't know exactly know where, but police are converging on the scene. does it seem like the police have contained the situation so they don't feel like there's a cop killer on the loose? >> reporter: we're being told it is contained, although as i

mentioned, it's a fluid situation. you can see officers running throughout the area. but where we are, which is right on the side of interstate 12 here, i see five, six police cars, and the officers are calmly standing, probably about half a mile from where this shooting took place. and something to note too, leland, you'll probably recall that alton sterling's son cameron, who is 15 years old, came out this past week, and he pleaded for the public to stay peaceful and to not respond to his father's death with violence. in fact he traveled up to washington, d.c. and spoke in a town hall where president obama was, and he was adamant. and his family has been adamant not to respond to any of this with violence. so you can only imagine what they're thinking at this point now that you have multiple officers who have been shot here in baton rouge.

>> and to that point, will, as we bring in elizabeth prann here on the set in washington, d.c., you have to think that four officers shot on a sunday morning, these officers were targeted. this was not a traffic stop gone wrong or something like that. >> and as we listen to will, he talked about how we had heard from the surviving members of alton sterling's family who had repeatedly called for peaceful protests and to avoid any more violence. so that does certainly signal that this was a targeted event. will, i want to ask you just one more question, and i know you touched on "the buzz" on perhaps any warnings on social media, people gathering together, perhaps a call for did that escalate perhaps even last night into this morning, was there any indication that this was an orchestrated event that you could have seen the footprints of online? >> reporter: no, not at all. and in the wake of cameron

sterling, alton sterling's son, asking people to keep peaceful, it has been very, very calm here for the past couple of days, so much that we were in downtown baton rouge last night having dinner, talking to a couple of people who work down there, and they said last weekend was night and day compared to this past weekend, where they said they weren't even allowed to go into work last weekend because all the protests, you had nearly 200 people who were arrested here last weekend. there has not been a single protest here in the past couple of days. alton sterling was buried on friday. jesse jackson, al sharpton came into town. everybody really had a strong message of staying peaceful. we have not seen any protests at all. so this is really something that came out of the blue here this morning in baton rouge. >> all right, will carr, reporting live. will, please keep us updated if you learn any details, thank you

so much for joining us. >> reporter: absolutely. >> it appears the scene here near the baton rouge police department where the four officers were shot, airline highway and interstate 12, one of the major interstates, that goes through baton rouge there. we'll bring in howard kurtz, martha maccallum in cleveland. you have to think, guys, the issue of police violence and police targeting that appears to have happened here is now going to be center stage. we saw that from donald trump yesterday, and perhaps center stage in the coming weeks there where you are at the rnc. >> i was even questioning whether the awful ambush of five police officers in dallas was going to change the tone of this convention. i think that it is impossible to believe that anybody with a blue uniform and a badge now is not in some sense a target, without being alarmist about it, in every community in america. and of course it's going to affect the political dialogue in cleveland. martha maccallum, you and i have

been through too many of these things. it is important to remind our viewers that we have no information on who the shooter is, what the motivation may be other than obviously did not like police officers, or whether it is somebody who was radicalized by isis or some other terrorist group. >> that's just the issue here, we have so many multiple forms of threats happening at home and around the world. and i remember in past conventions, you know, since 9/11, there were concerns that extremists would try to cause trouble here at home. but now you have a situation where the people who are supposed to be protecting the convention center are themselves watching their brothers in blue be shot in various locations around the country. so, you know, where the threat is coming from becomes this sort of mysterious question that has to be dealt with by law enforcement on the ground. i mean, this scene unfolding in baton rouge this morning, and we know that two police officers who left their families to go to

work this morning or perhaps overnight last night are not going to make it home today, and this is the reality that we see ourselves living in here. on my way here from our hotel, there are literally thousands of police officers who are around this city, who are preparing for this convention, riding motorcycles, riding bicycles, riding horses, and doing their best to protect this city. and they have to be nervous as they head to work, howie. >> that's a great point. i was thinking, are we going to get through a four-day political convention without more of this kind of violence? the focus in cleveland has been on thousands of protesters here, will that get out of control. if you're donald trump, even if you're hillary clinton, who is going to sort of out of the news this week as she prepares for her convention in philadelphia next week, you have to deal with this. this is what everyone in america is going to be talking about. once again, the heartbreaking

nature of police officers whose job it is to protect our communities, to protect us, being slain in the line of duty, i could see that rising to the top of the political and national and media debate right now. >> howard, one of the people who is going to speak at this convention is officer clark of milwaukee. he's been incredibly outspoken about how strongly he feels. he is a black police chief, as everybody who watches us knows, he's been so outspoken against the black lives matter movement, and he will be speaking at the convention. we know that donald trump has called himself the law and order candidate. expect a very big presence of men in blue and people sticking up for law enforcement at this convention. it's going to be i think one of the major themes that we see here. >> we are all reeling, here it is, it's happened again, more police officers killed in the line of duty. is there a danger because there is a republican convention, it would be the same thing if it

happened next week at the democratic convention, a partisan environment, it will be or be perceived to be politicized? >> i don't think so, because the groundwork has already been well-laid for that as a major tenet of the trump campaign, that they want to stick up for law enforcement. you've seen donald trump over the past several months, really, traveling across the country, making appearances with law enforcement officers. we know it all stems really back to the borders issue, he stuck up for the border patrol. people who are in the position of law enforcement, whether they be border officials or men in blue, and we see this tragic situation unfolding in baton rouge, louisiana, continues to just build the narrative that i think he's already laid out for quite some time. >> one thing is clear, not to reduce this to politics, but we now have a very different environment for this convention, a very super charged political story line, as we all are reacting, as americans, and we don't have all the information, we only have confirmed, sadly,

that two police officers have died from their wounds. we believe the situation is contained. and this is going to change both conventions, i believe, as we try to get more information about the shooter, about the motivations, about any potential radicalization by islamic terror groups, and also whether or not -- how this will play out for all of us as the country once again is grieving over this terrible news on a sunday morning. let's go back to washington and our colleagues there. >> howie, we've been doing a little bit of research here as you all were talking. police officers now go to work every day not only knowing they could get in a violent confrontation with a suspect or get in a car crash as they're rushing to a seen, but they kiss their families goodbye and now realize they are truly targets themselves. if you take a look at the numbers in 2016, the number of officers shot and killed, we're now at 29 officers, just here in

the middle of july. to put that number in context, shot and killed in the line of duty in 2015, in the entire year of 2015, 33 officers. the middle of summer, and we're at 29. and we realize now for the first time we're hearing the amount of vitriol and rhetoric about police officers. and it's sort of -- it's morphed from what we saw even a year ago about, we don't like police officers, or police officers are doing this or that that folks find unseemly or unsightly, to now advocating violence against police officers. >> advocating murder, and advocating -- and we're also seeing folks who are not even on the fringe of the social spectrum, not necessarily advocating murder, but also being willing to say, well, it's understandable that it might happen. it's a whole new world we're bringing in. >> i want to bring john

matthews, executive director of community safety institute, a former dallas police department employee. john, thank you so much for joining us. we have talked really, it's unfortunate, the last time we talked, we were discussing the fallout and what happened in dallas. and i want to get your reaction, because we heard from our will carr, there really was no warning on social media. these police officers are left completely defenseless. and i want to get initially, just get your reaction to the news that we're hearing this morning out of baton rouge. >> it certainly seems like an ambush-style attack like we saw in dallas just over a week ago. the police community is really reeling at this point, us in law enforcement, we just buried the last of five officers yesterday here in dallas. now this morning we have another horrific event like this. i can tell you that firearms-related deaths are up 56%. and ambush attacks are up

dramatically. and both of those concern us nationwide. >> i want to let our viewers know, we'll be showing some new video, it's not live, it's video outside of one of the hospitals in baton rouge where you can see the cops, they're hugging each other, they're there for each other, holding each other. john, i want to ask you, you know, how the community came together after dallas to really -- to get stronger after an incident like this. >> i tell you, i thought it was absolutely fantastic. citizens were coming up and hugging them and taking pictures. at the makeshift memo orrial, you saw all races, all creeds, sitting and talking with officers from all races and creeds.

>> john, i want to interrupt you one second. as we're watching these pictures that elizabeth pointed out from the hospital. the same television station, wafb, the cbs affiliate there in baton rouge, we can see sort of the overwhelming emotion that folks are feeling as they're getting this news, conceivably about their friends and their loved ones who may be in that hospital, from wafb, they now say two police officers, baton rouge police officers are dead. they're now saying seven have been shot. we don't know if it's seven plus the two or seven in total. that would be five wounded police officers. but when you hear that, you have to think that this is something very different than a traffic stop gone bad. >> yeah, usually you're not going to have that many officers in one spot. it would be two circumstances, usually. a call where multiple officers are dispatched to a scene, where you're going to have three or four responding officers, or an

attack on officers where other officers were coming to assist, just like happened last week in dallas. you can certainly see, i'm watching the images in front of us, and the officers at the hospital are visibly shaken. i mean, this is horrific. now we have targets on our backs. >> that seems to be very clear, targets on your back not only in terms of individuals carrying out horrific acts of violence, but also, john, in terms of the communities here, and even some community activists talking about violence against police officers. bringing in will carr now, the violence has continued and the anger towards police officers has continued. will, did you defeat that feeling that things are contained or are police officers still moving around in the way that they would if a cop killer was on the loose? >> reporter: yeah, things have calmed down a lot, just in the past couple of minutes, leland.

you can see, we're actually on airline highway here. i would say we're about half a mile from where this shooting took place. and to set this up for you, this is about seven miles away from the triple s convenience store where alton sterling was shot and killed on july 5th. in the wake of that shooting, there were protests across this city. last weekend, nearly 200 people arrested in those protests. but since then, it's really been quite calm, all across this area. alton sterling's son cameron, 15 years old, came out and made a plea to the public to stay away from violence, stay away from drugs and alcohol. he did say, if anybody wanted to peacefully protest, that would be all right, but he pleaded for no violence. so that led up to this weekend. it has been quite calm all throughout baton rouge. i mentioned a couple of minutes ago, leland, that we were talking to some people who worked downtown last night. they tell us that last weekend

they weren't even allowed to go to their jobs. pretty much all of downtown baton rouge shut down because there was a concern over the protest and potential the violence. this weekend there's a lot of people going to dinner, only to wake up mere around 9:00 a.m. where you had this shooting where now you have multiple officers shot. >> a number of reports at least seven officers shot and two officers killed. you talked about what alton sterling's family was saying about asking for a peaceful protest. there have been a lot of agitators. they have been anything but peaceful calling police we can't say on television. i'm wondering, what's the balance between these calls for violence and anger for police

versus these very reasonable calls you might say for a calm and peaceful protest? >> and you're definitely right about that. when we have been talking to law enforcement they say the real agitators are not from baton rouge. they have come from elsewhere to try to stir up some chaotic potential situations here. it goes to note too that last weekend, on saturday night, there's a pawnshop, probably a couple of miles from where we are right now. they said that four men actually tried to break into that pawnshop. they stole eight handguns and one was arrested when he was trying to run away. he said it was his intent to shoot officer throughout the area. it has been quite calm but officers have been on guard for a potential threat especially

after dallas and the officers shot and killed there. members of law enforcement here really taking no chances. now you can see the scene that is playing out this morning in baton rouge, leland. >> as you have been in baton rouge about a week, do you have any ideas, have the police been take any extra precaution or talked to you in light of these pawnshop robbery? did they have a plan for them to be used against them? >> yeah. you'll have officers racing up the scene and coming up behind me. for the most part it's fairly calm out there. officers have definitely been on guard all week with potential threat for dallas and protests. this is a volatile situation. when we talked to people who live mehere they want to make se

it doesn't turn into a ferguson or baltimore-type situation. we asked them if they were teaming up pairing. when they were patrolling they didn't want to elaborate but they have been quite aware there was a threat against police officers here in louisiana. obviously we saw that play out this morning. >> i know we have another guest we want to get to. i want to bring viewers up to speed who haven't seen the news this morning. is there any indication? it is not clear as to a time line of this morning? any incidents leading up to this ambush? >> reporter: yeah, i'm right here. >> can you hear me? >> reporter: yeah. >> i will just ask you one more

time if you can hear me. >> reporter: can you repeat that question. >> absolutely. our viewers, some are just tuning in and getting reports seven officers may have been shot. do you have any information of events leading up to this particular incident? >> reporter: no. there absolutely was not. it has been quite calm throughout the course of the weekend and even before that. on friday you'll recall alton sterling was buried here. there have been calls for f protests after that. his 15-year-old son coming out and leading to the public to stay peaceful. there has been very bad weather in the area, probably the past four or five days, severe thunderstorms every afternoon. it dampened any potential protests. there were signs leading up to this that this could

potentially happen outside of the threat we have been talking ability but officers have been quite aware of in terms of protest and violence leading up to this. we haven't seen anything in the past couple of days. >> thank you so much. we'll keep our viers postewers . thank you so much for joining us. you're getting the news this morning. first and foremost i want to get the reaction and ask you from a law enforcement standpoint, in the past couple of months, in the heat of the summer what are all law enforcement doing to try to be aware of any indications or any signals that events like this could happen? >> there are a couple of things. they are beefing up the apparatus. they are sitting on a number of different task forces and

federal agencies and getting information in live time. that's critical. these kind of attacks, these small weapons and tactical assaults on police officers are very hard to stop. secondly, one of the other things, the boots on the ground level they are doing, a lot of them are abandoning the idea of solo patrol. it is a policing type activity but it's a terrible ychlidea. you're seeing it on the defensive and reactive end as well. >> and we heard that three officers are confirmed dead. that's the mayor's office. what does that tell you? is that any indication there could be maybe more than one person involved? >> yeah, multiple officers are dead, down and injured. one of the thing that jumped out of the way, most of them had

bullet resistant vests on, not that you couldn't just take a god forbid a head shot as well. it seems to be a straight up assault. it doesn't seem to be any other way. it is really dispurr bing and it speaks to the evidence about what the motive was. i won't thing we can argue that reasonable people could all agree that the climate is not helping right now especially with a presidential election.

>> a few things to note here. three of these officers have been confirmed dead, a possibility of up to seven shot. we don't know if it's three officers shot and killed or shot and wounded. we are looking live at the scene near to baton rouge police department. in light of that, how much is policing going to have change? how is the calculus going to change on foot, out in the communities, trying not to be as militarized as they were but if they are attacked with slugs in bullet proof vests. >> yes. it requires a complete reevaluation of that. i had to reevaluate my position

on that. we can't put people out there with equipment that is not going to protect them. it doesn't mean we have to militarize our police departments but we definite will be evaluated. >> right. thank you so much for joining us. we really appreciate it. we'll keep our viewers updated. we'll be passing it onto our colleague in cleveland. she will be joining us at the top of the hour. >> you think about this as we sit here and you're sort of going through the amount of news and information coming in and you look at that scene, there were three police officers that gave him a kiss. it was a sunday morning. things calmed down a little bit in baton rouge, louisiana. they left their families and now they are not coming home. >> not only are they not coming home but the surviving members of alton sterling's family has

called for peace. >> it may not be predictable but law enforcement around the country continuing as this sunday coverage continues. breaking news now as the police shootings in baton rouge, louisiana. i want to bring you up to speed. at least four officers have been shot. fox news confirmed two of them died. the shootings happening less than a mile away from police he headquarters. we are live in baton rouge, louisiana. let's go to him to find out bla what's happening from louisiana. we have getting several police officers shot and the numrs