the coast again. >> then going back up again. >> sure. gradually. on the broadcast tonight, under surveillance. as we learn more about just how much the government is tracking us, the president offers a strong defense. tonight the debate over privacy and security. americans weigh in. campus shooting. chaos at a california college as shots are fired. several people are hit. the latest on the breaking story. the job market. a jump in the number of americans finding work, but just what kind of jobs are they getting? and back on track. a jockey forced into retirement because of aching knees makes a thrilling comeback. at 50 he's now beating rivals almost half his age. "nightly news" begins now.

good evening, everybody. i'm ann curry in for brian tonight. as there are more developments about the revelations that our government is tapping phone records and gaining special access to e-mails and the internet. today the president defended the surveillance programs saying they are necessary to protect us from terrorism. and he added the internet surveillance program does not target americans. we begin tonight with our justice correspondent pete williams on what we now know. pete, good evening. >> reporter: ann, good evening to you. from the president on down, federal officials presented a united front in the past 24 hours. their message, we are not listening to your phone calls or reading your e-mails. in california for a summit with the chinese leader, president obama defended the two programs that exploded into public view as necessary trade-offs to defeat terrorists. >> you can't have 100% security and also then have 100% privacy and zero inconvenience.

>> reporter: intelligence officials revealed more about how the systems work. the program aimed at telephone records gathers logs of phone numbers dialled by u.s. phone customers and dumps them into an enormous database maintained by the nsa. but director of national intelligence james clapper says the government is prohibited from indiscriminately sifting through it. in other words officials say no data mining. >> nobody is listening to your telephone calls. >> reporter: the data is checked he says only when there is a specific phone number or pattern of calls associated with foreign terrorists. >> the only way to do that is if you have all the records in one place at that time. if you're looking for a needle in a haystack you need a haystack. >> reporter: the latest highly secret program to be revealed allows the nsa to plug into servers run by the biggest internet companies to monitor suspected terror communications. clapper says it is intended to

gather information about non-u.s. persons outside the united states. it cannot be used, he says, to target anyone located inside the u.s. and unlike the telephone program which vacuums up data on virtually every call made in the u.s., officials say the internet program taps into servers only to look at specific sites suspected of having a terrorism connection. but as shown in this powerpoint slide obtained by the washington post, that can take many forms including e-mail, chat, videos and photos. while president obama and members of both parties say congress was fully briefed on the programs, many are far from convinced that the government has the legal authority to gather up and store records of virtually every u.s. phone call. >> i'd like to know how the president feels that my cell phone calls and your cell phone calls are relevant to an investigation. what investigation? what act or threat? >> i welcome this debate. and i think it's healthy for our democracy. i think it's a sign of maturity.

probably five, six years ago we may not have been having this debate. >> reporter: some members of congress concerned about these programs say they will try to change the law to rein them in and civil liberties groups are talking about filing lawsuits. ann? thank you. with the news that their data is being tracked by the government americans weighed in on the controversy today. john yang has the story tonight. >> reporter: from chicago's michigan avenue -- >> it's getting scary. >> reporter: to fred's texas cafe in ft. worth. >> i completely honestly do not care. >> reporter: to downtown los angeles. >> i think the government is overreaching. >> reporter: people have plenty to say about the government's data collection fuelled by fresh disclosures that e-mails and internet activity could have been tracked. critics see it as a question of civil liberties and privacy. >> there should be some surveillance, but not like that. >> whoever we want to call, that's our business.

>> there's a balance between security and liberty. liberty seems to usually take it on the chin. >> reporter: on twitter today nsa was still trending. i think we have no freedom. george orwell come to life. others say it is a price they are willing to pay for preventing a terrorist attack. >> i would be glad if we stopped one terrorist. >> it doesn't bother me a lot. >> reporter: in an age of security cameras, speed cameras, and devices that leave digital trails, some say it's no surprise that all that information might get scooped up. even before the data collection was disclosed, a new allstate national journal poll found 85% of americans said it was likely their phone calls, e-mails and internet use was available to others, including the government, without their consent. >> facebook, twitter, myspace. there's going to be a point where we don't have privacy anymore. >> reporter: on twitter, i already thought had been

happening since 9/11. i've nothing to hide. some used it for a laugh. i wish the nsa would show my phone records to my mom. i call plenty. finding humor in a serious issue that's rekindling the long simmering debate over privacy versus security. john yang, nbc news, chicago. we are also following a chaotic and unfolding story in southern california tonight. a multiple shooting at a college campus. it happened in santa monica and nbc's mark potter is there for us. mark, good evening. >> reporter: good evening, ann. good evening to you. you can hear the police helicopters overhead. this is still unfolding. it appears this was an incident involving a single gunman at three separate locations. it began in a neighborhood and moved to this college campus. police say seven were killed including the shooter and his six victims. >> oh, my god. >> reporter: police say the incident began shortly before noon pacific time at a home near the santa monica college. the home enveloped in flames.

authorities say two people were found dead inside the house and a woman was wounded in a car outside. eyewitnesses say police chased a car from that scene to an intersection at the campus where a person dressed in black carrying an assault rifle got out of the car and began opening fire. >> everyone threw themselves on the floor, screamed. he started to shoot from the front of the bus to the back of the bus. >> reporter: after shooting at a red suv and wounding the driver who crashed into a brick wall, eyewitnesses say the gunman then headed toward the campus library on foot. >> santa monica college they have an active shooter in a library with an automatic weapon. >> reporter: students hunkered down and some ran away as the school was put on lockdown. students described a chaotic scene and told of hearing shots and seeing a husky male dressed all in black carrying an assault rifle or a shotgun. >> as soon as we opened the door it was automatic. bang, bang, bang. three bangs. >> reporter: outside the secure

>> reporter: some of the students found safety inside the library. police found the suspect as he continued to shoot at those taking cover. >> the officers came in and directly engaged the suspect e. he was shot and killed on the scene. >> reporter: three miles away president obama was attending a fu fundraiser, but the secret service say he was never in danger and they were treating this as a local incident. so as not to interfere with the police investigation the president did change his travel plans going by motorcade instead of by helicopter to avoid all the police choppers still in the sky over the crime scene. ann? >> all right. mark potter, thank you so much. in cleveland, the man accused of kidnapping three women and holding them captive in his home for a decade was indicted today. ariel castro was charged with 329 counts, most for rape and kidnapping. he faces a count of aggravated murder for allegedly causing the

termination of a pregnancy. more charges could be filed at a later time. in texas, a new twist in the case of the tainted letters -- letters tainted with ricin sent to president obama and new york mayor michael bloomberg. shannon guest richardson, a pregnant actress who had small parts in "the vampire diaries" and "the walking dead" was charged today with sending those letters. fbi searched her house after she she first implicated her husband in the case. lots of people on the east coast are feeling the effects of what was tropical storm andrea as it makes its way north. weather channel meteorologist chris warren is keeping an eye on it for us. hey, chris, good evening. >> good evening, ann. it's flash flooding that's quickly becoming a major problem on the east coast, including new york, especially on long island. let's take a look at the storm as it is moving quickly up the i-95 corridor. flooding will remain a major issue this evening and into

tomorrow morning. flooding from rivers, creeks and streams. also it's the flash flooding. heavy rain coming down in a hurry. getting reports of submerged cars up and down parts of the east coast with thrain. we are looking at quite a bit of rain from andrea. three to five inches of rain will be a possibility in a matter of hours. some areas could see more than six inches of rain. this will move out quickly though. it will be a big hit causing travel issues on the road and through the air. tomorrow decisions will improve up and down the east coast. >> chris warren. thank you so much tonight. we turn to the economy and a cautious report on jobs today. the government reported 175,000 jobs were added last month. that's considered steady growth and about what analysts expected. the unemployment rate edged up to 7.6% because more people started to look for work again. wall street reacted positively. the dow gained 207 points. the nasdaq and the s&p were up as well.

for more we are joined tonight by cnbc's kelly evans. put the jobs numbers in perspective for us tonight. >> we can think of them as barista jobs. if you look at the composition and where we saw the gains last month, a lot of them happened at food and drinking places, in retail, and at leisure and hospitality. as the good sign to overall see 175,000, but we are talking about some of the lowest paying jobs and jobs that are often part-time jobs. that's consistent if you look through the details of the report. a lot of people said, yeah, they found a job but it was part-time because they couldn't find full-time work. so even though we like the trend here, part of the reason we saw the rally on wall street today is because there is still this bad news is good news mentality. it's not good enough that the federal reserve will step back. >> kelly evans, thank you so much for reporting tonight on this. >> sure. >> an update on the building collapse in philadelphia that killed six people and injured 13

others. nbc station wcae quoted law enforcement as saying the operator of a backhoe had marijuana and prescription painkillers in his blood hours after the accident. the building was being demolished when it collapsed. in southern california, richard ramirez, the serial killer known as the night stalker is dead. the california department of corrections said he died of natural causes today in a hospital after spending more than two decades on death row. he earned the nickname night stalker for a long string of killings and sexual assaults in southern california in the mid 1980s. in 1989, ramirez was convicted of 13 murders. today, the united nations made the biggest appeal in its history, calling for more than $5 billion to help the people of syria. the u.n. projects as many as ten million people, that's half of syria's population, could be in need of humanitarian aid by the end of the year and called the

syrian conflict, quote, the most dangerous crisis since the end of the cold war. when "nightly news" continues on this friday evening, high stakes at a low key summit with two super power presidents. and what about the talk about the first lady. later, getting back on track. at 50, love isn't the only thing that's better the second time around.

president obama is in california tonight for a meeting with his chinese counterpart xi jinping who took office just last november. the men had a lot to talk about and they are dispensing with some of the usual formalities. part of the focus has been on their wives. one of them is there. the other is not. our report from chief foreign affairs correspondent andrea mitchell. >> reporter: the white house hopes this is a different kind of chinese leader. relaxed, self-confident enough

to agree to an unscripted two-day summit. not the usual stilted state visit at the white house. unlike other chinese leaders, president xi is even bringing his wife. peng is a celebrity in her own right. a glamorous singer with a hard line past. china purged this picture from the internet of her in uniform singing for the troops after the crack down at tiananmen in 1989. the goal, getting to know one another. the setting relaxed. sunnylands, a luxurious estate in rancho mirage, california, built by the late billionaire walter anenberg and his wife lenore. this is no rustic camp david. 12 manmade lakes in the desert. a golf course, priceless art including chinese artifacts spanning 13 centuries. once a storied winter retreat for ronald reagan and his friends. but it won't be a double date. but michelle obama is staying home to finish the school year with the girls although some in china see that as a snub. >> i do think it's potentially a missed opportunity. here you have two powerful women.

peng is seen by many as an empowering figure. likewise michelle obama here. >> reporter: the president will stay at sunnylands but xi is at this hyatt, reportedly worried about eavesdroppinging. >> today the biggest problem could be cyber and intellectual property theft which costs us roughly $300 billion per year. >> reporter: the president wants china to own up to cyberattacks coming from its territory including this military building in shanghai. though mr. obama's argument could be undercut about leaks about america's eaves dropping on foreigners. president xi is already being protested by demonstrators against china's crackdown on human rights. another sign that it will take a lot more than one weekend in a fairy tale setting to fix all that's wrong between the u.s. and china. andrea mitchell, nbc news, washington. when we come back, the new homeowners who found something extraordinary buried in their backyard.

a milestone today in the u.s. congress. john dingell became the longest serving member having served in the house of representatives 20,997 days. that's more than 57 years passing the late senator robert byrd of west virginia. the michigan democrat was elected in 1955 to replace his father. dingell is now 86. for the record he said he hasn't decided if he will run again. an update from london on the health of prince philip, husband of queen elizabeth. buckingham palace says the prince is progressing after exploratory abdominal surgery. no other details were provided. the 91-year-old prince is expected to be in the hospital for another two weeks. the queen continued with her schedule today, presiding over the opening of the bbc's new headquarters in london.

and for a time during a live television broadcast it was the queen who was at center stage as the presenters looked back at their unusual guest. cold war-era bomb shelters may be a thing of the past, but a california couple found one in the backyard of their newly bought home that is more of a window on the past. a perfectly preserved shelter from 1961, like something out of "mad men" 15 feet under ground with a pantry full of vintage products in all their original glory. the owners say they will preserve the shelter saying, quote, it should last forever. it's something travellers dread. a flight delay that leaves you stranded on the tarmac for hours with nothing to do. this delay turned into a concert. members of the philadelphia orchestra on tour in china broke out their instruments as they waited on the ground in beijing and treated their fellow passengers to a string quartet by dvorak. what a good idea.

up next, a thrilling comeback. a veteran of the track very much in the running for tomorrow's big race.

finally tonight when they run the belmont stakes tomorrow in new york, all eyes will be on oxbow and his jockey gary stevens. will they be able to pull off a repeat performance after winning the preakness? for stevens it would be a sweet victory. our story tonight from brian shactman. >> it's oxbow and gary stevens to win the preakness. >> coming in first last month gary stevens's experience served him well. at 50 his ninth victory in a triple crown race was four months after coming out of retirement. he beat jockeys who were still in grade school the first time he won the race. >> i didn't know whether i would be able to do it. one reason for the comeback was to see if i could. >> reporter: at new york's belmont park you can't blame stevens for being nostalgic this week. he first raced here in 1988 when he had a little bit more hair. >> so i just went into the racing office to get my badge. i hadn't been licensed here since 2005.

>> reporter: just a year ago he had a different credential as an analyst for nbc sports. >> kind of small, isn't he? >> reporter: he was finding success as an actor in "sea biscuit" and "luck." when that show was cancelled, stevens realized the knees that forced his retirement seven years ago felt good. >> i got the itch back. >> reporter: soon after deciding on a comeback he ran into legendary trainer d. wayne lucas who knew stevens was perfect to ride a horse like oxbow into the winner's circle. >> it's like you're an nfl quarterback. when the game's on the line you want the experienced guy making those decisions. same thing here. >> reporter: the tradition of horse racing and the prestige of the belmont stakes under scores that being a jockey is a tough job at any age. >> like going out and driving an indy car without a seat belt.

i tell people my knees are like retreads. they're good. you can go along at 70 miles per hour and then the rubber is on the side of the road. it just happens. i'm prepared for that. >> reporter: until it does, this living legend is back in the saddle and leading the pack. brian shactman, nbc news, belmont, new york. >> watch tomorrow on nbc sports network and the big race at 5:00 on this nbc station. that's our broadcast for this friday evening. i'm ann curry in for brian williams. for all of us here at nbc news, williams. for all of us here at nbc news, thank you and good night. -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com

good evening. i'm terry mcsweeney. >> and i'm janelle wang. police say a fight turned deadly inside a sporting goods store. george? >> reporter: janelle, this is the first homicide of the year in milipitas. now police are telling us a little before 11 clo:00 this mog

there was a fight inside the sporting goods section of the store. they confirmed a weapon was used to kill the victim but they will not say what kind of weapon. police are not releasing the age or name until the family has been notified and it's not known if the suspect and victim knew each other. they will be looking at surveillance video to see if it captured anything. here is what police are saying happened when they arrived on scene. >> we received a call from inside the sports authority about a fight involving a weapon. officer arrived on scene in about 13 seconds and was able to take the suspect into custody while still inside the store. >> reporter: now the sports authority release this had statement a short time ago saying, quote, we are assisting law enforcement in any way we can with their ongoing investigation and ask that any further questions be directed to the local authorities. that's the latest here from the great mall. nbc bay area news. george, thank you very much. we're following breaking news in southern california. it is a tragic situation right now in santa monica where police say seven people are dead including a gunman who opened fire today at santa monica community college. e