good evening. welcome to kqed newsroom. today the fbi announced it's investigating the san bernardino massacre as an act of terrorism. law enforcement agents said the suspects had been in telephone contact with other possible terror suspects in the united states. a facebook official confirmed to the associated press that malik pledged a pledge to isis. agents completed a search of the suspects' home yesterday. today the landlord allowed reporters in to see the location where investigators found an arsenal of ammunition and homemade bombs. a news agency affiliated with the islamic state describes the

couple as, quote, supporters of the group but did not claim responsibility for the attack. joining me now to discuss the developments is congressman eric swa swalwell. welcome. >> thank you. >> from what you have been told, is this an isis inspired attack? >> i've been briefed twice on this. when you look at the travel of the couple, when you look at the contact they had with suspected terrorists, when you look at the arsenal of weapons they had and the fact that a message of support to isis was posted before the attack, all of the arrows point to terrorism. >> this couple was not on a watch list or on the radar of law enforcement. what does this say about the government's ability to track down these types of people and prevent such attacks in the u.s.? >> it's concerning. when you look at the paris attacks, those individuals were on the french government's watch list. here, however, it shows that isis is so influential these

days that they don't even have to order attacks. their success is inspiring them. >> so they -- these are home grown terrorists who are not only consuming propaganda but deciding to act on it. >> these are individuals who have been self-radicalized. the self-radicalization process can happen in a matter of weeks. the fbi is doing everything they can to go back into the lives of these individuals, find out their travel patterns, find out their patterns of life and learn when it happened and who else could be in the united states that they were related to. >> farook appears to be a law abiding citizen. malik had passed security background checks to gain a green card to reside legally in this country. given all of that, given the normalcy, the apparent normalcy of all that, is it possible to prevent such attacks? >> it's concerning. farook had a baby shower at his office not too long ago. there's nothing more just normal

than somebody who has a baby shower. so if someone like that could pull off an attack like this, certainly we have to wonder who else is out there plotting. this, again, just goes to show that until we take out the nerve center that isis has in syria and iraq, they will dispatch not only attacks that they order but through their propaganda inspire people that we don't know about yet. >> how do we take out those nerve centers? >> this is going to take american leadership. unlike anything we have seen since world war ii. which means putting to the a coalition of western countries, of islamic countries and even countries that we may not have ever thought we would be working with, like russia. back in 1939, you never would have thought that the united states and russia would team up to fight germany. they had a non-aggression pact with germany at that time. instead, we became allies with them and defeated nazi germany and japan. today we need to look at what countries have the interests that we share in defeating isis

and taking away that central node they have in the middle east. >> what about here on domestic front? what more needs to be done in congress via legislation to address this? >> whether it's a group that is carrying out an attack because they're inspired by religion or because they're carrying out an attack inspired by a political agenda like with the planned parenthood attack a week ago, too many dangerous individuals in this country have access to too many dangerous weapons. we need to ban assault weapons once and for all in this country. we need to make sure that if you are on a terror watch list, then we should conduct a background check to see if you are too dangerous to own a firearm. >> more than 2,000 people on the terror watch list have been able to buy firearms legally. >> that's concerning. it was a sad night in america last night when the u.s. senate almost every republican member and one democratic member voted to prevent us from having background checks on people who are on the terror watch list. would you think that would be the simplest group qwe could

agree on having a background check. >> want to ask you about president obama. he has said that the country is safe, don't worry, go enjoy your holiday season. given what we know now and given today's declaration that this is a terror investigation, a terrorism investigation, does the white house needed to be sending a more cautious message? >> we can't live in fear. where we are not powerless. it's a combination of showing american leadership with our countries who we can put together this coalition to go after isis. but right now, isis is more coordinated than we are. also, making sure that the weapons that these terrorists are able to access, making sure they are no longer as accessible as they are. we are never going to stop every gun violence death in the country. it's going to be something that will continue to happen. we can greatly reduce the amount of deaths by gun violence if congress stops having moments of silence and starts having

moments of action to do something about the gun culture in america. >> law enforcement authorities have long warned of lone wolf attacks. but this seems to be different. before this week, farook and malik seemed like any normal couple. young, new baby, law abiding. how does this change your understanding of how we need to combat terrorism? >> the old model of looking for plotting among people who are greatly dedicated to a cause, like we saw with al qaeda, that has evolved. now we are seeing that terrorist groups like isis from abroad through their propaganda and messaging can inspire people who are carrying out everyday lives. as i said, are having baby showers. what we need to do is make sure people are vigilantly looking at clues of self-radicalization, looking at what their friends are posting on social media. wondering, is this person dangerously close to taking on an action like we saw two days

ago in san bernardino? >> quickly, in the short-term, the house intelligence committee, are you going to do anything related to the attacks in terms of legislation and propos proposals? >> before we leave for the break, there has been talk on reforming the visa waiver program. there are dozens of countries in western europe where u.s. citizens can travel there without a visa and those folks can travel here. making sure that those countries are sharing intelligence about suspected terrorists with us to protect us here at home is at the top of all of our minds. there might be action on that. >> all right. thank you for being here today. >> thank you. law enforcement officials say the weapons used in the san bernardino massacre were purchased legally. but they say that someone other than the two suspects purchased the two assault rifles. that person has not been identified or charged. the incident in san bernardino was the worst mass shooting in the united states this year. 14 people were killed, another 21 were injured.

most of the victims worked for san bernardino county. the shootings have amplified calls for tighter restrictions on gun purchases. as you just heard, there's strong resistance in congress to changing existing laws. a stanford law professor has been studying gun policy. he joins me now. >> good to be here. >> according to research, what kinds of gun policies reduce gun violence? >> well, there are a number of things that could be effective in this arena. one thing that federal law has try doto do is keep guns away fm felons and those with serious mental illness. it's hard to achieve that without having universal background checks. that's one policy that president obama has been pushing for. congress has been reluctant to move in that direction. >> how effective are background checks? >> well, everything depends on how universal a particular measure is. because the narrower the focus

of the control, the easier it is for individuals to skirt the control. right now in california, we have universal background chebcks. nevada and arizona, do not. it's very easy for someone to buy a gun there and just drive it over the border. if you can get to a more universal approach, that has an obvious benefit. >> so do you think that's where the loophole was? california has the strictest gun control laws in the country. and yet, the suspects in this case got their guns legally. >> yes. well, of course, you can't make gun policy based on just one single case. what we do is we look across the whole statistical field of data. you get the sense that there are some policies that will hopefully curtail violence. you are never going to be able to stop all shootings and all violence. but sensible measures i think can reduce gun violence in reasonable ways.

>> are there measures that congress could take now that would have a real impact on public safety? >> well, i mean, it's unfortunate we had an assault weapon ban in place in this country from 1994 to 2004. probably thins wouleably things today if the law was maintained. it's hard to move back in that direction given the current composition of congress where there's a fair amount of on decision to an assault weapon ban. but i do think this is a battle that will go forward and we will see universal background checks at some point. at some point, if the continued trend we see a growing number of these active shooters scenarios, as that grows, at some point i think we're going to re-visit the assault weapon ban and limitation on high capacity magazines. >> we have an instance this week, despite this latest rampage, we heard the

congressman talk about the vote that happened on thursday when the senate voted down a measure that would have made it harder for suspected terrarrorists to firearms. are there any portions of gun control where agreement could be reached in washington next year? >> a lot will depend on what the public is willing to do. there's overwhelming approval for things like universal background checks, limitation on high capacity magazines and so forth. but the public has not been willing to express that in their votes for politicians. when that pref epreference is h the politicians will listen, i think. >> we have -- new york's former mayor, michael bloomberg, he launched a new candidate. what are the prospects of those

things passing and making a real difference? do you think that this massacre could be the tipping point? because we heard the same cries after sandy hook. schoolchildren were killed. this has got to be the final cry where people say, we need some really comprehensive gun control. it never happened. >> it hasn't happened yet. i do think we're on a trend according to recent fbi data that the number of active shootings are growing at an increasing rate. and so at some point, i think the pressure for congress to do something in this arena will rise. >> at what point would that happen, do you think? >> obviously, we're not there yet. but as you mentioned, at some point somebody -- some terrorist on the terror watch list is going to shoot up a public arena. there will be a lot of anger at the politicians who have resisted making that a

prohibited purchaser. there really is no plausible rational for allowing terrorists on a terror watch list to buy guns. currently, nra opposition and congress is enough to forestall that action. >> in fact, the nra and many gun owners in fact even the lawyer for mr. farook's family say it's important to protect the second amendment, the right to bear arms. what does current law say about limiting the ownership of guns and ammunition? >> this is something that's being worked out in the courts. some people think that there should be no restrictions on whatever type of gun you want to own. but the courts are consistently giving a message that reasonable restrictions on the type of weapon and the power of weapon and the number of bullets that are allowed in a capacity

magazine are reasonable measures. and i think the supreme court will endorse those measures as these cases percolate up to the supreme court. the first thing we have to do is figure out what are the best measures. and then try to get the public to encourage the politicians to follow their lead. >> all right. thank you so much for joining us, professor. >> thank you. good to be with you. the san francisco police department is facing intense scrutiny following an officer-involved shooting on wednesday. at least three witnesses captured the incident on their cell phone cameras. in one video, you can see several officers with their weapons aimed at the 26-year-old man who police say was carrying a knife. >> oh, my god! >> kqed's alex ensley has been following the investigation.

thanks for joining me. very troubling to watch. what led up to this shooting? >> the police say that there was a stabbing victim who showed up at san francisco general hospital about an hour before that tape that you see there. who reported that a person gave a description had stabbed him in the shoulder a few blocks away from where this video was shot. police searched for that suspect. were about to give up, actually. they couldn't find him. two officers found him and then he had a knife, police say. that led up to the incident on video. sg >> the person in the video is mario woods. he died. what can you tell us about him? >> he has a criminal record. he was named in a gang injunction the city brought in late -- initially in 2007 and updated when he was named was in

2009. they say that he was part of the o oakdale mob gang and was validated in that way. if you know something about gang validation, those are often questioned and were questioned by family members and friends of mario woods at a vigil last night. he was never a gang member they say. he was seen hanging out with people who the police say were gang members. >> so he has a criminal record. he was known to law enforcement. many people though who see this video -- it has been seen by quite a lot of people on social media. they will say, regardless of his conviction history and his troubled past, was that justified force? what kind of investigations are going on right now? >> there's several. but they're all sort of under the auspices of the city and county of san francisco. the medical examiner is doing an autopsy. san francisco police are doing a criminal investigation into just the incident in general. they will also eventually do an internal affairs investigation.

which is just regular -- i'm sorry, is just -- >> it's protocol? >> yeah. >> at least five officers have been placed on administrative leave? >> that's protocol as well for ten days minimum. all of the officers who fired in this incident will be on -- administratively reassigned they say. not necessarily on leave. they have a lot of tasks that they have to complete in this time, including a criminal interview where investigators will talk to them about this incident. >> there have been community protests about this. a number of people upset. what is san francisco's police chief saying about it? >> well, i think that he is allowing the legal process to play out while also explaining sort of protocol around use of deadly force by police when they are faced with a suspect who according to police is armed with a knife. >> in this case, they had used -- they had used pepper

spray, beanbags prior to the shots being fired. >> that's true, yes. they call those less lethal types of force that they used. again, according to police, to try to get the suspect -- mr. woods to drop the knife. san francisco police aren't armed with tasers. according to police officers i have spoken to on background since this incident they say this is another incident that shows why we need tasers. that has been controversial in san francisco. people against tasers don't want police to use them as a compliance device they say to enforce punishment on people. >> this is the san francisco police department's sixth officer involved shooting so far this year. has the chief made any changes to department policy or to training to try to reduce such a shooting? >> i think that he has. not necessarily this year, but a little bit before. a little bit in the past he put out a bulletin that i think has something to do with this case

especially because there was an instruction that went out over the radio to officers responding to the scene referencing this department bulletin. it's called create time, distance and rapport. when a suspect is not a danger to anyone else, officers have been instructed to step back and allow for some amount of deescalation. specifically in response to a high percentage of shootings of people with a mental illness. really all over the country but in san francisco as well. but once a suspect starts to present a danger to officers on the scene or to the general public, then the time, distance and rapport thing is overruled by public safety. >> and the chief has made the contention that the officer felt like his life was in danger here and that he was in the path of danger. >> that is what i understand from the chief's comments as well, yeah. but i think he will let the process play out. >> by coincidence, the same day

the commission voted on a new policy for body cameras worn by officers. at stake was whether they should be able to view videos before filing their incident report. what did the commission decide? >> right. the body camera policy is broad. that one little portion of it was a area of great contention. the commission made a compromise. they didn't say officers are never allowed to view footage after a shooting or a critical incident like this. they didn't say they are automatically allowed to either. what they said was the chief has to -- the chief of police or his or her designee has to make that call. what i hear from commissioners is that they're very interested to look back at this in about six months and see if officers are always allowed to view the footage when it's left up to the chief. >> an incident like this, would it have made a difference? would we have seen the incident from other angles and have more clarity on the situation?

>> i think -- yeah, i think the selling point or thing that people are looking forward to with body cameras in san francisco is that you get the police officer's perspective, as close as you can get with an electric device that's equipped somewhere on someone's body. >> more visual evidence, hopefully. >> yes. >> all right. alex, thank you. >> thank you. this week's big idea is called shock and kill. it's an approach that researchers at ucsf say could lead to a cure for hiv. on monday they received a $20 million grant from the foundation for aids research to test the approach. a doctor who has dedicated his career to ending hiv and aids is directing the research and he joins us now. thank you for joining us. >> great to be here. thank you. >> you have been researching and treating people infected with hiv for 34 years.

you have seen a lot of promises. some realize, some not. you have seen a lot of progress over the years. what is shock and kill? do you think it could lead to a cure? >> we sure hope it can lead to a cure. the idea is that in people with hiv who have been treated, with the drugs that we have, which are very good, there still is a certain amount of virus in the body hiding out in cells. we call that the reservoir of the virus. we want to find those cells, activate them so the body sees them and that the immune system brings them under control or that we might use other drugs to kill those cells. we want to shock the cells, wake them up, let them show they have hiv and then come in with other approaches to kill them off, to decrease the reservoir. >> what are the challenges in that? hiv hides in immune cells. it's like finding a needle in a haystack. >> it's a lot like finding a needle in a haystack.

the central problem is that it becomes part of your own dna. in these cells, that are infected, the dna of the person has the dna of the virus. it's lying there. we need to wake it up so that the body can see those cells. >> medications have come a long way. they have effectively blocked hiv enabling people to live pretty much normal lifespans now. those drugs are not considered a cure. why is that? >> the drugs we have are amazing. we have made incredible progress in controlling the virus. people can now live with their hiv infection taking as little as one pill per day. but when we stop the medicines, if we do, or if the person stops the medicines on his or her own, what we see is the virus comes back. so we know that the virus has been in the body despite the person being on treatment. that's the problem. we haven't been able to cure the

virus even though the drugs are really amazingly potent. >> so are there advances then in other diseases that you are now able to adapt and see if it works for hiv? cancer, for example. >> there's an exciting development going on in cancer where the immunology of cancer is now being manipulated to help the body recognize cancer cells and control them. we're hoping to use some of that same approach to try to cure hiv infection. but hiv has been a great model for other diseases. hepatitis c viruscurable. >> more than 35 million people are infected with hiv. are you confident that you can take the discoveries you make here and make them available to other countries, especially poorer countries, resource challenged countries? >> we do a lot of work in san

francisco abroad in resource limited countries, especially africa. they really need a cure. they need a cure probably more than we do. so one of the things that we're trying to do in this institute is come up with treatments like shock and kill that might be able to be developed in a very inexpensive form. that's part of our goal with this institute. >> prevention is still key to fighting hiv. what are we learning about effective prevention measures? >> what we have learned is that we have these amazing prevention measures in hand. the drugs we have now to treat hiv infection can be used to prevent hiv infection. the drugs can be used, if the person is being treated, we know the virus no longer is transmitted. we can stop almost all forms of transmission of hiv with the drugs we already have. now the approach is to find all the people that are infected -- that's something that san francisco's leading the way in

getting to zero. >> what make u.s you hopeful we closer to a cure more so now than ever. >> we haven't been very close in the past. now i think we have a combination of great drugs that are very potent, again very convenient and relatively non-toxic and technologies that allow us to look for the reservoir, look for the infected cells hiding in the body. and if we can combine those approaches and apply some of what we have learned about the immune control, the body's control of the virus, we think we can make progress. >> ten years from now, do you think you can say, we have found a cure for hiv? >> you know, the future is hard to predict. and i think we can promise that in five years we will have learned a lot in this effort. if we can then take that and apply it to actually treating people, i think it will take us

another five years to know if we're able to cure this virus. i think it's hopeful. >> this $20 million grant is a great way to get that going. thank you so much. >> great being here. that does it for our program for tonight. thanks for watching. for all of kqed's news coverage, go to kqednews.org.

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