welcome back to msnbc. i'm richard lui in new york city at our world headquarters. we begin the hour following the breaking story this afternoon out of california. a fire breaking out at a two-story warehouse party. nine people dead. officials fear the number could climb to 40 potentially. >> there is no reason yet to suspect arson, however, you have to work these investigations at the worst-case scenario and then

downgrade from there. >> we're very much focused on identifying those who are still missing. locating those who have suffered a loss inside who are ceas. >> msnbc scott cohen is live on the scene in oakland for us. scott, what have you seen within the last hour of what they're doing? >> reporter: they are continuing now to go through the building and trying to essentially find the dead, and identify them. we do know now that this build hag a history, and it's a recent history. as late as november 14th, a housing habitability complaint filed with the oakland department of building and planning for what's called and illegal interior building structure and the day before, a ton of garbage piling up on the property. items left on the sidewalk. the change causes our neighborhood to look bad and creates a health issue. we don't know the status of

those complaints and investigations and don't know at this point whether that has anything to do with this devastating fire overnight that killed at least nine people. at this point, authorities say they are, as i said, trying to identify the victims, find out who exactly perished in this fire and underscore how griz sl this was, officials telling family members, don't go to the hospital. >> we did not have a lot of victims go to the hospital. it appears that people either made it out or they didn't make it out. there's not a lot of other injuries that have been reported to us at this time. >> reporter: again, nine people confirmed dead, but it could be many, many more. they say at least 25 people unaccounted for, and are preparing for as many as 40 bodies. we don't know and we certainly hope that it won't get to that point, but clearly, they have an operation set thaup will be going on here for a while. first the recovery operation and

then an investigation that is likely to go on quite some time. >> scott, you got new information for us this hour. 1:00 local time. about concerns about codes that potentially were not being met in many cases you do not know who reported this, and sometimes you do. do we know who has said there are these issues related to code in the area? number one. and then, number two, this also gives us sort of an indication of how that neighborhood is evolving. before potentially, a warehouse, those things might have been okay. now used as structure where you hold events. not okay. >> reporter: right. i mean, i think that that tells you a lot about what's the evolution of this neighborhood, what it's been. that was a warehouse structure turned into an artist colony. you know, we're all familiar with neighborhoods like that, in cities across the country. so some of that's going on. clearly a neighborhood in transition, and a building in

transition. again, in have been reports of makeshift stairways and structures inside. there was this -- this artist colony reportedly that was occupying this building. and where they were in terms of code compliance, of course, dwoent know. and that's one of the things that the authorities will be investigating. >> one of the points here that's -- i know there's more questions than answers here, scott, but you've been reporting for us that no fire alarms, sprinklers, something that at one point today, if you were to build such a structure, would be required, but there were none in there? >> reporter: right. no sprinklers. no fire alarms, and, again, that gives you a sense of sort of what we're looking at, and among the many things that the authorities are going to be looking at. so they've spelled out for us how this investigation is going to go. they're sort of flooding the zone here with federal, state and local authorities, including the bureau of alcohol, tobacco

and firearms because one of the things lay look at, somewhat as a matter of routine in an instance this size, whether arson was involved. as we were told in the lt press briefing it could be that. could be something as simple as cigarette. we just don't know. >> talking about a press briefing that happened within the last hour or two. it was mentioned that potentially we could have another one in an hour or two after that. what are you hearing and what came from the last one in a headline, if you could here, scott? >> reporter: well, in the last, the last press briefing they were finally just getting into the building, and as you can see behind me, if you've been watching in the last few hours, it's become a lot more organized. there are some tents that are set up there, which suggesting there may be bodies that will be coming out here at some point. the she yellow police tape replaced by metal railings as they get a little more, i guess sort of structure around all of this. they've told us they will be

briefing us every hour on the hour. the briefing for this hour has not begun yet, but we will work to get that to you and get any information from that, but as of about an hour ago they were really just getting inside. that's how bad this fire was. it was a fire that -- that blew up very fast, clearly, and it took a good 12 hours for it, for the hot spots to be extinguished enough investigators to get in and do their work. >> great stuff there, scott. i know you're watching that location for u.s. t us. increase and density of those responders on site and so many hoping for good news. of course, we have to be careful. we don't have all the information as of yet. again, oakland, california. nine confirmed dead. a concern it could be up to 40. scott, thank you. we'll stop by later on that. also, watching developments coming out of cambridge, massachusetts. a fire there has grown to ten alarnls. looking at pictures here.

i believe they're live. smoke can be seen billows from several miles away, where the shot is. 4:06 local time. officials saying flames sparked around an hour ago. they quickly spread to several structures. again, ten alarms. watching that one for you. now, we turn to a diplomatic fallout over a phone call between prid-elect donald trump and taiwan's newly elected president. china's foreign minister calling this a "little trick played by taiwan." their government issues a formal complaint with the united states. nbc's kelly o'donnell with the latest from the trump transition team. you've watched responses, not only from that initial tweet, excuse me, not only from that initial statement, but then also tweets thereafter. kelly, do we no if president-elect trump was aware of the sensitive along the way of this from the beginning and now to today? >> reporter: according to his top adviser, formerly campaign

manager kellyanne conway says the president is properly and fully briefed about the series of phone calls he's had with foreign leaders, dozens of them in the weeks since elected. there have been a few that present some diplomatic challenge, and many on the outside looking at this who say that the trump team or donald trump himself did not fully appreciate how significant this would be. a ten-minute phone call with the new president of taiwan, which is, of course, an island the united states, china and most of the world does not recognize as a sovereign state. china insists taiwan is a part of its own country even though it self-governs. that is thorny, difficult politics with a power like china which is not only an economic partner with the united states but we need china in terms of its force in asia to try to keep the nuclear power of north korea in check. there are a lot of pieces to this, and so a ten-minute phone call with this new president became a diplomatic kerfuffle

because the new president from taiwan released photos. that's to be seen on equal footing with the next american president. no call like this has happened in more than 30 years. and that is because the u.s. agrees to say to china, we will only acknowledge one china. we will have an informal economic relationship with taiwan, but not recognize the island as a country. this has far-reaching effects. now, defenders of donald trump say this was simply a congratulatory call. he wants to do things differently. to have conversations with leaders around the world, set a new tone. what is unclear is what ramification there's may be. so trump himself acknowledged this whole issue in two tweets. one saying the call came to him. not exaly true. and the other saying the u.s. sells military assets and weapons to taiwan. what's the big deal about a phone call? we'll have to see in the days and weeking to come. as you pointed out, richard,

china complained to the obama administration. there will be consequences. we just don't know how large or significant or if this is lasting at all. >> kelly o'donnell, thank you for that report. bringing in asia affairs expert and columnist gordon. you wrote an op-ed this morning. why donald trump's taiwan call changes everything. i got to tell you, when i lived there five, six years reporting out of asia, you would never see such a thing happen here. you say this could be good, though? >> well, it could be good. the reason is, that u.s. policy on taiwan is unsustainable. what we're doing is undermining a friendly, free society, and doing that to favor an authoritarian state attacking our values. from a strategic point of view, taiwan is crucial. it is the quacork in the bottle preventing the chinese air force and navy from reaching the western pacific. our policies haven't worked. not saying that trump's approach is going to work, but nonetheless, something's got to change.

>> when we look at north korea, china, that hasn't worked for western interests in the region. when you look at trade policy after the wto, also, criticisms would be okay. china, you said nobody's holding your feet to the fire? >> right. an important issue in the campaign, because you had trump talking about trade with china. secretary clinton talking about a trade enforcer she would put in place if elected. both were going to do something about this issue. and so -- >> hillary clinton would have done the same or something similar you're saying? >> trump basically is going after the trans-pacific partner shep, the proposed 12 nation free trade deal. >> tweeted, i don't think, she wouldn't have? saying? or take a call? >> no. she wouldn't have taken the call. essentially what happened, though, china would have pushed her, if she were president. essentially come out to the same place as trump would, but only after interagency discussion, and maybe a year and a half. because, really, china has been driving the united states,

pushing it in directions we don't want to go. >> similarities perhaps on the perspective of the china/u.s. relationship between the two former presidential candidates. this is a question i was sort of thinking of, because when you look what donald trump was annal able to do in u.s. politics. discussing it last hour. might he be able to do the same with international diplomacy? >> he's certainly going to mix things up. things will not be the same. i don't know if it's for the better or worse. the united states has a lot of cards to play with china, but the chinese have always had more political will. therefore, they've been able to get what they want. i'm not so sure trump for all of the blather is really at the point where he is stand toe to toe with the chinese. now, he has advisors actually quite good. nonetheless, a fascinating con test that will last for years. >> talk about diverse perspectives. wilbur ross, his nominee to be commerce secretary, is pro-china. and so when you put that

together with some of the words we're hearing coming out of donald trump. it's tough to know what might happen. >> also you have elaine chao a relationship with china that goes back quite some time. we don't know who the secretary of state is going to be. also, you know, donald trump has this very strange relationship with putin who is the best friends with china's ruler there. we don't know how this will play out. >> the issue, we're thinking, this was, this call happened. then we see tweets thereafter. the sensitivity, and i use this word, powder keg. i've talked about this, you and i, before. the countries around china are watching with some trepidation. china gets upset. there could be, as said before, arms race brought on, just because everybody's scared of what might happen? >> there already is this arms race. it could accelerate if relations between beijing and washington get worse. it looks like they're going to

do. this is a relationship really very fraichal for the last eight years. even the last 16 years and sort of held together by this consensus in washington that we need to have cooperative relations with china, but in the last four, five years things have gone downhill. it's not president obama's fault. it's what's happening inside china with very adverse developments inside the political system including the military becoming much more influential. they've pushed our country and our president basically and we don't have a lot of incentive. we don't have a lot of leverage in certain cases but nonetheless can move in better directions, but we do need have the commitment to do it and no political party has had it up to now. >> okay. we'll continue to watching that. the relationship between the united states and china. the united states largest loan officer, if you will, and a very important relationship. thank you so much. appreciate it, gordon chang, as always, for stopping by. joining us, vice president of communications at the bipartisan policy center assistant dean at george washington university. and a political reporter for

politico. start with you, robert. this idea of a new world order. this idea of the way trump has done domestically that he'll bring a flavor of this to international diplomacy. yeah? >> we don't know. you know, this could either be one big mistake or it could be one suggest consent milestone. we just simply don't know. and the reason we don't know is because we don't really know trump's foreign policy ideologically, for example, because he really hasn't articulated that over the past year and a half. i honestly think it was one big mistake. his stach, perhaps himself did not know the ramifications of taking the taiwanese president's call. the real question, where is the state department? the national security council? i assume particular president-elect there is a bureaucratic foreign policy staff surrounding you. when you take 9 calls, a translator is certified to recognize all of the things translated are in fact true,

secondly, talking points coming from the state department that would guide the president-elect either a., that did not happen or b. that did happen and the president-elect did not choose to read the tuking points. >> to the idea the state department brings up the idea gordon chang brought up and asking the question, who will be the next secretary of state? who will be that nominee, shane? republican leaders, not commenting on that call as well. the question is who are the voices internally that might be putting out their views on the way to talk about issues coming out of certain regions in the world, asia being one of them. politically, what's the approach that might be happening? that needs to happen, from leaders like potentially at this moment paul ryan? >> in terns of in a secretary of state question, this is very much up in the air and trump hasn't decided. there's going to be a key moment tomorrow when david petraeus goes on the sunday shows for television interviews. trump has done a lot of picking

of people based on how they appear on television. big questions on that. rudy giuliani remains in the running and mitt romney. as was said, it's fairly ill-defined back to 1987 when he wrote "the art of the deal." trump said all deals when you strike them, you need to be unpredictable's what taking a phone call from taiwan is. the problem with unpredictability, diplomacy is built upon a structure of applicability. who he would pick as secretary of state would say a lot about the type of foreign policy he wants to pursue. >> one of the pieces we're seeing is consistent with what he just did, that he wanted to get rid of these large trade deals. p, t-tip, no, no, no. basically what he's saying here. therefore, bilateral agreements. robert, the president-elect has, if you will, done that. i mean, he's had call it's with leaders of pakistan, kazakhstan, the philippines, raised a lot of eyebrows as well.

had a one-on-one with prime minister abe as well. what role do you think the current administration can play as he is beginning the, this bilateral approach to trade and policy relationships? >> well, i think -- you mean, obama administration? >> that's correct. >> yeah. doing a wait and see approach here. because candidly speaking maybe can use the president-elect to nudge through a couple more deals between now and january 20th? but look, go back to my earlier point. this well could be a watershed moment. we don't know. think about this. back in 1969, hypothetically if richard nixon called the chinese president back then, most people thought he would be mad. younsly a couple years later he did the breakthrough of china with that visit for first american president. so my point simply is that donald trump is unorthodox. no doubt about it. i think the obama administration is probably looking at him in dismay and also with a little envious because he's so unpredictable and so willing to

go up to the beehive and hit it. >> go up to the beehive and hit it. watershed moment. cull pulling out all the stops here, robert. shane if he does do that, a lot of folks say, yeah. when you look at the p-5 plus 1, look at other relationships around and those that are multilateral, they have not worked. so why not? >> i mean, donald trump complained about almost every major multilateral agreement in the world. raised kwis about nato. whether eastern europe people countries were paying their fair share. revisit nafta. pull out of tpp. he's talking about reconfiguring american policy in asia, in the americas. looking at potential dramatic shifts. 9 thing is, no one knows exactly what he's shifting to. he said that on purpose. right? his policy around war and isis. comes to trade and the economy, predictability again is what so much of the world economy is built upon. >> if you're going to hit that

beehive, you better have enough beekeepers. that's really the question we're watching as he fills out the rest of his administration. robert trainor, shane goldmacher, thank you both for the analogies this afternoon. appreciate it. >> thank you. heal weekend. >> you, too. still ahead, much more on that deadly fire in oakland. watching that. nine people dying. u.s. issens more feared dead. we're watching microphones for a potential news briefing with more information. up next, angered louisiana after authorities release the man they say admitted to shooting former nfl player joe mcknight. s make earning bonus cash back so complicated? they limit where you can earn bonus cash back to a few places... ...and those places keep changing every few months. the quicksilver card from capital one doesn't do any of that. with quicksilver you earn unlimited 1.5% cash back on every purchase, everywhere.

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he wears his army hat, he gets awalks aroundliments. with his army shirt looking all nice. and then people just say, "thank you for serving our country" and i'm like, that's my dad. male vo: no one deserves a warmer welcome home. that's why we're hiring 10,000 members of the military community by the end of 2017. i'm very proud of him. male vo: comcast. the man who admitted to shooting and killeding nfl running back joe mcknight during a road rage incident is free right now as authorities in

louisiana determine what charges if any he could face. ronald gasser stayed on the scene of the shooting and handed his gun over to police who responded. witnesses say mcknight was standing outside his car when he was shot. at news conference friday, the county sheriff was emphatic for patience while the investigation is conducted, we're not going to reveal at this point in time any of the details of this investigation. i do not want to be accused of tainting this investigation or suggesting a story about this investigation to witnesses that we have not located, and talked to. >> dozens of people gathered last night at the intersection where mcknight was killed demanding answers why gasser was released from police custody without being charged. next, president obama's lessy on crim na justice reform and what he leaves undone. later, pipe line protestors

vowing to continue their fight despite a monday deadline to leave their protest camp.

i'm richard lui at msnbc world headquarters in new york city. the late effort on breaking news following this afternoon here about california, oakland, california. there, that deadly fire at a warehouse late last night killing nine people. authorities are fearing at this moment it could reach as high as 40 people. this as crews are just beginning to get inside the burned out structure there. >> i was getting off b.a.r.t. about 12:30, seen a bunch of flames over here and rushed over here because my house is fairly close from here. and -- i rushed over here, and -- this. >> oakland's mayor is expected to hold and update minutes from now. we'll be watching that. go to nbc's steve patterson,

watching this. i guess we're expecting to hear more information very shortly. we're watching a live camera a little earlier here, steve, but the concern is as they bring in more resources within just the last hour, is that we could see that number increase. what are you hearing? >> reporter: yes. that is a big concern. this is the first press conference where we will have the mayor and really the city taking a hold of this. we've been watching pressers with the sheriff's department and police working together. we could hear more what state and local resources are doing to work with federal resources, all of which are on the ground coordinating together try to investigate what happened in this fire. the work that's really being done right now, though, is the groundwork that crews have been in place to do for now hours. which is a big recovery effort. it's a really grim task, to go in there, to identify corners and pockets of that warehouse, which has, essential harry fly

intents and purposes, burnt to the ground. barely passageways to get into different parts of that warehouse to begin with and now have the task of going in, identifying, trying to find more victims and then to pull them out and then to identify, cross-reference, those victims with family and loved ones, and people who have information on who these people are. so there is a solidified count of just how many people, what the loss of life is in this incident. it could be that this is a mass casualty incident upwards of 40 people that were killed in that fire. what we flow. 11:30 last night, 50 to 100 people in there. a party/concert/social gathering in an artist sort 9 mixed use complex, that seemed to be as early reporting, that our investigative team is doing, not really set up to handle something of this magnitude. particularly when you talk about a fire, because the fire chief has already said, when crews

arrived on-scene no sprinklers, no fire alarm going off. their team had to go in, identify the problems sight on scene. and this was a fully involved, fast-moving fire that did a lot of damage very quickly. again, we're in the recovery phase right now, but we should hear more from the mayor, from people involved with the city on what's next, what follows as far as maybe the arson investigation, if there were -- was a case of arson or was any sort of foul play, and then what happens next with identifying how this started and where it started. richard? >> and again, those pictures from overnight. one of the questions they may be able to answer for us, steve, look at the white versus black smoke, meaning what sorts of materials were inside burning, and those materials, which were more dangerous to human life that were in there at the time.

we get potentially more details on that. again, we expect to have more information from aews conference. that is set to begin. we believe anytime. we'll go straight to it there in oakland. thank you so much, steve, for your reporting and we'll be right back. picking up for kyle. here you go. you wouldn't put up with part of a pizza. um. something wrong? so when it comes to pain relievers, why put up with just part of a day? you want the whole thing? yes, yes! live whole. not part. aleve.

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47 days left in the president's term. president obama's term, and the white house continuing its focus on criminal justice reform. advocates saying time is running out on reforms that just begun. including an effort to ban, parts of a job application involving criminal history. wesley lew viowry is a reporter the "washington post." a gathering, right, on wednesday to discuss just this issue with valerie jarrett. the president made a lot of this area, 2014, 2015 and this year, too. when you look at some of the things that he'd like to get

done, he only has not months but weeks left in his term. what is doable? >> we've seen a lot of pressure applied to the white house by activists because of an idea, if hillary clinton was elected they would continue to push through reforms they want. now, perhaps only 47 days left. we've heard calls for things sump as mass calm com mutations. commutes a few dozens of people at times, the sons of every person arrested on a non-violent drug crime, something along those lines. seeing pressure, could there be something done in to the executive order? a question whether or not that's not something immediately undone. but, again, when you look here. issues of policing. currently the doj probe out in chicago. the investigation to eric garner and alton sterling in baton

rouge. still active investigations done by the doj, it's unclear what would happen under a donald trump administration with those investigations. a lot of pressure to get a lot done very quickly. >> one of the numbers you know so well. 25% of all imprisoned people on earth are in the united states and 2.2 million people behind bars today in the united states. compared to half a million 30 years ago. the cost here -- $80 million. the numbers are quite staggering, and the solutions that you're bringing up. which ones do you think can impact this the most according to what you're hearing in your reporting? ban the box, eliminates that question about criminal history? later in the interview process? or taking out altogether? one of several that were reported coming out of that meeting. >> of course. so questions about the box speak to the broader issue of recidivism. when someone is incarcerated what do we then do to prevent

them from continuing to be reincarcerated, right? the doj announced last week building a department of education within the prison system. this idea that inmates end up in the criminal justice system. one of the largest things they talk about, programs to address recidivism. activists and, criminal justice experts working in this space railroad particularly confident what happens next. just in his first rally as president-elect donald trump talked about empowering law enforce nont aggressively tackle crime. strike as very law and order rhetoric which is quite dissimilar to the rhetoric of people talking about mass incarceration. the federal government assisting states at further crim na crackdowns, further incarcerations flies in the face to the conversations on both sides of the aisle walking back the aggressive news of the

criminal justice system. >> fellow reporters that have followed what happened in ferguson, baltimore and new york and florida over the last three years, it has been a difficult time for criminal justice and now criminal justice reform. and a topic not necessarily discussed during this election cycle as much as many who are part of these communities were watching. regardless of background and i know that you agree with that. wesley lowry, thank you. if want more on that, fd a report o nbc news, blk, on our news site. thanks so much, wesley. >> thank you. next, fallout from donald trump's phone call with taiwan's president. how china is responding to that significant break with diplomatic protocol. coaching means making tough choices.

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the wake of donald trump phone call to the president of taiwan. the u.s. has not had diplomatic relations with taiwan since 1999. janice has the latest from beijing. >> reporter: with one phone call donald trump upended decades of u.s. proposal kahl on taiwan. after spending much of the campaign trashing china threatening tariffs, calling it a currently manipulator. this is perceived as a challenge to beijing, where the leadership expected the status quo in washington. officially, they're saying that china will not tolerate any country that expects official relations with taiwan. beijing was also expecting the status quo with taiwan. they criticized the call as being petty. this comes as sensitive time as beijing is pushing towards

reunification. we can't overlook grating tsai on her leadership. it's not something acknowledgeed by beijing and considered an affront. whether trump knew the ramifications of the phone call still are unclear, but if it signals a major shift in u.s. policy, then it will also bring a major rift in u.s./china relations between trump's presidency even gets started. richard? >> janice, thank you. from beijing with that report for us. i now want to bring in two ranking members here from congress. we have california congresswoman judy chu, chair of the congressional asian-pacific caucus in los angeles. also with us, new york congressman gregory meeks, chair of the congressional black caucus pac. also a member of the house committee foreign affairs financial services. start with you, representative meeks. since you're on the house committee of foreign affairs financial services. a lot of money, when we talk about china. there's the trade deficit which is about one-third of a trillion

dollars, each and every year. it's the largest funder to the united states. you sitting in congress on the house committee of foreign affairs financial service, what's your perspective, your reaction to what donald trump has done by taking the call from the leader of taiwan? >> it's scary. it's breaking every protocol we know. it's not taking into consideration the entire economic output and relationship we've had with china. it's a need for the check and balance we have with china, how he negotiated. to me, what he's doing initially is being amateur. i would hope he needs someone to come in to be his secretary of state or someone who's a real diplomat who maybe can explain to him the reality how the relationships should work and the dangers are. seemed to me he's shooting at the hip, as he did during the campaign, and you cannot do that as president of the united states. should not just be shooting at

the hip and without understanding there's real consequences to his actions. >> representative chu, do you share much of what representative meeks has said here? and what do you believe should be the right response, if any, coming from congress to the way that donald trump has engaged so far not taking office officially, being president-elect? what do you think? >> i certainly agree with congress member meeks. donald trump has been shooting from the hip, and i wonder if he really thought through what he was doing when he made the call to president tsai of taiwan? this goes against many decades of protocol. now, i do believe that the u.s. and taiwan should have a strong relationship, but it is far different when you're operating from the office of the president. this leads me to wonder how he is going to carry out foreign policy, and whether the doubts we all had about his foreign

policy experience will in deed be held to be true. that he wasn't really ready to deal with these foreign matters. and it leads me to wonder how he is going to be able to negotiate the delicate areas that he needs to as president. >> congressman meeks, as we look at the way he's dealt, at least with this latest interaction with taiwan, one of his tweets was saying, they called me. is that okay? and if this is the way that he proceeds with dealing with foreign powers, is this the way we're going to talk about foreign policy for the next four years? >> it's very dangerous. you know, sitting on the foreign affairs committee, on the subcommittee for asia-pacific for a period of same and even around the world. how he talk about nato, dealing

with european allies, dealing with individuals and even in central and south america. it is very dangerous, you know. playing around with russia, and then what's going to happen with turkey and syria? it's a delicate balance that you have to work with. you just can't shoot at the hip and then go tweeting, and then someone say something you tweet back, and that is not the way the president of the united states conducts diplomacy and not the way that we are going to keep the trust of our allies. >> right. >> which is very important. >> i want to shift gears now to something that happened on your side of the aisle, congressman chu, and congressman meeks, and that is the question about leadership for democrats in the house. and what we heard from nancy pelosi is that she would like to look at at least two junior leadership positions. this to bring in some new blood. that average age discussed to date of 66, clearly the two of

you are not close to that, by the way. what is your perspective on how this might move the democratic party in the house to a new generation? to a new information that addresses what happened this election? congressman chu? >> well, i commend leader pelosi for being so responsive to the ncerns of the younger members of congress. they really wanted to have concrete input into the leadership decisions, and they felt that they had no avenue to do so. so they came up with these proposals which i think were very, very sound, and now we have these two junior positions that will be right at the top of the leadership discussions. there is quite a bit of electioning going on as people are eager to take on these responsibilities, and i think it will help the democrats to really go towards the future to address those people in america

who may not have felt that they had been reached out to by the democrats. >> and we look at that very issue that you bring up here, representative chu. it is something that is resonating, right? over this last year about, our voices being heard. representative meeks, as we look at leadership not only in the house for democrat, and by the way, representative pelosi still knows how to get a vote. does she not? plus or minus two or three. but to get over the dnc. that's also for you and representative chu a question. who should lead? who is hearing the voice? >> well, i think that that's where our work is really going to be over the next two to four years, because we've got reach out to all of america. the sprob not just the presidential election but we've lost gubernatorial seats, lost state legislatures. getting close to 2018 and 2020, with our lines cut, a lot of

talent there, but we have to win those seats back. over the last four years we lost 900 members from the state assembly or state senate. we have to win those back and the dnc has to make sure it has a program together that's going to be inclusive of all 50 states winning back state houses. >> all 50 states, and quickly, do you represent all genders? no women currently running at the moment i'm aware of for the dnc chair. your thought? maybe you? >> oh -- i don't know about that. but i do think we have well-qualified persons running for the dnc chair, and i'm so proud that our own congress member, keith ellison, is running. i think he would do a marvelous job in that position and provide from, for us some in blood and new thoughts, but i do have to say that with this past election, we have diversified the house and congress, and just as an example, it was -- a

historic gain for asian-americans. we went from 13 members of congress that are asian-pacific islander to 18 members, that are asian-pacific islander, and in the senate, there was a very historic gain of four women of color. >> all right. thank you both. congresswoman judy chu of california and also chair of comfortpac and thank you, also, freptive gregory meeks, also head of cbc and the its parqupa. breaking news out of california. look at some pictures here of that burnt out warehouse where nine people have died. dozens still unaccounted for. oakland's mayor is expect to hold a press conference flints now. we'll go that when it happens, live. with them. make sure the germs they bring home don't stick around. use clorox disinfecting products. because no one kills germs better than clorox.

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we believe there are more victims, but we're not going to get into the numbers game at this point. we do have numerous reports of

missing persons unaccounted for persons. some of these folks are not from within the united states. they're visitors. a lot of the people that were, are victims here are young people and when i say young people, people in their 20s to 30s. >> all right. that from a news briefing earlier today, in the afternoon. it is right now 2:00 p.m. in oakland, california. where a warehouse fire that happened about 14 hours ago has killed nine people. 25 unaccounted for. the concern that we are watching, is it that we could see that death count increase, but we're going to go to a news briefing that we expect to start within the next four, five minutes, which we will go to live. there coming out of oakland, california. and this as the intensity as well as the numbers of personnel have increased, just within the last couple of hours.

governor jerry brown tweeting, our thoughts are with the entire city in this difficult time and we extend our condolences to the family and friends of those lost. we'll be back right after this, live, coming out of oakland, california, and the fire overnight. coaching means making tough choices. jim! you're in! but when you have high blood pressure and need cold medicine that works fast, the choice is simple. coricidin hbp is the only brand that gives powerful cold symptom relief without raising your blood pressure. coricidin hbp.

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that's why there's biotene. and biotene also comes in a handy spray. so you can moisturize your mouth anytime, anywhere. biotene, for people who suffer from dry mouth symptoms. a very good day to you. i'm richard lui at msnbc headquarters in new york city. following breaking developments this hour out of oakland, california, where a massive fire broke out overe night at a two-story warehouse party. seeing pictures that k s thas t came out just this afternoon. nine people dead, there's fears the number two climb up to 40. >> you have to work these investigation from the worst case scenario and downgrade from there. >> we're very much focused on identifying those who are still missing. locating those who hav