stuart: good morning, everyone, and welcome to very any and company. this is about the last thing the bind campaign wants to see,s a

damning headline on the front page of "the wall street journal." quote, behind closed doors, biden shows signs of slipping. slipping is a polite word for advancing cognitive decline. it exposes the president's mental and physical if difficulties. there's or more. he was interviewed for "time" magazine. the writer says he clearly showed his age. more on this throughout the program. it's a bombshell. to the markets. interest rates down, stocks up. i'll start with the all-important 10-year treasury yielding 44.2 -- 4.332%. maybe we'll get some relief on mortgage rates. the 2-year now yields, what, 4.. 77? last month it was close to 5. stock investors like this. the dow and the s&p, and look at the nasdaq, up 1200 points. -- 120 points. bitcoin moving up to $70,999900 -- 90000. oil in the low 70s. gasoline down to $3.50, that's

the average for regular, diesel is down $3.84. gold, little change. right there it's at $, 361. 2,6361 -- 2,3 61. let's get become to politics. the -- and at the press conference, the president again showed his mental and physical decline, he seemed confused if lost are. early this morning biden arrived in france for a state visit. he immediately declared a lid. that this means no activity for the rest of the day. he needs rest are. on the show today to, you'll see an astonishing video from the board by star reporter bill me lieuin -- melugin. hundreds of people walking across asking for directions, there was only one border patrol officer to meet them. and a new poll take ever after -- taken after the the guilty verdicts shows trump holds a narrow lead over the president. lawfare doesn't seem to be

working. wednesday, june 5th, 2024, "varney & company" is about to begin. ♪ ♪ ♪ and and i'm free, free falling ♪ stuart: the i just love the late, great tom petty, and i particularly like this song. it doesn't refer to the stock market -- lauren: oh, no. toothout it refers to biden's cognitive ability. [laughter] we're going to get right to the bombshell headline, here we go again. "the wall street journal" says behind closed doors, biden shows signs of slipping. all right, lauren, this does not make the president look good, does it? lauren: the story is based on interviews with more than 45 people, republicans and democrats, who have sat down recently with president biden. i'm going to to quote one meeting in january, this is how the journal describes it.

biden spoke so softly at times that some participants struggled to hear hem. him. he read from notes the make obvious points, paused for extended periods and sometimes closed his eyes for so long that some in the room wondered whether he had tuned out. did he fall asleepsome if he's lost his stride -- asleep? the journal says the white house keeps saying he's sharp as a ever, and then they're urging democrats, the journal spoke to the, call them back. tell themmesque's -- everything's okay. and the journal reported that. stuart: you don't do that in politics. president biden, he sat down for an interview with "time" magazine and discussed concerns about his age. when he was asked if he could do the job as an 85-year-old, in other words complete a second term, biden said, quote, i can do it better than anybody you know. you're looking at me, i can take you. was he picking a fight with the reporter? if he seemed confused yesterday

at the white house by reporters shouting wes at him. [inaudible conversations] -- questions at him. [inaudible conversations] >> [inaudible] stuart: that's not good. former governor of arkansas a mike huckabee joins me here in new york city. governor, how can biden be president for another four years? >> well, he really can't, and we've seen it in all a of these videos. i thought it was interesting when he said, you know, i can do this job, and i'm as a good as i've ever been. i'm thinking, that's the problem, you're still joe biden. [laughter] you remember the old -- you and i are old enough to remember captain kangaroo, and remember grandfather clock? and they'd have to scream at him and say, wake up, grandfather, and they'd have to wake up the graph clock. i feel like -- grandfather clock.

i feel like i'm watching a rerun of captain kangaroo and all the cast at the white house has to scream, wake up, mr. president. you have a meeting, and it's going on right now. stuart: but it's not funny. that's the problem here. we can smile and joke about it, and i to -- >> yeah. stuart: -- but it's a serious national crisis. you could have president kamala harris. >> that's frightening. that's not funny. stuart: right. >> no. i think we laugh to keep from crying because we recognize that he is past his sell-by day. but here's the real issue. it's not his age, and i want the make very clear, this isn't ageism. mick jagger is prancing around on the stage, he's the samage as a joe biden. -- same age as a joe biden. this is about his cognitive ability, and it's gone. and you see it in the video you rolled, that stare off into nothingness and just sort of wandering away and saying inconsistent things. and this report was disturbing

on one point when he actually told the reporter, i can take you. and i'm thinking, what was this, a 22-year-old young lady who he could plan on taking down? but the very idea he believes he's stronger than ever, that is, to me, disturbing. stuart: it is, indeed. governor, don't be a strange ther. >> i'll try not to -- stuart: come to new york city anytime you like. comedian jon stewart, he went after president biden for smiling when he was asked about trump's guilty verdict. lauren? lauren: he seemed appalled. he's a comedian, and he seems appalled by the president's demeanor. biden was asked a question. he paused to answer it, he didn't answer it and then he smiled awkwardly. watch the take. >> perhaps if nothing personified the delicate high wire between glee and gravitas more than president biden's cher shire cat -- she should or shir.

>> prime minister, donald trump -- president mr. president, donald trump blames you directly, what's your response? >> no, don't stop! [laughter] don't stop! why can't they tell him, just [bleep] keep walking? lauren: and then he called the smile weird. the trump campaign actually made an ad out of that smile. they call it political persecution -- [inaudible] corruption. stuart: i think that was brutal. what jon stewart did there ors it was funny but brutal a, and that's a fact. this is for you as well. a new poll, donald trump continues to lead president biden, and this poll was taken after the guilty verdict. lauren: may 31st-june3 2nd -- june 2nd. right after trump was convict canned. he leads 44-43. the week prior, before the verdict, he was up 2 points. very small change. bottom line, at this moment in time voters are largely unswayed by the guilty verdict.

stuart: i think it's time we moved on to the markets, you know what i mean? check out futures. this is premarket action. solid green. dow up 120, nasdaq up about 137 points. david nicholas joins me now. david, we've been talking about this a lot on the show, the need for more electricity. and we've been saying we need nuclear power. so how do you informs in nuclear energy in -- invest in nuclear emergency? >> that's right. you don't get a.i. or data centers, cloud without energy. nuclear, i think, is the best way to play it. but there's a difference between public and private utilities. public utilities' prices are governed by states, they set the prices for customers, so those are names like southern company, duke energy. if you're an investor and want to play it safe, sit back and get a nice dividend, own a name like southern company or duke. if you want to own a private utility and want to steak bait -- speak speculate on this upside price for a.i., you want a name like constellation energy

or vis that energy. it's knowing which utilities you're owning and if you want to play pit safe, you go with the public. if you want some speculation, go with the private utility, stuart. stuart: so private utilities can operate nuclear react a to haves? they can do that? >> they do. conscious canlation and vistra does as a well. stuart: okay, that's good to know. now oil, we've got it down to $73 a barrel this morning, close to a 4-month low. i think that's bullish or finish stocks, right? >> -- fullish -- bullish for stocks, right in. >> yeah, this is the busy summer months, so i think we're in somewhat of a slowing economy. lower energy prices are good for the consumer. there's a lot here that a makes sense. even it helps the feds, because if energy prices stay low going into the summer months, going into the fall, that shows up in the cpi numbers, and that may make the fed if say, you know what? we could start seeing interest

rate cuts this year. so overall, lower energy prices is a good thing for stocks and the economy. stuart: david, i'm watching -- wrapping this all together, and it sounds like you i think the bull market continues. >> yeah, i think it does. we're getting a lift here with energy, so you want to stay invested because if the fed lowers rates this year, you don't want to miss that ride, stuart. stuart: got it. i'm looking forward to the ride. david nick nicholas, see you again soon. do you remember when the media dismissed hunter biden's laptop as nothing but russian disinformation? watch this. >> hunter biden, this laptop, the intelligence officials have warned it's likely russian disinformation. >> i'm going -- ongoing russian disinformation effort. >> it is so obviously a russian operation. stuart: okay, that was four years ago. well, now i the justice department is using it as a key piece of evidence in hunter's gun trial. how about that? jason chaffetz coming up. congressman chip roy had a tense exchanges with attorney

general merrick garland about border security. watch this. >> -- as the attorney general, the way to stop people like this from coming into the united states to give more resources to the border patrol. so that they can -- >> mr. attorney general, no. no. >> you don't -- >> we, the people of texas, money's not going to solve the problem. stuart: okay. so what is going to fix the open border? congressman roy is next. ♪

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stuart: plenty of green on the screen. dow up 12112, nasdaq up -- 112. stock the nervous like it. fox took this video showing

hundreds of migrants cross the border into california early this morning just as president biden announced his new border policy. bill melugin is in california. all right, bill, did these migrants say where with they were coming from? >> reporter: yeah, from the middle east, a lot of them from special interest countries. we'll get to them in a moment, but it was basically business as usual out here last night even as president biden's executive order took effect at a midnight if eastern, 99 p.m. local. we drove around the hot spots, didn't see a rush of people trying to to get in before it took effect. take a look at this, this was sunset, minutes before that the order took effect, we saw this group of predominantly chinese and vietnamese illegal aliens who had crossed over. they were still being processed, or but it wasn't like some alarm went off and border patrol agents started blocking people. they just did their jobs and processed them and took them away. earlier in the day, take a look at this, this was predominantly men from the middle east cross,

a much bigger group. several of these guys are what dhs calls special interest aliens coming from countries that have potential terror or national security concerns. so they're supposed to get additional vetting. we caught up with several guys from jordan, egypt and turkey. take a listen. jordan. jordan? why'd you come to -- egypt. why'd you come to america? >> for job. >> reporter: for a job? >> yeah. >> reporter: you know it's illegal to cross the or border like this, right? >> yeah. >> reporter: you don't care? where you guyses from? >> yes. egypt. >> reporter: what country? >> i am from turkey. >> reporter: turkey. all turkey? [inaudible conversations] >> i love you, america. >> reporter: or where are you from? >> yes. egypt. >> reporter: egypt, okay. egypt. and so far cbp contacts tell us here in san diego sector since

october 1st there's been about 260,000 illegal immigrants who have been apprehended. but we just got some stunning data linked to us by cbp sources which shows of that number, a staggering 78% have been released into the country here in san diego sector. a large part because a lot of them are coming from countries where it is very difficult to send them back. back to you. stuart: extraordinary reporting, bill melugin. fbi director christopher wray addressed the surge in suspected terrorists crossing the border. what's he saying about it? lauren: yeah. he's still worried about a coordinated attack from u.s. soil soil by illegal border crossers. watch. >> we have seen over the last 5-6 years an increase in the number of known or suspected terrorists. the bigger problem, in my view, so twofold. one, individuals who, when they come in, are either armed with

fake documents or snuck in in some way. or, or -- and this is very important -- individuals for whom there's not enough derogatory information in the intelligence community to watch list them yet. lauren: from what we do know, this is who is on the watch list, 1,664 migrants that we know about that crossed and were caught under biden. so far this year 277. expect that to double. stuart: 277, all right. lauren it's scary. stuart: thank you, lauren. republican congressman chip roy got into a heated exchange with attorney general merrick garland over my grants accused of killing u.s. citizens. roll tape. >> as the attorney general, the way to stop people from like this from coming into the united states so to give more resources to the border patrol so that the they can -- >> mr. attorney general, no.

no. >> you don't want -- >> we the people of texas -- money's not going to solve the problem when the department of homeland security and the president of the united states refuse to enforce the law. department of justice is suing the state of texas in court, taking valuable resources to go against the people of texas. when texas simply wants to say that we should have a say in stopping people who are illegally -- stuart: we are pleased to say that congressman chip roy, republican from texas, is with us now on this show today. congressman, we got this latest fix from bind on the border. -- biden on the border. will it actually fix anything, congressman? >> yeah, stuart, of course the answer is, no. in fact, when the president went to the microphone, i was in that hearing with merrick garland and having the exchange you just showed. i came back and i watched, and i watched the clips of the president, you know, and i was hoping there might be something legitimate9 there. look, the president gave up the game in his own speech p. first of all, he acknowledged, quote, we need to regain criminal of

the border. so the president for the first time acknowledged we do not have control of the border. he also said, hey, this is because republicans won't pass that senate bill which is the great bill that i must have in order to do this. at the same time that he's issuing executive orders allegedly the solve the problem by setting a cap at a 2500 people a day instead of 59000 -- 500 a5 a day, both of which will are foolish because you're not dealing with asigh hum or parole -- asylum or to parole. in fact, it was parole that led to the individual getting released into the united states who killed laken riley. it's a sham. the president is lying again. democrats are lying. they're killing americans. they need to be held accountable now, and they need to be held accountable at the ballot box in november. stuart: congressman, i want to go back for a moment to biden blaming trump and republicans for the border crisis. >> right. stuart: is just watch this. roll it. >> four months ago, after weeks

of intelligence negotiation between my -- intense if negotiation between my staff and democrats and republicans, we came to a clear, clear bipartisan deal. it was the strongest border is security agreement in decades. but then republicans in congress, not all of them, walked what -- away from it. why? because donald trump told them to. so today i'm moving past republican obstruction and using executive order authority available to me as presidented to do what i can on my own to address the border. stuart: congressman, i'm sorry, but that is laugh,,. your comment, please. >> again, he's giving up the joke because you could have done it -- if you do it now, you could have done it three and a half years ago. why are you saying 2500 instead of 55000 -- 5000? first of all, president trump was actually managing our border so that we only had about a 30,000 a month. of he was getting the job done. but importantly, we were all

opposing that that legislation before president trump came out against it. president trump came out against it because it was a bad deal. and the fact that it was a bad deal is clear by virtue of what we're seeing right now. remember jeh johnson, secretary of homeland security under president obama, said 1,000 a day was a crisis. this joker wants to come in and set it at 2,500 or that we should have passed the bill at 5,000? if laken riley is dead because of his policies. he should be impeached for it, he should be booted for office -- from office for it in november. our people are dying over this. stuart: congressman chip roy, thank you very much for being with us today. >> yes, sir. stuart check futures, dow up 120, this is premarket. nasdaq up 140. the opening bell is next. [thunder rumbles]

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it's a, technically speaking or relatively speaking, it's a small cap company with $1.5 billion market cap. it's got $3655 million in annual revenue based on the trailing 12 months. profit or margin is almost 30%, they have a fabulous balance sheet. their earnings growth is almost 36% year-over-year. it's a very well-run company. we love the space. we love the etf space. i think they're going to create more product, and as we see in flows into the market, i think we'll continue to see innows, many something like wiz -- inflows, it's a no-brainer. stuart: iwm, i think that's the russell 2000etf right? if. >> yes. we see the russell as having underperformed, of course, big tech but the s&p as far as a benchmark for the whole market. and i think we're going to start to see some performance catch-up so, yes, we've got a position in iwm that's bullish.

again, if we continue to go with where we're going, i don't really see any reason for us to back down. interest rates are now going back in the correct direction. there's really nothing pressing down on it. stuart: but you're not walking away from big tech, are you? >> oh, no. those are all core position. they will always be core positions because fundamentally, that's where the earnings are, where the earnings growth is going to be, that's where the addressable markets are globalled and continuing to expand. so, yes, they'll always be go-tos for us. stuart: so i will always a hold my microsoft as long as i live. is that right? [laughter] >> and add to it on dips. [laughter] stuart: add a to it on dips, all right. hey, shah, you're all right. that was good stuff. see you again soon. here we go. the market is about to open. in fact, it is open. off we go. stocks rise as a nvidia surges to record high. there's your banner across the bomb of the screen. in the very early going, the

dow's up 80 and about three-quarters of the dow 30 are in the green. they're up. the s&p 500 also opening higher. percentage wise you're up about a half a percentage point almost, 530000 is the level are. now the nasdaq, it is up two-thirds of 11%, 6 -- 1%. 69 is the level. big tech, i'm pretty sure most of hem will be higher, they are. meta, ap alphabet, apple, amazon, microsoft, all on the upside. and then there's this, elon musk says he is diverting nvidia a.i. chips made for tesla and putting them towards his new x ventureses. are tesla shareholders worried about that? lauren: i'm going to go with not early. [laughter] this is how i see it. musk wants his pay a package, $56 billion, and he has said a 25% voting stake in tesla are. the chip diversion now, the nvidia chip, is going -- chips, it shows he's not bluffing.

he wants full control of a.i. if he's not going to to get that 25% voting share at tesla, we'll keep it at a, and. i think thats's the main reason he did accelerated these 12,000 chips. because of it s and this would be the worry for tesla shareholders, that their a.i. infrastructure is now delays five months, since months because they're not getting them as quickly. on june 13th we have this major shareholder vote. different proxy firms are coming out for and against. ron barron is saying back it, give him the $56 billion,ing, he deserves it. he's the ultimate key man. that package is likely to pass although not guaranteed, and that would lift a cloud of uncertainty for tesla shareholders. going back to just tesla, musk hired an executive at geico to come in and help lower insurance costs because the costs to repair is tremendous. so they're brawn. ing out to make -- brawn. ing -- branching out.

stuart: the geico lizard. lauren: three pieces of news on e ron musk. stuart: one company launching brand new a.i. chips today. do we know if there's anything special finish. lauren: the name of the company is neuron. it's a start-up. what's special about it is privacy. they want to be an alternative to amazon and microsoft and their cloud services. is their customers that buy and use their chips can run them on their own servers in-house. if you're a bank with or a financial firm or or a hospital, you're dealing with sensitive data, you don't want it uploaded on third parties, so that's the difference. stuart: got it. earnings before the bell, campbell's soup. they're down. lauren: this was a beat and a raise. their soups, sauces, frozen meals, they're landing with customers who want to, per the company, focus on stretch the, meals. i like the terminology. he can we make this go further, right? and then they bought rao's a couple months ago, and that's landing well with young customers yet the stock is down

11.5%. stuart: go figure. dollar tree. i know the stock is down. you're going to tell me why. lauren: they cut their financial forecast and announced a review of family dollar. they bought family dollar in 2015. it's underperforming. they have been selling family dollars. they're selling an additional 150 this year. they did announce that today. and the "wall street journal" is reporting that they might sell the company. they're exploring options. stuart: cybersecurity company, crowdstrike. they're up -- lauren: way up. stuart: why? lauer lauren a.i. magnify foos the risk of cyber attacks. companies are spending on a.i. and spending on security to protect themselves. so their forecast for this current quarter and the year was strong. stuart: makes sense. hewlett-packard enterprises. it's up, 12. lauren: yeah. three reasons. they all have to do with a.i. a.i. servers, sales hit $3.9 billion in the quarter. demand for data storage a, the cost of artificial intelligence,

and their mar margins, unlike dell, were strong. dell's margins weren't. hp is telling us the opposite. stuart: i want to know about a new stock market in texas. lauren: yes. stuart: could it challenge the big board9 and the nasdaq? lauren: yes, but when who cares? i was on the phone all morning about this story. it would be the texas stock exchange in dallas. fully electronic, trade next year. host companies the year after that. they completed their initial capital raise with backers that include blackrock. why texas? well, why not? so many companies have gone there. but if you look at the historic, iconic manage, back in the heyday they handled 90% of all trades. now on a good day that number's more like 20 percent, so there's 80% happening else. >>. -- elsewhere. texas wants a piece of that the 80. but you could trade stocks, the margins to trade stocks is pennies these days, so what will texas do differently to compete

for companies and listings? how will they be more friendly to such companies? if i do not know, but there's got to be some sweetheart deal in here. stuart: okay. texas being texas, they'll pull somebody in. all right. what's this about a john deere? it's not john deere, it's deere & company, that's the proper name. job cuts, how many -- lauren: i don't have the the number, but there are salaried as well as production jobs, and the reason is deere's not selling as much farm equipment. crop prices are low and interest rates are high. so now deere is cutting jobs after cutting their profit forecast recently not once, but twice. stuart: okay, got that. next case, check out the big board. we are now, what, nearly six minutes into the trading session. we're up 60 points on the dow, .if 115%. -- .15%. there are winners headed by caterpillar, goldman sachs, dow inc., ibm and3 m. the s&p 500 winners ors top of that list, hewlett-packard enterprises, applied materials,

super micro compute if per, lamb research, seagate technology. nasdaq winners ors, crowdstrike, asml hold, zscaler is up there. now look at this, the yield on the 10-year treasury down to 4.13. checking the price of gold, $2,3661. bitcoin almost $711,000. 71,000. the price of oil, $72 a barrel with right now, nat gas with at a $2.if 67. regular gas, $3.50. diesel down a couple of cents, actually, at $3.84. can and coming up, president biden landed in france early this morning and he's already called a lid, so we won't hear or see him for the rest of the day. how will that look on the world stage? dhs secretary alejandro mayorkas seemed confused when trying to explain if biden's new border executive orders. roll it. >> if, in fact, the number of

encounters thereafter is 25000 or more -- 250 to 90 on average for 7 consecutive days, we have the authority to, again, implement this bar. stuart: you got that? how exactly is it going to work? hunter biden's ex-wife expected to testify in his gun trial today. should hunter plead guilty before it goes to the jury? former acting attorney general matthew whitaker on that next. ♪

fourth stuart 12 minutes in, here's where we check the market. the dow has lost much of its gain, it's only up 18 point, but the nasdaq is up 113. day three of hubber biden's federal gun -- hunter biden's

federal gun trial underway. rich edson is there. all right, what can we expect today? >> reporter: well, stuart, we can expect a continued discussion as to whether hunter biden was using drugs when he bought that gun back in 2018. we are underway here, hunter biden arrived about a half hour before these proceedings, also first lady jill biden made an appearance. she's in the courtroom while her husband is out in prance commemorating the 80th anniversary of the d-day landings. lead attorney for hunter biden, abby lowell, is cross-examining erica jensen, using much of their questioning to introduce lengthy segments of hunter's audio e-book where he says he had a superpower, the ability to find crack in any town at any time. >> crack takes you into the darkest recesses of your soul as well as the darkest corners of every community. unlike with alcohol, you become dependent not 078 on -- only on a criminal subculture, but the

lowest rung of that subculture. >> reporter: prosecutors also showed the gun at the heart of their case, asking the gun buyer, hunter in this case, used illegal drugs. it's marked, no. the defense says that form asks whether the buyer is a drug user, not whether he's ever done drugs. the defense maintained that hunter had periods of sobriety during that time and, in fact, was abusing alcohol instead at the time he bought that a gun. prosecutors also used special agent jensen's testimony to bring hunter's notorious with laptop into the courtroom. about a 18,000 pages long including photos and text messages. next up, the prosecution's expected to call hunter's ex-wife who's also in a legal fight with him over accusations of unpaid alimony. prosecutors have signaled they'll also a call more of hunter's exes including his sister-in-law, haley biden. they were together after a his brother beau died, and zoe, another ex-girlfriend of hunter

as this trial continues, day three. stuart: rich edson, thanks very much. matthew whitaker is the former acting attorney general and joins me now. i'm hearing that the evidence against hunter is already damning. of is so should he plead guilty now before he gets to the jury? >> well, it's good to be with you, stuart. you know, i think the miscalculation that hunter's team has a made is that he's going to be sympathetic. i think also they've made a calculation, quite cynically, that they have home field advantage. they're in a delaware court with a delaware jury and they, i guess with, figured that that they wouldn't be convicted by this jury.. i'm sure they've probably done presentations to mock juries and prepared for this, and they must think that they're message if -- their message is going to resonate. but these witnesses are lined up to, you know, essentially draw a box with around a him so tight that there's no way to get him out of him checking the box that he was not a drug user at the

time he bought that gun. and that's really the only evidence. a very simple case. stuart: would it make sense for him to plead guilty, just get it over with is and avoid more embarrassment for his dad? >> yeah. so is i don't think he wants to face jail time, so i'm sure if the prosecution offered him a deal that a avoided jail time, i don't know why he wouldn't take that. but, you know, that may not if be on the table, and they may not want to risk that event callty. i think a big case though where with he faces more significant punishment, ultimately, is the tax trial that he's facing in the coming months. i think it starts in september in los angeles. stuart: next one, matt, listen the what merrick garland said about giving congress access the biden's tape recordings from that interview with robert hur. watch this, please. >> all of the reasons that congress has given us for why they need the audio are satisfied with respect to the tapes that have provided

mr. hur's testimony in full, and we've provided mr. hur's testimony -- report. we've gone as farah as a we can go to -- far as we can go to accommodate. we're trying to protect our ability to do investigationses in this case and any other case. stuart: matthew, we're never going to see these tapes, are we? >> you know, merrick garland is standing on a little, tiny piece of land and trying to defend that. i think congress has the stronger argument. but at the end of the day, everything that congress does requires 218 votes. and if so if they can't put together the number of votes to hold him in con tempt -- contempt, it doesn't really have any teeth. the accommodation process, essentially, has been interpreted by the courts to, you know, let the two sides work it out. but typically congress gets what they want especially if there's not a law enforcement interest, and i haven't heard merrick garland express any defense of his position other than it's embarrassing to president biden. stuart: but you need 218 votes

in the house to get to see him held in con felt. got it. we're never going to see 'em. matt whitaker, thanks very much for being here. cheers. >> thanks. stuart: -- reportedly growing. what more do we know on this? lauren: it was emotionally draining for the president. many reports say he's worried about a hunter all the time. he wants him to keep his spry ifty and is nervous about the upcoming testimony from hunter's exwaif and brother's widow. their testimony could reveal sordid details about hunter's past. it's affecting the president, and it's also a happening around the an seriously of beau biden's death. stuart: that is entirely understandable. bombshell report from the journal, behind closed doors biden shows signeds of slipping. that's the journal's polite way of expressing his cognitive decline. is joe biden capable of being president for four and a half more years in my take, top of the hour. chicago handing out millions

of dollars to revamp the downtown. the city wants to turn unused office space into hotels, apartments. in chicago that's going to be an uphill struggle. we have the story next. ♪ ♪ wake me up, wake me up inside. ♪ i can't wake up, wake me up inside. ♪ save me, call my name and save is from from the dark ♪ you'll get better when you're not blamed for a condition you can't control. you'll get better when your pain isn't minimized, dismissed, forgotten. we will never stop trying

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stuart: many cities are offering help to developers to convert unused office space into with apartments and hotels. you know that is easier said than done, i think. kelly saberi with me now. what is chicago offering? >> reporter: good morning to you both. chicago is offering property developers $150 million to convert 4 commercial buildings in this case in the downtown area to more than 1,000 apartments. one big reason for this push to convert is because many people still work from home, and companies are downsizing their office space. because of that, rents remain high, and many landlords are facing higher interest rates are and are finding it difficult to refinance that debt. one leading chicago developer saying this is leading to shrinking supply if saying, quote, there are fewer land

lords competing for tenants because so many buildings are in this zombie state. this coupled with the need for more affordable housing in downtown areas is leading many cities around the country to offer help to developers to convert those empty office buildings to residential spaces. cities like new york and l.a. a are offering to cut the red tape and expedite approval processes. san francisco, a i city with one of the highest commercial vacancy rates, is offering tax incentives. only after the conversion is complete. now, let's are look at the national vacancy rate. it's about a 19%, but specifically the major metro areas are looking at ones even higher than that. detroit, 29%. san francisco, 26%. houston, the 24%. and here in manhattan, 18 percent. still, it will take years before the conversions are ready for people to move in. st. to stuart oh, yeah. years and years and years. you have got to9 get planning per if mission, and that doesn't come quickly. kelly, thanks very much, indeed. check that big board.

we're down now. down 54 points. we opened 100 points higher, but the dow is now the off 50. look at a dow winners, there are some in this market. we have intel, goldman, apple, amgen, microsoft all on the upside. s&p 500 winners, we have hewlett-packard enterprise, up 14% now. seagate, lam research, bath and body with works, applied materials. nasdaq, a a sml holdings, lam research, applied materials and marvell technology. the 10-year treasury yield down. in fact, it's now down to 4.30. check the price of gold. $2,361, that's where we are. bitcoin, we're at $70,79000 -- 700,70 -- 700,700 -- 70,700. and diesel, $3.84. still ahead, liz peek on

"the wall street journal"'s in depth report on biden's cognitive decline. dr. marty makary on fda a panel shutting down ecstasy as a treatment for ptsd. jason chaffetz on trump changing his 2020 stance. he's pushing republicans to vote early. and congressman mike lawler on the migrant accused of shooting two in its police officers. he is a member of a venezuelan gang. 10:00 hour, "varney & company,"s next. ♪

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stuart: justin bieber, our producers are not always clear what he means. 10:00 eastern, to the money, the dow is down 60 points, opened over a hundred and the nasdaq holding onto the solid gain of 120 points