>> go. >> president trump meeting with rand paul and others and he's engaging with people. >> i think we need to pay attention to the changing of senate rule. big deal always for the future. mari maria:. >> always a big deal. stuart: damaging to the left, damaging to the obama team, ignored by the media. fox news learned it was susan rice to revealed the names of government officials contained in reports. she was president obama's national security advisories. she received summaries of reports, she asked for and received names of trump campaign related officials. she did not leak, but made leaking easier. it was designed to undermine the trump presidency and came

from the highest levels of the obama team. this bombshell is not on the front of "the washington post," or new york times. and ignored on the nbc newscast and cbs defended susan rice. same old same old. and it was susan rice that went on television to blame benghazi on a video and told pbs last month she knew nothing about surveillance of the trump campaign. bottom line, the obama team detested donald trump and went to great lengths to undermine them and the media detests donald trump and goes to great lengths to cover up the wrongdoings of the left. we need clarity. about "varney & company" is about to begin.

>> and this year, the confetti is going to fall for north carolina. carolina. >> there you are, the champions, university of north carolina, the tarheels, beating gonzaga to win the ncaa tournament, 71-65. this is north carolina's sixth championship in school history. they avenged their heartbreaking loss in the game last year and by the way, i don't know whether you stayed up for it, but it was not over until midnight or just beyond that. the tip-off was 9:20. >> 9:20. stuart: i couldn't believe that. and let's get to important stuff, not at that basketball isn't important, oh, no. how about the futures where we're going open the market. down 40. >> 20,500 is where we are. now, look at this. there's a new poll from pugh, a reputable organization. 58% say their view of the economy is very, or somewhat good. they like what's going on with

the economy and that's the best level, the best reading since the financial crisis. market watcher mike murphy is with us this morning. looks to me like people are ignoring the political minutia and the noise coming out of d.c. and concentrating on what's reallgoing onthe economy. are they justified in their optimism? >> 100%. i don't think they're necessarily ignoring it. i think a lot of people want to find the faults in washington and can't deny the fact-- i talk to a lot of small business owners around the country and the optimism they're seeing and feeling is something they haven't felt in ten years, so this is real. stuart: it's all about expectations for growth coming up. >> for growth coming from lower taxes and less regulation. people are feeling the reduction in regulation already in their businesses. they're seeing people planning. they're seeing orders coming in that they haven't seen and that's all from the new policies that are going to come out of washington. >> so it's just not a

projection in the future. it's happening right now. >> happening right now. >> orders are coming in. >> orders are coming in, people are feeling better and ordering more and looking to the future and expecting better things. >> fascinating stuff. and the market is still at 20,500. >> you see it priced into the market already and now we need the earnings to support it. stuart: let's see about that. now, i've got individual stocks making moves today. i'm going to start with the big name techs. this is apple, amazon, facebook, google, microsoft. almost all of them are at or near all-time highs. all of them down very slightly in premarket trading today. now, look at panera, they're reportedly exploring a possible sale. they deny they're in talks with anybody specifically, but maybe starbucks, dominoes pizza, names thrown out as possible buyers. that's premarket. i don't think that's right. i think that's wrong. i saw premarket panera, up about 20 bucks.

we'll fix that for you. next case, tesla, big pop yesterday. i find it fascinating. look at the level 297. tesla's market value is now greater than the ford motor company and just mind general motors. will you look at that? $48 billion what tesla is worth. ford 45 billion and gm is only 51. that's astonishing murphy. >> most certainly is. when you look at these, you have to realize you don't price a ford or gm or the market doesn't, the same way it does for tesla. amazon was losing money and people said it was overvalued and now they're a behemoth. when you look at tesla, you can't compare it to ford and gm. it's a technology company. it's a different type of stock and priced differently. i know, but-- >> it's still a car company. stuart: it's still a car

company and i'm still astonished. what did they sell, 20,000 in the first quarter ford and gm millions. it's extraordinary. >> it most certainly is. it's a great story and the fact that tesla continues to move higher and put up a great quarter and you saw the ceo elon musk come out and stick it to the shorts, saying ou're short this stock, good luck. liz is right, they make cars, but i wouldn't say that-- it's a technology company. stuart: liz, tell us what does elon musk say about those. liz: stormy weather in shortville. he's going after the short to buy the shares and pocket the difference. yes, it's priced like a tech company and wall street is saying, wait a second, you, elon musk, you have to add the

factories and money to build the cars and batteries. elon musk owns 27% of tesla so he's a cheerleader. stuart: he's a multi-billion doll dollar-- multi-billionaire. liz: yes. stuart: and fox news learning that susan rice asked for the names of trump team members caught up in surveillance and president obama made that information much more widely available and as a result shall names were indeed leaked. joining us now, fox news contributor rachel campos duffy, a republican at heart. >> yes. stuart: rand paul, senator paul says this is the smoking gun. >> it absolutely is and right when he's saying that they need to bring her in and ask her questions. i mean, if this had happened on the other side, can you imagine?

i mean, the media and the democrats would be screaming lock her up. and this is serious stuff. it is a bombshell. i didn't realize until you did your opening that nbc and cbs didn't cover this. stuart: didn't cover it. >> this is incredible and the kind of double standards that drives republicans batty. it's bad enough we don't hear the good stories that mike was talking about, the orders and optimism in the economy we don't hear that in the news. this has huge national security implications. it's not just that they spied on trump, the american people have given the intelligence community huge leeway to spy, to keep us safe, under the condition that they are not going to unmask or leak this information about americans. and this has happened and this undermines the trust that the american people have with the intelligence community and puts our own national security in danger. stuart: susan rice was the unmasker, she revealed the mes, not to the public. she didn't leak, but she

revealed the names ahen president obama made sure that all the information got out to a total of 17 intelligence agencies and makes a leak almost inevitable when there's that many involved. >> she's not a inten intern, no career national security-- she's a political operative. she's been doing the president's dirty work since benghazi. and the president said she is his right-hand gal. this has the making of the scandal. the scandal is that the media is not making it. where is the a.c.l.u. and where are these people. stuart: and they are -- the media is know the touching it. there's the national review, nothing to do with susan rice. >> it's insane. stuart: i don't know about that, but.

[laughter] thank you very much indeed. >> thank you. stuart: we'll see you shortly. how about this? ronco, there's a name, ronco, they're the info info mercial g the pocket fisherman and others. if you buy some of that. ashley: don't go away, there's more. [laughter] if you order right now. stuart: look on the screens, boeing has signed a $3 billion deal selling planes to iran. how is that going to go over with president trump? well, we're on that one, of course. more varney after this.

>> we are going to open down,

but not much this morning on wall street, 44 points maybe on the down side for the dow industrials. boeing has made a $3 billion deal to sell planes to iran. do we know anything more than the bare bones number. ashley: 6 billion, up to 60 planes, in agreement with an option for 30 more. and we're not sure what the trump administration thinks, a first major deal between the u.s. company and iran. and boeing says it's got the permission boo i the u.s. government to do the deal and it has to be signed off on the treasury department. it will sustain 18,000 jobs. stuart: do they have leverage on us or we have leverage on them? i wonder how that works. back to the big political story of the day. president obama's national security advisor susan rice unmasking the name of trump transition officials who were caught up in surveillance, that is revealing the names.

the source close to rice making this statement to cnn early this morning. the idea that ambassador rice improperly sought the identities of americans is false, and the request when making a senior national security official, whether republican or democrat. all rise, judge napolitano is here. as national security advisor you can ask for names, nothing wrong with that. >> only under certain circumstances. if an american is individually or intentionally surveilled, that name is kept secret. if it's to understand who the conversant is. let's say geral flynn and the white house ambassador. the white house only gets words, says american number one, russian ambassador. american number one, russian ambassador. if they need to know who american number one is, they can unmask for that limited purpose. he can this not unmask for

political, curiosity, revenge, embarrassment. second, if the conversation is know the about national security and it's incidentally caught up, they cannot unmask for any purpose. unmasking constitutes-- the improper unmasking promotes espionage, why espionage, because the american caught up in surveillance is protected by top secret category. this is the same category that hillary clinton probably violated by putting top secret information in a nonsecure venue in her home-brewed e-mail service. stuart: this is the legalistic weeds. >> i know, but it's important because the fbi should handle this and the fbi should investigate whether or not mrs. rice committed espionage by improperly unmasking the americans. she only had one boss.

who would she go and say, hey, guess what donald trump and paul manafort were talking about the night before he gave his acceptance speech in cleveland? >> i understand. >> espionage. i'm interested in the politics, the dirty tricks, the dirty tricks in the extreme. >> absolutely. stuart: deliberately undermining the incoming president who legitimately won the election. >> absolutely. as you pointed out earlier today, not only where is the media? where is the democrats? everybody should be outraged this was going on. can you imagine if president bush and condoleezza rice were spicing on incoming president obama? everybody should be concerned about spying, the criminal use of top secret information gathered by america's spies. stuart: so if ms. rice revealed

the names or got it know the names in a way that was inappropriate or illegal. >> espionage and should be investigated. stuart: she should be put on oath. >> she's probably not going to testify against herself, but the fbi should have a criminal investigation. the congress. i doubt that she's going to answer anything. stuart: so far we've steered clear of the investigations and back and forth about the russians and this, that and the other. today we've gone full bore with the susan rice story because i think it's a major scandal. am i right? >> i think you're right. it's a major scandal and a turning point in the scandal and demonstrates-- daily caller reported that susan rice ordered, they used the word ordered spread sheets of donald trump's conversation. stuart: spread sheets of his conversations? >> spread sheets of his conversation. this is a scandal of watergate magnitude if true.

if it happened as these venues are now reporting it. stuart: that would mean, if that report is correct, that means susan rice, on a spread sheet, laid it all out. who is donald trump talking to, what was he talking about, and then gave that out. and then allowed that to be disseminated, is that the allegation? >> yes, and don't you think it was disseminated for political reasons? >> oh, no, no, no. i'm being facetious. ashley: i know you're being facetious. >> that's inappropriate, read criminal dissemination. stuart: judge, got it right. thank you for joining us, sir. appreciate it. now, president trump announcing a crackdown on visa fraud. this one could hit the tech industry. details on that one for you. how about this one, in swede n workers are having microchip some workers having microchips insurgentically implanted in their hands. why would you do that? there is a reason. we'll tell it to you after the break. at fidelity, trades are now just $4.95.

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[ [ screams ] ] [ shouting ] brace yourself! this is crazy! [ tires screeching ] whoo! boom baby!

rated pg-13. [ screams ] [ [ screams ] ] [ shouting ] brace yourself! this is crazy! [ tires screeching ] whoo! boom baby! rated pg-13. [ screams ] >> president trump wants to crack down on h1b visa fraud. these are the visas that we give out to skilled workers that we want to come into the country. immigration services will target work sites that have a high ratio of h1b visa workers to u.s. workers.

they want to make sure that companies are filling jobs with american workers before they recruit foreigners from overseas, okay. stuart: butler county ohio, the sheriff there says he wants to crack down on businesses that hire illegals. >> people say americans won't do these jobs. that's not true. there used to be american drywallers, used to be american roofers. they've run them all out of business and it's continuing and i've asked the president of the united states, they've not had any workplace enforcement in eight years when obama was president. the last one we had was under bush. so, i'm asking this president, who i supported and still support to this day, to come in and do some workplace enforcement. this is not-- >> that's exactly what's happening right now. president trump is forcing the-- cracking down on h1b visa fraud. rachel campos duffy is back. do you think the sheriff on our program, he's going out there

and saying-- you hire an illegal and i'll arrest you. what do you say to that? >> i thought the whole idea behind trump was was we were going to get the hombres, and for example, 50% of people to milk the cows in wisconsin are illegals. >> you're from wisconsin and your husband-- >> yes. >> we have an immigration system that's broken to fill the jobs. the biggest competition for the jobs are the government. the government has such a large welfare program, that a lot of people don't want to take these jobs. we hear this all the time where we live, that, you know, if the government gave a little less of the welfare checks, people would take the jobs. stuart: rachel, we hear you, thank you very much indeed. now, look at this, the market is coming back a bit.

we were down 50,pots earlier and now we're going to open 20 or 30 points lower. we'll see. the opening bell is in minutes and we'll take you there.

>> all right. now, we're going to be opening this market in 20 seconds. let me remind you that

yesterday we closed at 20,650, down just 13 points on the day. 20, 650. despite all the negatives that you get in the media all the time, we're still at 20,650. what's that, about 500 points low the l-time hh. here we go, it's 9:30. tuesday morning, we're off and running and which way are we going? down slightly thus far. i've got to tell you a half hour ago, maybe an hour ago. futures were pointing to a 50, 60, 70 point loss, that's not what we've got. we're down 10 or 12 at the moment. plenty of red on the left-hand side of the screen and some green as well. i call it a mixed to slightly lower opening. how about the tech stocks? you've got to concentrate on these, this is where the money is flowing and by the way, those five companies are worth more than the gdp of france as we point out endlessly. 2.6 trillion dollars, okay? down of so slightly this morning.

that's not a selloff by any means, they are still at or close to all-time highs. i want to bring you up-to-date on panera. now, that stock is down this morning. it was up, i think about $20 yesterday, on speculation that somebody wants to buy it. starbucks was mentioned, dominoes pizza also mentioned. panera comes out and says, no, we're not in talks with anybody, and down it goes by $3. and panera at about 279.50. tesla is now more valuable and the ford motor company. opened on the upside very close to $300 per share. it's more valuable than ford and only a couple of billion dollar behind the market valley of general motors. we've been on this all day today and yesterday, i remain astonished. who would have thought, tesla?

ashley webster is with us, elizabeth macdonald is here and mike murphy from rosecliff capital. i'm sticking with tesla, i find it fascinating overtaking the ford motor company in value. i asked you 20 minutes what you think about this, tell us again. >> well, i think that they're pricing tesla like a technology company. if you think back a few years, there were announcements coming out, amazon is now worth more than macy's. amazon is worth more than this retailer and you think about it, of course they are. you see amazon today, you would think it's ten times what macy's is and rightfully so. that's the bet on tesla. i'm not telling people to go out and buy test la at $300 a share, buthat'what the market is telling u now. they're betting on elon musk and-- >> is there a shot that they're right, that tesla is the technology company of the future, are they right? >> they could be. what else can elon musk do the

technology. amazon were a booker, now look what they are. liz: wall street says the day of reckoning is coming. it takes a lot of money to build the factories, and cars and batteries, and a lot of people are doing that. stuart: the investors are saying that. liz: they're saying the day of reckoning will come. it has to spend a lot of money to generate that. and elon musk owns-- >> it's almost like built on optimism and hope it can get done. problems so much and teases us with great innovation, is he going to get to the finish line? we'll see. stuart: i can't get tough of tesla. i dismissed them before.

and the fabulous five, that's where the money is. they hit all-time record highs. all of those stocks hit record highs. amazon is up a bit more, 892 on amazon. mike murphy, you're the guy with the money, th the investment company the are you buying think of them in that? >> he own facebook and we're not buying more here. i didn't buy it at 100 so it's tough at 140. if i was going to buy any, i would buy apple. wall street is too long and i think there's apple. stuart: yahoo! plans to change its name to oath. o-a-t-h after the sale to verizon is completed. ashley. liz: they're going to merge. ashley: you want me to take an oath?

i'll take an oath. stuart: ydz i don't understand what it's about. ashley: and when yahoo! takes over and aol. stuart: oh. ashley: you've got it. the head of a ochlt lchlol overs behemoth, unstoppable brand, take the oath. liz: it's ridiculed as possibly the worst corporate rebranding, worse than new coke. they're saying it sounds like a heavy metal band the criticism on social media. what does it mean. stuart: i'm still trying to get used to alphabet instead of google. liz: that's irritating. stuart: it will take me a decade to get used to oath. >> i'll take oath over alphabet. stuart: we're down 10, 11 points, 20,640 as we speak. look at procter & gamble,

they're cutting the price of razors, too much competition from companies like dollar club. and they're paying too much for the razor, no, it's the blades. liz: people are sick of paying top dollar for razors, there's a price war. ashley: it's like digging for gold to get new razor blades, so expensive. >> what happened here, you had startups come out and disrupt this industry. there was no one else making razor blades, two old behey -- behemoths come out. you had dollar club. and harry's. and you signed up andhey come to the door. they put pressure on the incumben. the entire market. the startups are changing what's going on. stuart: i wish they made blades acceptable to different brands,

from this, that and the other. i've got blades i haven't used in 20 years, they don't fit. liz: you've held them for 20 years. stuart: i'm joking, i've been shaving for two years. you remember ronco, pocket fisherman, spray on hair, no comment. if you buy $5,000 worth of their shares when you go to the public you get a free counter top rotisserie oven. okay? now, that's ronco. we're showing amazon, ronco is the story. they're going public i think in the near future. ashley: in the near future. they're trying to raise 30 million. this is a company that's filed for bankruptcy twice and made a loss last year and some analysts says it's beyond. liz: i love the story. ronco, never change your name. we know the chicken ovens are half the revenue, but what a way to go. stuart: i wish we had a clip

from bass-o-matic. >> if you're making a decision based on an oven-- >> and selling commercial airlins to iran and i think more after the 30. ashley: 30 planes with an option for another 30 to a privately held airline in iran. stuart: rosecliff capital, does it own or intend to own boeing. >> we do not own boeing and we do not intend to. there's political risk it's tough to figure out at this point in time. stuart: you don't like old industrial-- i'm labeling boeing old and industrial. >> we focus on the start-up world, companies that are going to disrupt the boeings of the world. stuart: these technology companies have so disrupted everything. >> they have and not just tech, stuart, it's food, it's

clothing, the way you live your life. liz: razor blades. stuart: thank you very much, liz. next story, the new york fed says average household debt will reach the same level as it was in 2008, it will reach that level this year. big reason, auto and student loans. huge. what's with that? >> it is huge and read an article this morning how auto loans are the next sub prime crisis. everybody is trying to find the next sub prime crisis. there are tech companies looking to handle students handle students loans and auto lopez. stuart: 1.2 trillion of student loan debt and who would have thought we'd get it that. ashley: how much of that student loan is going to be

repaid. stuart: the government owns it so it dictates who gets credit and credit forgiveness. liz: why don't you dictate to the universities, stop gouging with tuition costs. stuart: a man with all of your children worrying about the future college costs. i'm just getting over it a new poll from pew, 58% say their vi of theconomy is good or somewhat good. that's the best level since the financial crisis. how about that, liz. liz: that's something and you know, the tracking of it, meaning the rate of growth, it's the highest top ever in the history of pew doing this sentiment. so, i always like to look at the flip side of it. does this mean that the obama administration for the last eight years had a gigantic x-ray blanket on the entire u.s. economy, demoralizing obama administration, the finger wagging, you didn't build that, the government, we can do everything. what these guys did, the obama administration, they took

emergency rescue measures for the bailout and treated them as economic growth measures. come to us and we'll-- when you see nonpartisan pew saying this, and that finding, that shows you where we were in the last eight years. ashley: and democrats and republicans are in agreement. that the economy is good. stuart: something is bipartisan. the reason why staples is on the side of the screen. staples is exploring a sale to a private equity firm, could sell for $7 billion or more, hence the price going up 14%. that's about it from mike murphy, you're out of here. go make some money. >> yes, sir. stuart: go for it, son. let's check the big board, we're down 20 points. 20,632. california state senate signs

off on a state-wide sanctuary bill, make it go a sanctuary state, i go new york the federal government and protecting illegal immigrants. full story on the formerly golden state coming up. later this week, china's president will visit mar-a-lago, even president trump tells it will be a difficult meeting, but we have leverage over china, we'll tell you in a moment. ♪

>> drawing back to almost break even point. the dow is down 4 points, that's it. that's where we are, just 15 minutes into the trading session. do, please, take a look at tesla and amazon. both at or very close to

all-time record highs. can you believe this? amazon is awfully close to $900 a share. tesla hit $300 earlier. new high there. what an extraordinary performance by those two companies. that's why we pick them out today. amazing. a california state senate approved a state-wide sanctuary bill. ashley, does that make california a sanctuary state? >> it would. prevent law enforcement from cooperating with immigration officers. and wait a minute, you're looking at public safety by allowing criminals. and they made that they would contact ice officers prior to the release of an illegal offender. i can't believe i'm saying it, but they request whether that would happen. there's a separate bill, this has been approved by the state senate in california and will go to the full assembly and hasn't been passed yet that

would create $12 million to pay r lawyers to defend illegal immigrants. stuart: we, most interesting. i don't know what to say. ashley: the once golden state says it all. stuart: all right. later on this week, president trump meets with china's leader and the meeting will take place at mar-a-lago the estate in florida. peter mauorici is with us. and some are worried that we may be walking into a trade war with china. i think that we have, however, enormous leverage on the trade issue with china. he think you agree with me on this. >> yes, but i think we need to look at this more broadly. it's not just trade, it's security issues like the south china sea, north korea nuclear arms. being more steeped in the details and having more experience, the chinese leader will try to basically tie up trump in knots and do what the chinese have done with every past president that's come in.

basically say, we need to talk some more and set up a process. we are at the tippingpoint with china. if we do not stand up to china across the board on all of these issues now, this may be viewed as the week when power really did shift across the pacific and china became the preeminent power. it's not like it's going to happen tomorrow morning, but if we don't take this opportunity, this crisis in korea is a golden opportunity to put china back in its box and if we don't do that, we're going to be-- our children will be very sorry for our cowardly action this week. stuart: now, at least two members of the trump team, peter navarro and wilbur ross have come out strongly and said we're already in a trade war with china. they don't respect our brands and our intellectual property and they export 400 billion dollars worth of stuff every year, more to us than we send to them. they are prepared to take, it

sounds like, a very hard line on china. surely president trump is going to do the same, isn't he? >> i don't think so because we have a tug-of-war inside the trump administration between the national economic council on one hand and peter navarro. and wilbur ross is limited to the textile. putting him in charge of that would be me on yankees baseball. they've moved navarro out of the white house to the house across the street. before they know it he'll be in colorado. gary cohn and others are wall street animals. they look how to make money off their clients. and running this administration is no exception. new york banks don't face much

competition from chinese banks, now, importing products into the united states and they have about as much regard for the poor struggling folks in reading pennsylvania and all the little towns dotted west outside of the u.s., where there's opioid addiction, boarded up windows and prostitution. minutia, look what he's done for them, basically foreclosed on old ladies. stuart: ooh. >> i think that trump has been pulled in the wrong direction. stuart: right, don't ooh me. look how these guys made their money. stuart: here is what iould expect at the end of ts meeting with president xi. i would expect a kind of non-descript statement in which china claims they're now on an equal footing with the united states, but in private president trump is very strong on china trade. that's what i would expect. are you going to disagree with me? >> i think he'll be very strong in what he says, but he won't come away with results. if you get a statement like that, what it means, not much is going to happen. look at wall street journal

this morning, the diary of the american dream or the epitaph of american greatness. it said that china has already revalued its currency and gone up a whole 1%, you know, and yesterday pronounced the truth on the trade war was that really america's industry was stronger and better off because of a $300 billion deficit. i don't know what they're smoking over there, it's something that's for sure. stuart: we'll leave it at that. we will leave it at that, peter. [laughter]. enough of that speculation. peter morici. we'll see you soon. >> take care. stuart: and check out the market scan. a third up about two-thirds down. the dow is off 12 points. >> a major newspaper in mexico shuts down after 30 years of operation. why? too many journalists are being murdered. the ug cartel is too violent.

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chao and gary cohn and had something to say about infrastructure. ash, elaine chao first. ashley: she said we know that american infrastructure is just quote, plain broken. it's a massive program and to spend a trillion dollars, a trillion dollars over ten years to improve the infrastructure. they say a problem is the permitting. it takes eight years just to get the proper permits to begin construction. she said we're going to cut that time. stuart: so it's a trillion dollars. what is gary cohn saying. >> air traffic control, he says that's an interesting infrastructure project. he said we're playing catch up. it will cut down flight times, tarmac times will go down when we get a proper plan in place. stuart: fix laguardia. there's a story about a newspaper in mexico that's shut down or about to shut down because so many of the journalists are being killed.

liz: and that goes to trump's build the wall. three reporters just killed recently, one shot in front of his wife and son. they're covering corruption and the drug cartels. 38 reporters have been slain in mexico since 1992. mexico ranks right down there with brazil and russia as being one of the most deadliest countries for journalists. stuart: and that's right across the border with the united states of america. liz: this newspaper has been around for nearly 30 years, now shutting down. stuart: lizzie, thank you very much. got it. next the top of the hour i'm going to spell out exactly what the obama team was doing, what were they up to before and after the election. my take on what looks like deliberate attempts to smear president trump. three minutes away.

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stuart: let's spell this out clearly. this is what the obama team was doing before and after the election of last year.

susan rice was president obama's national security advisor. she asked about government surveillance of people in the trump campaign, and the trump transition team. the names of the people who surfaced in those reports are masked, that is, kept secret. she ordered their names revealed. and then, by order of the president, that information was made available to 16 other intelligence agencies. then, came the almost inevitable leak. sure looks like a deliberate attempt to smear trump's team, a deliberate attempt to imply there were in cahoots with the russians. dirty tricks in the, dream. not the first time ms. rice has been embroiled in scandal. she went on tv to spin benghazi as the result of a video. she knew it wasn't you true but she was defending her bosses, president obama and secretary of the state hillary clinton. step book a moment. what would be the reaction in president bush's national

security advisor had encouraged the leak of information about the obama team? talk about a double standard. same with the media. this mning the susan rice allegations are t onhe fnt page of "t newk times" or "the washington post." they were ignored by nbc and abc. cbs defended ms. rice. fascinating, isn't it. when the revelations look bad for president trump, you never hear the last of it. it is headline news for days on end. nbc says the trump presidency is in crisis. when the deliberate undermining of the president is revealed, silence. it is just not right. the second hour of "varney & company" is about to begin. ♪ stuart: i want to update the daily, the susan rice story. "the daily caller" is now

reporting that susan rice ordered spy agencies to produce, quote, detailed spreadsheets involving the surveilance of president trump's stance significance seem. that is the daily caller reporting that as we speak. left-hand side of your screen. that is gary cohn and transportation secretary elaine chao, at the white house. ashley: talked about elaine chao. talked about spending a trillion dollars to improve the country's infrastructure next 10 years. we all know, the americans know that infrastructure in this country is quote, just broken. the permitting process to get these construction projects underway as they currently stand are way too of a drag. get eight months to get all processing of permits. that is going to change. gary cohn talking about up grading the air traffic control system in this country. it is antiquated. we need to catch up with the rest of the world. stuart: he is talking about

upgrading the power grid. i'm laughing, because i understand didn't he mention elon musk's idea, of a tunnel from dc to. new york city? >> elon musk proposing a tunnel between d.c. and new york that would accommodate high speed trail and dot trip in one hour. stuart: i poo-pooed elon musk. tesla at record high. stop it. i will remember that for -- okay, quick check of your money, let's do that the dow industrials are down 20 points. we've been there most of the morning. 20,620 where we are. update the tech stocks. we always do this, big deal. we've got a slightly lower, this morning, except for amazon, which is awfully close to $900 per share. look a panera. there is all kind of speculation about it being sold to another company. they deny it. the stock is down now after gaining significantly yesterday.

the price of oil, $50 per barrel. no impact on the stock market at all. we're at 50 and change. that is where we are. 50.54. where we are. moving up a little bit. get back to my take at the top. hour. let me update this. the daily carler reports that -- "the daily caller" ordered spreadsheets on trump campaign officials. here is the quote. the idea that ambassad ric improperly sought the identities of americans is false. there is nothing unusual about the making these requests, when serving as a senior national security official, whether democrat or republican. that is accurate. i want to bring in katie pavlich, "town hall" editor and fox news contributor. this is a huge story in my opinion. just got bigger with the daily caller revelations. your point, please.

>> yep. is anyone surprised susan rice would use her authority to go after president obama's political opponent? i don't think so. when you look at the interview that susan rice did recently, denying that she knew anything about what the chairman of the house intelligence committee was talking about in terms of unmasking incidental collection on american citizens, she said she had no idea, and, she also noted at the same time, well, i have no idea about what was happening, i do know what was happening was legal and lawful. so that is what she is going to use moving forward. democrats have gone from it is crazy that the president, meaning president trump ever suggested he was spied on, to, well, susan rice was just doing her job, when it comes to collecting information on citizens and people they deemed as a threat. i mean that is where they have gone in terms of the spectrum here. stuart: but you have to go back to that tweet on a saturday morning at 6:30 a.m. where president trump said, mr. obama,

ordered the bugging of trump tower. maybe he didn't order it, but maybe there is an element of truth underlying the whole thing. >> we also don't know. stuart: what is your thought. >> we don't know. we're at the beginning of this, the investigative reporting into who was ordering the unmaking of these u.s. citizens and how incidental collection was used for political purposes. the issue of illegality is not on whether susan rice was allowed to look at the information. of course she was allowed to look at the information as part of the national security council, but, the problem is that it was used and has been used to spread information in the press, send information up to capitol hill to hurt the trump at administration. that is when it becomes a problem. so they're going to argue it was legal and proper. they were looking with people in contact with russian adversaries. i guarranty you this, stuart, if

hillary clinton won presidency she would not be looking at contacts with russian officials which is normal behavior. stuart: i think it's a disgrace that the media is simply ignoring what is an extraordinary story, it is an absolute disgrace. katie, thank you very much for being with us on an important day. >> thanks, stuart. stuart: how about this one? attorney general jeff sessions orders a sweeping review of federal oversight of local law enforcement put in place by the obama administration. dan patrick joins us now, the tenant governor of the great state of texas. mr. lieutenant governor, welcome to the program. good to see you again. >> always good to be with you, stuart. stuart: we reported the facts of the case here. attorney general jeff sessions i'm going to review all of those reviews of local police behavior. spell this out in normal terms so we can all understand exactly what's going on here, please.

>> well, in the broad view, stuart, president obama wanted to control everything, down to the lowest level. you remember he wanted to be sure that boys and girls showered together in every school. that is how he drilled down into the granular details of everything about life. with law enforcement he wanted to take over every police department. he wanted to put in obama's rules. he has done that on health care. he has done that on education. the difference between that administration and this administration, president trump understands the tenth amendment. he understands states rights. he understands that the federal government does not know better in washington how to run a police department, schoolhouse, hospital in any state or city or county in the country. stuart: is there some belief on the ground here, on the surface, that those investigations of local police departments were skewed towards one side of the argument? that is underlying this whole thing, isn't it? >> it would appear that way, stuart. look at ferguson where they

ordered a total overhaul of that police department, yet they found no fault with that original shooting. there was no hands-up, don't shoot. there was no police action there, but yet the justice department, that cleared, if you look back at all these cases last year where we had police officers killed or other people killed, time after time, whether it was baltimore, ferguson, wherever it s, the police were cleared, when they got to court or by the justice department, yet the obama administration wanted to take over those police departments. and we want the federal government, surely in texas, every lieutenant above in the country, feels the same, get out of our business. this is our business. we will take care of those who cross the line in whatever area of government we oversee, but we want the control. we want our money in block grant for medicaid. want money in block granted for education and. stuart: greg abbott will sign legislation that imprison

sheriffs who do not cooperate with federal immigration laws. you're nodding your head. you're the lieutenant governor of texas. i'm sure you're behind the governor. it seems a little bit harsh for people outside of the state of texas. shaking your head. that is not the case? make your case, sir. >> as president of the senate, as lieutenant governor impresident of the senate, on february 8th we passed out senate bill 4, strongest anti-sanctuary city bill in the nation. i hope it gets to the governor's desk and he signs it t would fine cities, number one or counties or local jurisdictions if they don't keep retainers that i.c.e. asks for on criminals here illegal. it could be a fine of 25,000-dollar a day per person they release but beyond that, if we find activity someone been released by the sheriff here where i sit in austin, in travis county today, sally, sanctuary city hernandez, that is how she campaigned, she is letting criminals out. if one of those criminals commit as crime that local district attorney could prosecute her and

put her in jail. basically senate bill 7 removes sovereign immunity from a state or citizen being able to sue the government. let me give you some stats real quick, stuart. you're a numbers guy. from 2011, until january of this year, in texas alone, in texas, we put into jail over 212,000 criminal aliens, about 2/3 were here illegally. we charged them with over 566,000 crimes, 1100 murders, over 6,000 sexual assaults, 500 kidnappings, 67 drug offenses and other crimes. this is serious about, stuart. when any city mayor like rahm emanuel or anywhere in the country or de blasio in new york, if they were mayors in texas, our bill would put them in jail if anyone they release commits a crime. could put them in jail, the da cod prosecute them. this iserious business, every sheriff in the country that are a border sheriff because dealing with this issue. stuart: you're tough guys. lieutenant governor dan patrick of texas. thank you, sir. >> thank you.

stuart, happening right now, president trump has a full schedule ahead of him. he is preparing for the weekend when meets with china's president xi xinping. he admitted it will be a tough meeting. we'll be all over the story, guaranteed. vice president mike pence going to capitol hill meeting with freedom caucus members, that are republicans. they're trying to get a deal passed. could it be signed before easter? a lot of speculation about that today. varney after this. -- more "varney" after this. ♪ [student] i can just quit school and get a job. [ex student] daddy's here. [wife] hi [dad] hey buddy [son] hey dad [wife] i think we can do this.

[chancellor] adam baily. [chancellor] adam baily.

stuart: town hall meeting going on. they're discussing infrastructure. congressman kevin mccarthy is leading the discussion. ivanka trump speaks in just a few minutes. then president trump.

we'll bring you up to speed with the president's remarks when they occur. now president trump says the united states may have to go it alone if china will not help us stop another cree's aggression. ambassador john bolton joins us now. fox news contributor, american an enterprize institute scholar. mr. ambassador. seems to me like we are now taking a much tougher an adversary in one of the most dangerous parts of the world. what do you say. >> long overdue. through republican and democratic presidents alike we engaged in 25 years of negotiation with north korea which the north koreans have abused, taken advantage of right along. we're at a place where we have very few good alternatives. the real issue here is whether china is going to stop being schizophrenic in its approach to north korea saying yes, we don't want north korea to have nuclear

weapons on the one hand. on the other hand being unwilling to do, unique capability to do to prevent it from happening. i think there needs direct talk here. i think the answer is rue unification of two koreas. essentially merging the north into south korea. china has some problems with that as you might understand, but i think there's a deal there between the united states and china. we should have started talking about this 10 or 15 years ago. better today than not at all. stuart: i need you to update us on the susan rice, exploding story. because, there ambassador, "the daily caller" is reporting that she ordered spy agencies to produce detailed spreadsheets of members of the president trump's transition team. this was going on for some time. way i understand it, she ordered production of spreadsheets of conversations including donald trump. this is exploding scandal if

there every was one. >> there is a lot of misinformation out there. most of people on television talking about this have never seen the transcript of an intercept. they have never seen a minimized or deminimized name. i've been in this situation and the fact is, that whether i ask, as i did when i was at the state department for names to be, to be deminimized to get the actual person's name, or you're susan rice, the national security advisor, you have to have a national legitimate security reason. you have to give that to the nsa or anybody else llecting the information. th is why she i think is in real legal jeopardy. she didn't say to the nsa i want these names for political purposes obviously. i'm sure she said it was for national security reasons. that is a fraud on the government. that is potential violation of 18 usc section 1001, that forbids misstatements to the government. anybody else who participated with her is, has got the same legal problems.

so let's not hear this business, oh, she was entitled to look at the deminimized names. i don't agree with that. stuart: well, i'm not so sure she is worried about the legalisms of this, or the minutia. >> she will be though. stuart: yes, seems to me the obama team was using the machinery of government to spy on and undermine the incoming administration. that is the way i see it. how about you? >> that is both completely inappropriate use of intelligence information and i think illegal, even before you get to the leaking, which is unquestionably illegal. stuart: yeah. >> so i think the real question here, what did the president know, and when did the president know it, as howard baker said in the watergate hearings. i'm not talking about president trump. i'm talking about president obama. come on, mainstream media, ask a few questions. stuart: thanks for joining us today. big day today. >> all right. stuart: "varney & company" will return after this.

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rated pg-13. [ screams ] stuart: how about this one. ralph lauren, cutting offices and some stores and jobs. the stock is down 3%. kate spade says it needs more time to consider the buyout bid from coach. needs more time. oh, down 15%. staples is exploring a sale possibly to a private equity organization. that is putting the stock up to 13%. new poll, it is from pugh, reputable organization. 58% say their view of the economy is very, or somewhat good. that is the best response, the best level since the financial crisis. i have to say this is trump optimism liz e.

liz: it is gotten out of humorless frozen party of democrats know how to regulate the country. the regulatory state suppressed optimism, suppressed optimism for the last eight years. they have never seen this jump ever in history of doing this polling. it is up, double-digit spike in confidence and optimism. stuart: just over the past year. liz: just the past year. what the non-partisan pugh is sayingentially people are feeling better. american pple out there, trump voters are sayg enou with the russian meddling story. you haven't closed the sale. you haven't delivered the goods on the story. this information in the swing states, bernie sanders quoting disinformation too. we know russia has been doing propaganda for decades. but excuse me, trump voters saying enough already. we hired the president to do job growth, to fix the economy that obama wrecked. stuart: not going to argue with that, lizzie. liz: sorry, i'm very blunt. stuart: ron cobrands, verge

mattic, pocket fisherman, they are going public. if you buy a big chunk of stock you give a ronco free gift. what is the gift? ashley: there is more. you get a countertop rotisserie oven. i tell you after 5000 shares. that is the most popular item that ronco sells. stuart: on the screen? ashley: rotisserie oven. if you invest $1000 into the company, you get 20% discount on ronco.com products. liz: i love the story. ashley: it's a great story. this is a company back in the '70s, '80s invented late night infomercial. it was doing pretty well. pulled in 150 million a year at one point. fall inch on hard times. they have no great products. they're struggling. lost money last year. probably a last-ditch attempt. stuart: don't forget what they call top cover?

thats for men who are bald on television. like black spray paint, put it on top of your head, nobody can tell you're bald. stuart: yours is real. mine is not. moving along, meeting with the president and members of the administration. it is about improving the business climate in america. president trump speaks shortly. his daughter, right there, is speaking now. we're on it. full details in a moment. oh, let's listen in. >> the chancellor germany when she was in town a few weeks ago, because germans really led the way on this front. the swiss have done a great job more recently. in england we've seen a lot of folk consist on apprenticeship training. thinking about the role of vocational education and making sure it is incentivized for both students to consider it as a viable option, and partnering with the private sector to

really insure that what's happening, education taking place, whether community college, or at apprenticeship programs, matches, matches ultimately their needs. so skilled-based education. the last thing we're looking at is workforce retraining. so, for people who have been out of the workforce, for a number of years, looking to reenter, or people currently in the workforce, but they're in a field where jobs are rapidly being displaced. so how do we take large groups of people and think about how to retrain them in areas where their skills will be more relevant to the workforce of the future? so it is a big topic. there are tens of billions of dollars allocated across over 14 agencies on this topic. so another area similar to what we were talking about with infrastructure, is really taking a look at all the programs that are out there, consolidating those programs and working collectively.

we had a meeting last week where we had the secretary of education, wilbur, we had the secretary of -- >> mick mulvaney was there. >> mick mulvaney was there, thinking how we insure everyone is working collectively with these goals in mind. >> great, thank you. secretary ross, are there ways to incentivize the private sector to it further their investment in workforce tr? many of them have taken a leadership role. stuart: this is clearly top level meeting. you see senior members of the administration right there. the president will speak momentarily. let me backtrack a little bit. earlier at that meeting ivanka trump revealed it is indeed a one trillion dollar infrastructure plan, okay, spread over 10 years but that number came out a trillion dollars. and then gary cohn, top economic advisor to the president, he was talking about infrastructure as well. talking about the national grid,

the power grid, is in trouble. that is an infrastructure project and a half. he was talking about air traffic control. you can make an enormous difference if you upgraded air traffic control. he also mentioned elon musk's idea of a tunnel. ashley: yes, a tunnel between washington, d.c., and new york that would accommodate high-speed rail, and cut the trip down to just one hour. stuart: bottom line, they're talking serious projects. ashley: yes. stuart: serious money, ready to go, that is what they're putting the word out about with ceos. liz: with 50 ceos. they come from ge. they come from vornado realty trust, h sb c bank, mastercard and new york stock exchange. these are major business leaders at the meeting lessening to the ideas they're talking about rejuvenating, renovating the economy. stuart: grover norquist is with us. grover normally talks about taxes, tax cuts. he is all for it. give me a comment on a trillion

dollar program and apprentice ship idea, renovg air traffic control. comment please, from your conservative tax-cutting perspective what is going on the left-hand side of our screens, infrastructure meeting with ceo's? >> sure. looking at the faa to be modernized. i don't know whether you want to call it privatized or corporatized, or taken out of government control would be a tremendous step forward. canada has done this. britain has done this. a number of countries have. you can dramatically reduced cost, and if it is privately organized get real investment into it. you want to make sure that, that there are fixed costs involved. you get a contract for x-amount of time, that somehow there aren't going to be fees that keep increasing but faa reform could be very, very helpful. stuart: who will pay, grover? you're talking a trillion dollar infrastructure plan over 10 years. $100 billion a year.

who pays? >> it is very important to say, hopefully the people who use it, whatever it is, infrastructure is not just things that the government owns. it is pipelines. it's ports. it's rail lines. a lot of things when we just need is for the federal government to get out of the way. the most important thing they could do stop getting in the way of pipelines. stop getting in the way of mining. stop getting in the way of more roads. stuart: interesting. those are infrastructure projects which are not paid for by the taxpayer. >> yes. stuart: they're paid for by private enterprise which intends to use the project, like a pipeline for example. >> to roads toll roads. how do you feel about toll roads? >> for new roads. no problem at all. for new bridges no problem at all. always the question how you organize it if it already has been paid for, but i rather do a toll road rather than additional taxes paying for the situation.

you have more control. stuart: ivanka trump what what is common, eight-year delays because the government is in the way. this is right up your street, grover. you're a small government guy. >> speeding up permitting saves billions of dollars. i hope they consider those savings as part of the trillion. and getting rid of the davis bacon act passed in the 1930s, require you pay union salaries, rather than the average salary when you do anything that deals with federal dollars, which is roads, and bridges. we get about 25 to 33% less for our money if it goes to washington, then washington sends it back to the states because of the davis bacon act, prevailing wage act t was put in to keep african-americans north to take union jobs. it has a sad, disgusting history. we ought to get rid of it. it bankrupts and costs us so much when we try to build

bridges and roads. stuart: i need your comment on this. it's a headline from "politico" which tends to lean left, that is my opinion. president trump taking the lead on tax reform. the president is doing the negotiating on this one. what do you say? >> one, it is possible. two, the president and the house of representatives have already been negotiating and working on this for almost a year now. remember the president wanted to go to a fifteen% rate. the republicans in the house were at 25 at corporate level. they came to 20. both the house and president decided to go to 25% for subchapter s, pass-through corporations, partnerships. the president cepted wt the house had put together going to full and immediate business investment. he moved to where the house was on the individual side. so that the house and president have been moving together. they have worked together a lot longer on this tax bill than

they did on the health care bill. so, i think we're a lot further along with presidential leadership and house leadership. and the senate's been, they have been in touch with the senate all the way through. stuart: grover, hold on a second, notice on bottom right-hand corner of screen, the market turned positive. maybe talk after trillion dollar infrastructure plan. maybe that is helping. let's listen to ivanka who is holding the floor. >> create in the next generation of graduating students the skills they need to what is really happening already in a very robust and dynamic way in the private sector because of need right now. there are over half amillion jobs that can't be filled because the students graduating don't have skills relevant for those positions. we want to bridge that gap. we want to take the programs and grow them in real and measurable way. >> that is a great point and one of the things we have to do part

of that, we have to rebrand vocational education. need to make sitting honored as your father said so often, a skill needs to be honored. and fortunately we have someone in ivanka knows a little bit about branding. you have also been a vocal person about the need tome power women in the workforce -- to empower women in the workforce. today is equal pay day nationally. how will this workforce initiative support your goal of empowering women in the work place? >> well my father wants to create 25 million jobs in this country and women need to fully participate for that to be realized and for that goal to be realized. women are starting businesses at enormously fast rate. we need to empower them and to fuel that growth. when we think about workforce development and one component of

it, i was talking about earlier, stem education, while 48% of today's workforce are women, only 24% of people in stem fields are female. and when you think about where the jobs of the future are coming from, that's a very frightening statistic. we're actually moving in the wrong direction. over the course of a little over a decade women's participation in science be, engineering, math and technology has actually slid from just around 30 to now in the low 20s, depending on which of those disciplines. so it's really important we think about the introduction of girls in stem fields in our school system. making sure that, that they're really participating in these fields because when we think about equal pay and the challenge we have to finally level the playing field, i think this will be a very important component when we think about

the future to doing just that. >> that, we talked about it in the first answer. this is going to be a holistic approach. unfortunately and fortunately all these topics were talking about today are big topics. stuart: all right. as the gentleman was just saying, these topic is are big topics. yes, they are indeed. what they have been talking about so far a trillion dollar infrastructure plan. some details are coming out. gary cohn wants to talk about renovating the air traffic control system and upgrading the national grid, the power grid, i should say. so all of this is taking place in washington, d.c. it is getting publicized all over the place. the dow jones average has now moved to the ps column by the way. before thistarted it was in the minus column. and shortly president trump will be addressing that town hall meeting. grover norquist, still with us. wrap this up please. seems to me we have very

positive views on the future of the economy because of things like this. the word getting out that president trump is pro-business, around wants to spend big in our society to get us some growth. i think this is going down very well. what say you? >> absolutely, but again, it is not just the amount of money you spend, it is how wisely or unwisely you spend it. eight years to permit a road or to have to do an environmental study to widen a road as if caribou moved into the the fourth lane in the last six months, that is nonsense. that needs to be sped up. that dramatically dropses cost of a new road and wider bridge and pipelines and so on. the faa reform, you're talking about moving tens of thousands of jobs out of the government and into the private sector. so there are some real savings here. davis bacon, davis bacon, davis bacon has got to go. why throw money into something

when a third to a quarter is misdirected for political purposes. many states have ended their mini davis bacons. west virginia recently did. wisconsin recently did. needs to be done in all 50 states. certainly in washington as well. stuart: i do have to ask you about one thing that could really mess things up. that is the vote at the end of this month where we have -- let me listen to ivanka then. she is right there. sorry. >> has done quite a good job on this front. that is why so many apprentices are coming up through the industry. taking some exam millions, bringing that to manufacturing, bringing that to technology. >> i'd like to challenge the people in this audience to come up with the better way to label vocational. stuart: i do apologize. i interrupted grover. grover, look, there is something coming up at the end of this month and that is a vote in congress on keeping the

government going, funding the government. beyond april. conservatives will screw this up, say, we're not going to agree to that unless you agree, 100% these terms? is that possible? >> it is not possible conservatives could do that. it is possible silly congressman could do that, who don't understand politics is a team game. conservatism would have nothing to do with it. stuart: is it likely it will be held up? >> my hope after what we went through on health care, delay that caused, potential damage that has done to moving us forward on tax reform, is that people a little more sober about the idea that there is a republican majority in the house and senate and president. we don't have to play these games. everybody who's jumping in now wanting to talk about health care rewrite was invited at six different points to work with the leadership on writing this bill. if you don't show up to the

first six invitation, don't show up at the last minute and decide you need to be editor in charge of the whole thing. stuart: real fast, grover. i hear all this talk about maybe they will resubmit the health care bill at the end of this week, and get a yes vote. do you heard anything like that? >> it is entirely possible. it does look as though we're coming to an agreement, something we could have done a month ago if people had been focused on it back then. people need to get their homework in on time and they need to show up when the stuff is being written, not at the end of the day. a lot of things we need to do in right of center perspective. we have a lot of time to do it. used to be only time with president's attention, was obama. stuart: vice president pence has taken the microphone. listen in, please. >> how about a round of applause for the last panel. ivanka, dan and wilbur. a great privilege to welcome you to the white house.

thank you so much. i want to thank everyone involved in the partnership for new york city. michael corbett, stephen schwartzman. it is an honor to have leaders gathered in the room here with us today. i know the president is on his way over and my great privilege to share a few thought in the midst of this important conversation on the topics that you're covering before i intruce my friend and the 45th president of the united states. but let me s first and foremost, the companies represented in partnership for new york city, are all american success stories. you have our admiration. you have our appreciation. the businesses account for 7 million jobs. you add over one trillion dollars to our economy each and every year. what's more important is the people behind the numbers, and topics that you have covered today were all about more jobs

an more opportunities for americans who are anxious to climb the ladder of success in the organizations you represent and the companies all across this country. first and foremost on behalf of the president and whole too many you heard from this morning and distinguished members of our cabinet, thank you. thank you for what you do. thank you for your leadership. i think as you will hear this morning in the dialogue that is about to commence, that america has elected a businessman as president of the united states and he is committed to being the best friend business has ever had in the white house. [applause] we've already seen the results since literally when the election was called at, i think it was about 4:00 in the morning, that morning, wasn't it, ivanka? we were all together, we've seen renewed energy and dynamism in

the american economy. the first two jobs reports i'm sure you're aware, thanks in no small part to the leadership represented in businesses in here in the room today. the first two jobs report show under president trump, nearly 500,000 new jobs have been created in the first two months of this year. businesses and consumers haven't been this optimistic in decades. in fact we just learned from the national association of manufacturers that in their historic quarterly report, 93% of manufacturers are optimistic about the future that represent ad 40-point increase in optimism since the last report. [applause] we think that is, that is evidence of a vote of confidence in our new president, and in his vision, to get this economy moving again by putting common

sense principles into practice. from the very outset of this administration the president has been energetically working to roll back excessive regulation and red tape. leaders in congress, and i see leader mccarthy who's with us today, have been producing under what is known as the congressional review act, legislation to roll back onerous regulations that emerged in the waning days of the obama administration. and in the coming days president trump will be signing even more bills into law, rolling back that avalanche of red tape. the president's also taken decisive executive action on expanding american energy. the keystone pipeline and the dakota pipeline. we are, we continue to work earnestly with congress for a new future on health care reform. the president and i remain confident that working with the congress which will repeal and replace obamacare with health care reform that will work for the american people and work for the american economy.

and of course, in the offing before we reach the end of the year, the president is determined to roll his sleeves up, work with the congress and pass the largest tax reform in a generation. business as i said from those numbers about optimism, businesses has clearly gotten the message. but today's conversation, is all about learning from job creators, represented in this room, how we continue build on the momentum in this economy, particularly focusing on infrastructure, government modernization and workforce. i can tell you that the subject that i came in at the end of, i know as much a topic today with ivanka and with wilbur, having to do with improving the quality of our workforce, expanding opportunities for what is known as career and technical education, what we back in indiana yana call vocational education is a real passion for our president.

we look forward to partnering in ways we continue to encourage investment and create opportunities for expanded career and vocational education. so today is all about, is all about really giving you an opportunity to share your thoughts. it's part of an ongoing conversation this administration has commenced since the very first day the president took office, listening to business leaders, listening to every-day americans about ways that we can bring about his agenda to make america great again and to have our economy growing and expanding in a way consistent with the most powerful economy in the history of the world. i think the president is in the side chamber. so let me say to all of you, the opportunity you have today is to hear from a man who i have a chance to sit with every day. what you're going to see

first-hand is what i see each and every day. and that is, that is not only just a businessman made president, but you're going to see a leader, informed, focused, decisive, and absolutely committed to make america great again. it is my high honor, and distinct privilege to introduce to all of you, my friend, the 45th president of the united states of america, president donald trump. [applause] >> thank you, mike. good morning. hello, ivanka. >> i know you know a few people in the room.

>> all the killers from new york. looking at all the competitive, great talents, great builders. >> i have to give you a heads up, ivanka chaired one of the sessions before this. tough act to follow. >> very tough. >> vice president pence listed some amazing accomplishment that have taken place since your election and your5 days in office. the stock market -- 75 days in offers. the stock market had almost unprecedented sustained growth. unprecedented confidence from manufacturing sector and business sector leading to massive private sector and manufacturing job growth. you gotten rid of regulations that were unnecessary and job-stifling. you strengthened the border and military. you nominate ad great supreme court justice among many other things. how does that feel. >> we're getting unbelievable credit for what we've done other than the mainstream media which gives us no credit whatsoever but we are getting tremendous

credit. if you look at the real estate industry, the mining industry, the farming industry, if you look at any major industries you look what is going on. even today, i was very happy as i read this morning early, that our trade deficit with others has gone down very considerably in the last short period of time. it is having a big impact. as you know i'm meeting with the president of china on thursday and friday in palm beach, florida and i think we're going to have a very interesting talk. we're having, have a lot of respect for him. i've spoken to him numerous times but we have to do better because our deficit with china as you know, $504 billion. that's a year. >> that is incredible. >> that is enough for a lifetime. even steve would say that. that's a year. so we're going to have a great meeting. i'm sure we'll have a fantastic meeting. we'll talk about a lot of

things, including of course, north korea, a problem and that's really a humanity problem. so we're going to be talking about that also. >> you have made it a driving force in this administration to bring in the best minds we can from the private sector, to listen intently to them and to take decisive action. how important is that, and how important is it to reform government to bridge the gap between the private and public sectors? >> well i did. i brought you. i brought gary cohn. i brought a lot of great people. my friend steve is helping us out. we have a superstar committee of 22 people. every time somebody calls me, i say, steve, put them on. no, we want to keep it at this level. the heads of biggest companies, they all want to be in our committee, right, stephen? steve likes to keep it very small. they go off and disappear and we'll put others on. we had great meetings. we learned a lot. one thing that did come up and it came up yesterday, gary cohn,

where is gary? is here? can you bring that chart please. do you mind? this was just something, this is sort of incredible, that is so beautiful. you're not quite. this is, to build a highway in the united states, now this was just done yesterday. i saw it for the first time. i said i'm speaking to some of my friends, who are builders. really great builders. and they have gone through the process. we've all gone through it in new york. we call it the zoning process in new york. but you start up here, an this is anywhere from a 10 to 20-year process. 17 agencies. you have hundreds and hundreds of permits. many of them are statutory where you can't even apply for the second pmit until six month go by. at the process this, is to build a highway. this is simple highway. these are the agencies. so 17 agencies.

how many different steps, is it? >> d.j.? >> [inaudible] >> 16. >> 29 different statutes. five different executive orders all apply to this process. this is indicative. this is not a specific project, but this is the type of process that a government, this is state government would have to go through to permit a highway federally. this is just federal. not state regulation. >> can take any from 10, if you're really good, 10, to 20 years. then they vote and you lose. they don't want it. and it costs sometimes hundred of millions of dollars just to go through the process. thank you very much. that was a great job you did. be careful, don't fall. i don't want to have you fall. will be a big story in the paper if you go down. so, i just saw that yesterday. gary cohn walked in and showed it to me. for no reason, i said you have to do me a favor. but a lot of you, you're such pros, some of the best pros in

the world sitting in this room, you understand it. it's a process. now i have always liked it, gave people who could go through the process an advantage like jerry, but it gave us an advantage, if you could get through the process but getting a building approved in new york is a horrible, horrible thing. and that is nothing compared to when you get into the highways and the dams. doesn't even talk about dams anymore. you know, hydropower is a great, great form of power. we don't even talk about it, to get environmental permits are virtually i impossible. one of the best things, hide he drove. we don't talk about it anymore. we've come to a halt. a tremendous person we have in charge of epa, scott pruitt. who is an environmental person. he wants clean air, he wants clean water, but he doesn't think it takes you 26 years to get a permit to build a building and to have jobs. which time those companies are usually gone, out of business, et cetera.

we're really speeding up the process. we'll try to take that process from a minimum of 10 years down to one year. i said, can't we make it four months? can't we do it in four months? and, there is a certain logic to that but we'll be satisfied with a year but it won't be anymore than a year. so we have to build roads. we have to build higays. talking about a major frastructure bill a trillion dollars, perhaps even more. we have to do our jobs. if we say we're giving to new york city hundreds of millions of dollars to build a road someplace, it doesn't help if they can't start, because it is going to take seven 1/2 years to get the permits, even to redo a road takes years to get the permit. you have a road that is there, you want to redo it, you have to get new permits for kind of asphalt you're using, the kind of concrete you may want to use and if we're going to give all of this money, there was a very

large infrastructure bill that was approved during the obama administration, a trillion dollars, nobody ever saw anything being built. to this day i haven't heard anything being built. most of the money went and used it on social programs. we want this on infrastructure. i'm working with steve roth and richard lefrak, two friends of mind and great builders. they know how to get things done. they know how to cut red tape. we'll get them advantage having what we have. i see elaine is here. so important, doing incredible job, by the way, secretary of transportation. elaine will be working and we'll set up a committee headed by steve and richard, we'll cut a lot of red tape. we don't want to say, send, a billion dollars to new york and find out five years later the money was never spent because we're going to be very strong it has to be spent on shovels, not on other programs.

and, in the last case, a lot of it was spent on other programs. if you don't spend the money, if you have a job you can't start within 90 days, we'll not give you the money for it, it doesn't help us. we'll be very strong on that. they have to be able to start within 90 days. >> president trump, some of the great business leaders in the country hire if okay with you they have a few questions. >> great. hello, jerry. [laughter] he didn't have to say his name. he was ready to say his name. we know, we know jerry. jerry spire, everybody. >> mr. president, you're doing a great job. we're all really grateful to you for the sacrifices you're making. hope you heard that. i think from new york's point of view we send a lot of money into

the economy, as a number of people have said. it's over a trillion dollars. we're worried we're going to have a problem with congress. >> with deductions. >> that too, that too. rious programs that help the city. the city is doing fine right now. even the yankees are doing fine. but, what we're really concerned about is the future. do you have any advice for us? >> look, i love new york and, you know in some ways we're all lucky that i'm from new york, because new york has unique problems. so does los angeles, so does chicago. there are places that have unique problems. one of the problems that you have is debt and deductibility.

trump: so you do have a -- i call it a tail of two cities. you have different interests. but i am watching over

everybody, jerry. you're in good hands okay. you're in good hands. believe me, you can tell the people of new york. even though i didn't win new york state, i should have won new york state. >> mr. president, kathy, i want to return to a conversation we just had with with ivanka, dean, and wilbur on jobs, the workforce, and the future. so as we think about that and as we think about our skill sets in new york city alone, our high school public high school graduation rate is at 70%. but the readiness of our students for college and careers is only 37 -- is assessed at 37%. so as we look at the pace of change, we look at the digital transformation we all see in the business and marketplace, and we look at the skills, this disconnect between what employers need and what our students coming into our workforces are prepared to deliver, it would be great to get your thoughts on the

priorities of the administration around and what i like to call not the future of work but the work of the future because the work of the future sounds pretty visionary, so if you could give us those priorities. trump: okay. so before you -- so you're giving me numbers from new york. you're a proud new yorker, but you're giving me numbers. why is it doing so badly? tell me. why are the numbers so horrific in terms of education and what happens when somebody goes through school and they can't read -- they graduate from high school, and they can barely read. so what's the answer? >> yeah. first i would say as we look at new york, new york has made enormous progress in a decade. by the way, a 40% increase, so we're making enormous progress. trump: see how quickly that's changing? >> we have a lot of progress, we have a lot of work to do. we talked earlier about public

private partnership, apprenticeship model, which we have a beautiful apprenticeship model that works and brings our next generation of leaders. so i do think there's a lot we can do by relooking at funding programs. we talked earlier about consolidating many of the programs out there. we're all trying to make our individual impact, and we can make a huge impact together. trump: sure, and i know you work very hard on it. charter schools are another thing that people are talking about a lot. and some of the charter schools in new york have bn amazing. they've done incredibly well. people can't get in. i mean, you can't get in. i don't call it an experiment anymore. it's far beyond an experiment. if you look at so many elements of education and so excited to see what's coming, what's happening in the country. if you look at the numbers, the numbers in new york, the numbers in chicago are very rough. the numbers in los angeles, the cities, it's a very rough

situation. common core, i mean, we have to bring education more local. we can't be managing education from washington. when i go out to iowa, when i go out to the different states, they want to run their school programs locally, and they'll do a much better job. and, look, these are some very good people in washington, but you also have bureaucrats that make a lot of money and don't really care that much about what they're doing or about the community that they have never seen and they never will see. and i like the fact of getting rid of -- common core to me is we have to end it. we have to bring education local, to me. i've always said it. i've been saying it during the campaign, and we're doing it. betsya have to sabetsy devos is doing a great job. tremendous track record. but she has one of the toughest jobs of any of our secretaries. to me, she's got one of the toughest jobs.

there are pretty tough jobs out there. we're going to spend a lot of money, a lot of talent having to do with education because there's nothing more important than education, and we've got to get those numbers in new york better, and i think they will be better. and a lot of people, a lot of the greatest people i know in new york, they're totally in love, including ivanka and jarod. they're so much involved, and it's so important to them the word education, and it's happening, and i see it happening in new york very much. but it's happening elsewhere too. i think we're going to have a great four years. >> mr. president, i know you have a pressing issue to deal with. steve and mike i think just wanted to thank you for attending today and maybe make a final comment on behalf of the -- thanks a lot for being here and thanks for everybody

for being here. it's been really interesting day, and you've had everybody of importance at the event. i think it's terrific in terms of the stuff you're trying to do to modernize the government, educate, and so forth, and i think we have to keep a focus on that because the outside world doesn't always get the message that that's really what's going on. because you're doing profound things. taking on enormous embedded issues, and i think with the kind of effort that can be marshaled, you can do amazing things, and that's on behalf of mike corbin and myself, chair of the partnership and the trust gets rotated from person to person every two

years. i want to wish you very good luck with the chinese. that's an important thing, as we go all know, and i think there's a real opportunity to make progress with them, and you should have a good time in florida. i hope the weather's good. trump: yeah, the weather will be beautiful. thank you, steve. i just want to finish by saying we are absolutely destroying these horrible regulations that have been placed on your heads over -- not eight years, over the last 20 and 25 years. you have regulations that are horrendous. dodd-frank is an example of what we're working on, and we're working on it right now. we're going to be coming out with some very strong -- far beyond recommendations. we're going to be doing things that are very good for the banking industry so that the banks can loan money to people that need it. i speak to people all the time. they used to borrow money from banks to open up those in nevada where to open up a

pizza shop, he had three shops, he had a bank, he said, you know, at that time he called me mr. trump because i hadn't won yet. but he said mr. trump, i can't open up anything. i can't do anything. the banks don't even -- i had a bank for 20 years. now they don't even take my phone call, and i was always a very goo customer, so i haven't been able to do what i do. they can't do it. i mean, the banks got so restricted, and i've always said, and some people get insulted. but, you know, it's not necessarily the man that's making a lot of money that's running the bank. you look at the folks from government that are running all over the banks, they're running the banks and the people that are really, you know, the head people, they're petrified of the regulators. they're petrified. they can't move. the regulators are running the banks, so we're going to do a major haircut on dodd-frank. we want strong restrictions. we want strong regulation. but not regulation that makes it impossible for the banks to loan to people that are going to create jobs.

but we're doing -- that's just one example. we're doing so many cuts on regulations, and we have a book on regulations and if you add them all up, it goes up to the ceiling three times over. it's just one after another after another. it's just like that chart. i thought that chart was so descriptive. and every industry is just like that chart, and that's to build a simple roadway or highway, that's what you have to go through. and we're going to be able to get rid of 90, 95% of that and still have the same kind of protection. and we want safety, and we want environmental. we want environmental protection. i mean, i've won awards on environmental protection. i'm a big believer, believe it or not. but we want that kind of protection. we want clean air, and we want clean water. but we shouldn't have to get the approvals from 16 different agencies for almost the same thing. so we have a country with

tremendous potential. we have the greatest people on earth, but we have to use their potential, and we have to let those people do their thing. and with that, i just want to thank you all. i think you're going to see a much different environmental than you've been used to over the last -- again, 20, 25 years. we're going to unleash the country, and i'm willing to take the heat, and that's okay. i've been taking heat my whole life. but in the end, i know it's the right thing to do, and we're going to create a lot of jobs. we have 100 million people, if you look. the real number isn't 4.6%. they told me i had 4.6% last month. they said i'm doing great. i said, yeah, what about the 100 million people? a lot of those people came ot and voted for me. i call them the forgotten man and forgotten woman. a lot of those people, a good percentage of them would like to have jobs and they don't. you know, one of the statistics to me is just ridiculous. so the 4.6 sounds good but when you look for a job, you

can't find it, and you give up. you are now considered statistically employed. but i don't consider this people employed. if you look at what's happened with ford and with general motors and with fiat chrysler and so many other car companies you see what they're doing back in michigan and ohio, they're leaving. they were going to mexico and many other places, they're now staying here. now, i did say -- you've seen me say it many times to big auto companies at meetings. it's okay. enjoy your new plant. please send me a picture, i'm sure it's going to be lovely. but when you make your car or when you make your air conditioner, and you think you're going to fire all of our workers and open up a new place in another country, and you're going to come through our, what will be a very strong border, which is already -- you see what's happened. 61% down now in terms of illegal people coming in.

way, way down in terms of drugs pouring into our country and poisoning our youth. way down. general kelly's done a great job. but when you think you're going to sell that car or that air conditioner, it's not going to happen. you're going to have a tax. and the tax may be 35%. and you know what? every single major company that i've had that conversation with has said, you know, we've decided to stay in the united states. it's amazing. and you would have thought they would have said this, frankly, for years. but nobody's ever said it. and we've lost close to 70,000 factories over a relatively short period of time. 70,000. you wouldn't believe it's possible to lose 70,000 factories. 70,000. you look at a map of the united states. how many factories can you lose? we lost almost 70,000 factories. and i will tell you that's not happening because now they're all staying here, and they're all expanding here. ford announced last week a

massive expansion of three of its plants. that was not going to happen. believe me, if i didn't win. so good luck, everybody. enjoy yourselves. you're my friends. you're amang people, and we're going to put you to work. thank you. [applause] . stuart: and there you have it. i'm going to call that vintage donald trump. he was using his appearance today capturing the headlines, capturing and commanding the airwaves. he used it as a bully pulpit for school choice. he used it as a bully pulpit for deregulation and above all, he used it as a way to speed up the permitting process so the infrastructure projects, which he's got in hand are able to go very, very quickly. i think we've got the videotape where the president held up a huge scroll of all the permits required to build a road. there you go. this is vintage trump. those are the permits required which sometimes take over 20

years, separate permits to build a road. the president says not going to do that anymore. we're going to speed things up. peter, i thought that was a pretty good performance. >> i thought it was great and every time he exacerbates or frustrates, he should play that tape because that's what he's good at and that's why we elected him. stuart: he also mentioned $137 billion worth of tax credits as a way to start the financing of a-trillion-dollar infrastructure plan. liz: 137 billion. this is where the left wing is going to come in to attack him because it's about private partnerships with the public sector. he's saying, listen, we've got to get this country moving again. he just said 70,000 factories have been shut in the u.s. stuart: yep. liz: he needs china to enter the world trade organization in 2001. so that's what he's talking about. stuart: he got into some detail of the infrastructure plan, broadband hospitals. liz: yes. stuart: air traffic control, revamp it. do immediate good. the power grid, revamp that.

he likes hydropower but as he says, you can't build a dam these days. you can't even say the word these days. and there was a pretty strong performance to get the country moving. that's how i would wrap it up. any further comments? liz: well, the one thing he has also said that you don't hear rarely, he's saying stop with the state and local unions mucking up the process. they get first dibs often on these contracts. knock that off. i'm going to put a three-month deadline to get these projects out there. you've got to do it within 90 days. give us a deadline, get the deadline, get the work starte s. stuart: get it moving. get on with it, f heaven's sake. while that was going on, the market turned around. this was not huge turn around. when he began speaking, the dow was down 8. well, now it's up 18. i'm not going to say that that is a turn around because of president trump. no, i'm not going to say that. however, we've got some big names that are moving today. will you look at this? amazon is now very close to

$900 a share. up another nearly $7 as we speak. microsoft approaching 66. we have alphabet down a little bit. apple is down from its all-time high not that much and facebook's at 141. ashley. ashley: yeah, look at caterpillar stock. leading the dow. not a big surprise when you talk about a trillion dollars of infrastructure. stuart: next blockbuster is tel tesla. now up four bucks. by the way, we should repeat this. tesla is now worth more than the ford motor company and only just behind general motors. peter, i think that is extraordinary. >> tesla will be the number one valued car company, and it's extraordinary when you think about it. so far this year, tesla sold 25,000 vehicles. 25,000. last year ford motor sold

6.5 million cars. so there's a lot of focus on what this feels like apple in the early days. stuart: by the way, people like me who have been somewhat skeptical of elon musk, well, he took us to task. those people are worried about the stock price getting overheated. he went on twitter and called people like me to task. whatid he say, liz? liz: he said stormy weather in shortville. all those shorts betting against the company, well, looks like you were wrong. it should be pointed out that's 29% of the float. they could be putting a floor under tesla stock. this is a company that has lost more the last five years whereas ford has made more than 26 billion in profit over that five years. listen, elon musk owns 27% of the company. is he cheerleading it higher? is it priced like a tech company? should it be priced like a car company? you have to add a lot of factories, spend a lot of money to get those cars out there and the batteries out there. stuart: that means he's the ceo, and he owns about a quarter of the stock. that means he's worth -- he's got about $10 billion worth of

tesla stock in his pocket. that's what he's got. >> he does. and one of the thing that's interesting to me i think he looks very closely to steven jobs. and ten years ago today, steven jobs used to call it apple computer and then just apple. now calling it just tesla. stuart: just passed general motors in total market value. >> so my prediction of a minute ago was right. stuart: i've got to tell you. >> i can go now. stuart: that is an historic event. ashley: it's amazing. stuart: this is ford and general motors. now eclipse buy tesla. liz: now surpassed it. now at 52.9 billion. versus gm's 60. stuart: i'm hesitant to call tesla a car company. it's a technology company. we should make that. more valuable than general motors. how about that? now this. the story of the day. political story of the day. president obama's national -- president obama's national

security adviser. susan rice unmasked reveal, that is, the names of trump transition officials who were caught up in surveillance. and listen to this from the daily caller. they are now reporting that susan rice ordered spy agencies to produce quote detailed spreadsheets involving the surveillance of members of trump's transition team. dana loesch is with us, radio host of the dana show. all right. dana, welcome to the program. i don't know how the media is going to contain this. they're going to try, but i don't know how they're going to be able to contain this and just not mention it. >> no. and i completely agree with you. this is pretty astounding, and it's dirty politics is what it is. i know that there are some people out there who are defending susan rice and saying, well, you know, this is just she wanted to see who was included in these conversations. perhaps they argue it's because of a national security concern. i don't really buy that

argument, and i don't buy her ignorae, nor do i buy her story just a month ago because keep in mind, this is the same woman that went out on national television and lied to everyone and said that, well, the terrorist attack on 9/11 in benghazi, well, that was ultimately the result of a video. this is the same woman, stuart, i know you remember, who said that bowe bergdahl served with honor and distinction. shortly thereafter he was court-martialed with misbehavior. so she has zero credibility, and i would argue anyone who wants to play party politics and defend her actions in this manner, well, they're going to lose credibility simply by associating with her and trying to defend this. this was a political hit job the dissemination of this material and the unmasking of these names. it was petty politics to get at the trump administration then in campaign phases. that's what this was all abou a. stuart: well, if you dig deep enough here, it looks like there was an element of truth in president trump's early morning, saturday morning

tweet where he said obama had bugged trump tower. okay. technically not true. but these revelations suggest that there is an element of truth buried in there. serious stuff. >> it is, and he was discussing this in the context of it being a political hit job. and the fact that their names were made public, that these were unmasked, their names were unmasked and all of this is circulated throughout various intelligence agencies within the obama administration, that right there completely just that underlines trump suspicions, and that's the whole point. it was an absolute hit job and the actions of susan rice and the actions of anyone defending this, they're culpable as well. stuart: dana, i want to talk to you about judg gorsuch. looks like we've reached the point where you can't do anything in america these days because you've got to have 60 votes in the senate. i think we're about to sweep that away. do you think that sweeping away and going nuclear, so to

speak, that's a good thing? we can start getting things done? >> honestly, i would love to avoid it. i would love to avoid such a situation. unfortunately, back in 2013, harry reid didn't really leave the senate with much of a choice. and if we want to discuss changing of the roles, well, harry reid is the grandfather of that. he's the guy who modernized the nuclear option. and, by the way, i know that all republicans would like to thank harry reid for doing that back then because it's actually going to go so well and work for republicans now. but that's beside the point. the point is that democrats have no principled objection to someone like neil gorsuch, and they would love to bring up the name of merrick garland who numerous republicans had legitimate principled objections to him to be nominated for the supreme court. with neil gorsuch, all of the same individuals who are protesting his nomination now, stuart, these are individuals who wholeheartedly endorsed him back in 2006. so suddenly now because it's the trump administration and because gorsuch is going for supreme court, they realize they're falling and now they want to go ahead and stand up.

not on principle but petty politics. to see someone say something along the lines of, well, this is what you get when you do this with merrick garland, that's not how we should be viewing the supreme court. and i wish that half of the senate chamber would grow up a little bit and realize that there is a mandate from voters that's been established on november 8th. this is the nominee that america wants. stuart: dana, i'm terribly sorry. i have to interrupt you -- i'm sorry, dana, we've got to interrupt you. we've got the manufacturers coming out. let's listen in. >> town hall style with some of the great ceo leaders based out of new york and partnership of new york. together they represented over 7 million u.s. workers and over a trillion dollars to the u.s. economy. and we focused on some of the major forward-thinking initiatives of the president and this administration, including infrastructure and the infrastructure package that we're working hard on,

including modernizing government it, specifically modernizing the it infrastructure the government, which is in desrate need of overhaul and modernization, both for the efficiency of government and for the security of government. and lastly on workforce development, there's no question that this administration is bringing back hundreds of thousands of skilled and technology-related jobs, and we need to invest in training our workforce of tomorrow so that they're ready for this demand. truly my pleasure to turn over to some of the great ceos and business leaders of which offered us wonderful ideas that we'll be learning from and will help influence our policy. thank you. >> hi i'm deanna, ceo of life insurance of america. we as new yorkers have same concerns as all americans. we spoke to happen about infrastructure modernization and the positive impact that could have on new york, as

well as the rest of the country. >> hi kathy, we were happy to participate today with leaders and the administration to hear about things like just talked about. really preparing our students to being the workers of the 21st century. so very important to us as well around infrastructure, tax reform, so we talked about all the big agenda issues that this administration is tackling, and we look forward to working with a public, private partnership around. thank you. >> hi i'm steve schwartzman, i'm cochairman of the partnership for new york city. i've had a really terrific start to our day with the president, vice president, and a lot of the other major people in government in washington. we're going to be spending time with the congressional delegation in new york with a number of senators, with

leader mcconnell, speaker ryan, and also with our senator chuck schumer from new york. it's really important for people to come to washington. learn what's going on, and try to affect the dialogue to improve the country. because that's what we all want to achieve. thank you very much. [question off mic] . stuart: okay. these are the ceos just emerging from the white house having had the town hall meeting prosecute president trump, vice president pence, and some other members of the administraon. it was very much a bully pulpit statement from the president, which may have had some impact on the market when the president started to speak, the dow was down 10. now we're up 41 points. a very positive projection from the president, especially about the-trillion-dollar tenure infrastructure program. all very positive stuff.

liz: yeah, he needs fast victories, and it looks like he's moving forward with both an infrastructure and a tax reform plan at the same time. infrastructure, people are talking about maybe we'll just do it next year. but after the collapse of obamacare reform, he's now pushing forward doing those two things at the same time because it involves tax credits to build out infrastructure. stuart: sounds like a plan for growth, peter. >> it does sound like a plan for and what i like is emerging these two things together. they belong together. stuart: and look at that. amazon has hit $900 per share. that means it has a market value of $429 billion. amazon at 900. now look at this. tesla as of right now, tesla is worth more than general motors. tesla is more than ford motor company. that's quite a development when you think of it. i know we've been harping on this. but who would have thought that tesla would come from nowhere and be more valuable than general motors and the ford motor company. liz: i mean, ford last month made nine times more cars than tesla.

tesla has more than $2 billion in losses over the last five years. stuart: you know what? peter, you put your finger on it. tesla's not a car company. okay. they sell cars. they're a technology company. >> they're a technology company and look for them to make big steps into technolog and battery, they're building batteries for their own car. those people don't sell your gm, it trades at a five times multiple and a yield. that's a great stock. but it happens at a very different business. stuart: following your president's town hall, which i say is a very positive event for business, had a very positive view on the economy, how about this? it's a pew poll, reputable organization, the pew organization, here's what they say. 58% of the respondent ant respondents is good. that's a sign of true as a slogan says, true economic

optimism. >> what i like most about this is the group that has come around the most in the last ten years is republicans. they were very uncomfortable with the direction of the economy, they're now on fire with the economy. i think this is good news and what we have to do now is deliver into that confidence. . stuart: okay. i want your opinion on this. the new york federal reserve says average household debt will reach the same levels as 2008, very high level, they'll reach that level this year and that's mainly because of student debt and auto loan debt. >> yeah. this has been a big shift and something worth watching if you go back to 1957, there were a handful of credit cards, by 2007, over a billion credit cards and, yes, now we're back to $12.5 trillion in debt. the big change i is that a trillion of that used to be mortgage-related household debt. and it swapped. one third, two-thirds with student loans and car loans. and car loans is what's

driving a lot of the growth in our industry, we're borrowing more for cars than we ever have. stuart: really? ashley: well, plus the automakers have been given financing. ashley: have trucks and suvs going just gangbusters. but if you have lots, like i have, i like to look at inventory. there's an inventory spike and the spike is all of these spar cars. they're not selling them very well. which means shop. you're going to get a great deal. stuart: that's the point, isn't it? sla is at 301, more valuable than ford and general motors. that i the big news of the week, i would guess to say. now, the big political story today is that susan rice, what she did.

interference from the outside. now our next guest says while the obama administration interfered in israel's 2015 election. and, by the way, they got away with it. david reuben is with us, and he's with the shiloh israel children's fund founder and president. you know a thing or two about interfering with elections. your charge is the israeli election. how did they do it and what did they do? >> there were billboards all over the country that said anyone but bb, meaning the prime minister of israel, netanyahu. and it was widespread. and it only came out after the elections that there was an organization of far left organization, very pro palestinian, hence antiisrael called one voice. and they're working together with another organization called v15, meaning victory in

2015 and those -- the one voice organization received $350,000 from the state department and the two organizations joined together -- stuart: america's state department. >> the united states state department during the obama administration. stuart: $350,000. >> yes. stuart: to an organization that opposed netanyahu. >> absolutely. and within a couple of months of receiving that donation, israel went to elections

stuart: what you're saying was interference in a foreign election, then the obama team got away with it. >> it's absolutely true, and it was investigated by a senate permanent subcommittee -- stuart: okay. >> which confirmed that this information is true. they did not confirm any legality, and then it dropped afterwards. stuart: now, president trump met with egypt's president, al-sisi, that was at the white house yesterday. you must know what's going on inside that discussion. who said what the whom? speculate for me. >> oh, for sure. well, i -- first of all, it's important to point out that sisi came to power in egypt by overthrowing mohamed morsi -- stuart: yep. >> -- of the muslim brotherhood, okay? that same muslim brotherhood

that calls for, and i quote, the destruction of judeo-christian civilization from within. stuart: okay. >> okay? this is the muslim brotherhood that barack obama supported. stuart: okay. >> and he was right on board with morsi. when sisi overthrew morsi, obama was very upset, and relations between obama and sisi were terrible. now that trump -- stuart: president trump's got a good relationship with al-sisi, presumably. >> well, they're developing a good relationship. al-sisi, i should point out, has been fighting terrorism in -- not only has he been fighting the muslim brotherhood, he has been fighting islamic terrorists from isis who were active in the sinai desert which borders israel. stuart: okay. >> so he is probably the leader of a muslim country in the middle east, the one leader that

is outspoken and very acve acting against the islamic terrorism. stuart: okay. >> so i think that the meeting, the meeting was most likely very productive, and i think that they will be developing a good relationship. sisi, by the way, has a very good, discreet relationship with israel. he can't -- stuart: secret. >> yes. he can't come out and say he is pro-israel even though we ostensibly have a peace treaty with them. because in the islamic world, that's just not acceptable. stuart: it's not exactly pro-israel, he's content to be at peace with israel. that's where we stand. >> yes. stuart: i appreciate you being with us, thank you very much. met late last night with members of the freedom caucus maybe to present some changes to the health care bill. senator mike lee joins us now, republican from utah. senator, always a pleasure. welcome back to the show.

good to see you, sir. >> good to see you, thank you. stuart: now, do you think we've got some movement on the health care bill, meeting between vice president pence, the freedom caucus, senator rand paul plays golf with the president over the weekend? is there some movement in your direction towards the conservative direction on the health care bill? >> it sounds like there is some movement going on. there's certainly been a lot of effort at both ends of the capitol. there's been an effort to meet with people across the ideological spectrum among republicans in the house and senate to find some areas of compromise, something that can bring us to agreement on an obamacare repeal package. i haven't yet seen what they're presenting to the house. i look forward to seeing it in writing. stuart: is it -- there's a lot of talk that there may be a bill represented to the house this week. is that a stretch, do you think? >> well, it seems pretty fast to me. again, i'd like to see language

before i could indicate where i thought it had a chance of passing. but we're talking about just a few days between now and the deadline that some have suggested as to when this might be introduced. it seems a little hasty, we want to make sure we get it right. i'd have to see it before i could tell you whether it could pastor or how fast that might occur. stuart: president trump a few minutes ago used a chart to demonstrate how hard it is to build a road. for the benefit of our viewers who may not have seen it, i'm going to roll that tape again. here it is, and listen in, please. >> my friends who are builders, really great builders, and they've gone through the process. we've all gone through it in new york. we call it the zoning process in new york. but you start up here, and this is anywhere from a 10 to a 20-year process. stuart: senator lee, that is red meat for you, isn't it? >> well, certainly, especially insofar as we're talking about

federal regulatory impediments. that's a big problem, because this results in everything getting more expensive and more difficult for the american people. it results in more moms and dads spending more time stuck in gridlock traffic rather than spending time with their children, people paying more for every good and service they procure in the market economy. this helps no one other than maybe a few government bureaucrats and a few experts who are hired to walk people through this byzantine labyrinth of regulatory stagnation. this is something that through the federal government alone cost the american economy some $2 trillion a year. that's an enormous amount of money, and that's up from $300 million a year just 20 years ago. so we've got to look at the problem, we've got to address the fact that these are resulting from laws made not by elected representatives, but by unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats. stuart: sir, you sit on the senate judiciary committee. the senate will vote later this week to confirm neil gorsuch. looks like we're going to have

to go nuclear to get him confirmed on to the supreme court. what do you say? >> well, first of all, you have to remember that back in november of 2013 the democratic majority at the time made the decision to take the nuclear option on the executive calendar. and at the time they said, well, we don't intend for this to apply to supreme court nominees, but they applied it to everything else. it has been applied to literally everything else since then. we're talking about article iii lifetime judicial nominees, cabinet-level positions, subcabinet-level executive positions, people appointed by the president requiring senate confirmation to serve on boards and commissions of various sorts. it's applied across the executive calendar. so it begs the question why exactly wouldn't this apply naturally to supreme court nominees? all of the logic, all of the arguments that they used to explain their decision to go nuclear in december -- in november of 2013 applies equally in this context, and i think that's where we're headed. stuart: sir, i don't see a

downside to the republican party in going nuclear on this. i just don't see it. >> well, again, a lot of the reason why i think that's right is it's already happened. it happened three and a half years ago. they went nuclear at the time. there's nothing left to nuke in the executive calendar. stuart: senator mike lee, thank you for joining us, sir. appreciate it. >> thank you. stuart: california state senate has, is approving a statewide sanctuary bill. i think that would make the whole state a sanctuary state. >> yeah. it's headed to the state assembly and then on to governor jerry brown's desk for signature. it basically says local -- they can't use state and local governments to detain, report or arrest illegals. this is a real pushback on president trump. this is the first time we've seen a sanctuary state bill progressing so rapidly. now, the democrats there are saying we have a quarter of the country's illegals in our state. we will defend the right of

illegals for due process. we'll give them safe harbor. the gop is saying, hey, wait a second, you're letting criminals in. stuart: peter? >> well, one of the things, thank god someone out ott there has a brain, they did change the law at the last minute. if you're a convicted felon, a murderer, a rapist, a bank robber, you are going to get reported to the i.c.e., you're going to get reported to the feds. this is not a complete get out of jail free. so this bill which now cannot be -- because of the way they passed it -- can't go into effect until january 1, i would say it's gone from absolutely crazy to something that's just an annoyance. stuart: let's see what the trump administration does about that if it is, indeed, approved. check that big board, this is just about the high of the day, getting close to 20,700. we're up 44. the market started to move up after the president addressed that ceo town hall. look at the price of procter & & gamble, too much competition from the start-up guys like the

dollar shave club. virtually no movement for the stock. back to the big political story of the day, susan rice unmasking the names of trump transition officials caught up in the surveillance of trump tower and the trump administration, actually. judge jeanine pirro next on that. she's also got a new show. it's called "you, the jury." here's a clip. >> somebody died. >> i know, you killed her. >> in a country divided to the core -- >> you a racist? >> we hand the full power of the law to the biggest jury in history. welcome to the new face of american justice. this is "you, the jury."

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so when you need a plumber, you can count on us to help you find the right person for the job. discover all the ways we can help at angie's list. because your home is where our heart is. >> i'm nicole petallides. stocks have turned higher, commodities also higher as we have kicked off this new quarter under some pressure, but now you can see the dow is higher by 39 points, the nasdaq fractionally higher, the s&p 500 hovering around that unchanged line. taking a look at the winners and losers on the dow, we're seeing cater or pillar, winner -- caterpillar, winner. goldman sachs likes it going forward. nike, on the other hand, to the downside as it's switched from a hold to a buy. looking at the infrastructure, president trump has been focusing on this, saying that the bill may be topping $1 trillion. this group doing well today, and

some of these names are up 40 and 103% this year. also watching the banks very closely as trump says going to make it easier to banks to loan money, new regulations there. start here, five a.m. i'll see you there.

stuart: a late update on the significant political story of the day. the daily caller is reporting that susan rice -- that would be president obama's national

security adviser -- she ordered detailed spread sheets on trump campaign officials. that information was made available to 16 other intelligence agencies and subsequently leaked. the information was obtained from surveillance of those people. judge jeanine pirro joins us right now. this seems to me to be a very, very serious proposition here -- >> it is very serious. stuart: they were surveilling trump people and subsequently the information was leaked. very bad. >> everybody wants the know who unmasked the names of those americans who may have had discussions with individuals who were being wiretapped. stuart: well, she ordered the unmasking -- >> well, i don't know -- stuart: -- but she did not leak. >> she's saying, what they say now is that she is the one who requested that they be unmasked -- stuart: yes. >> not necessarily that she ordered it. these are people who know how to dance with prosecutors, they

know how to go back and forth with the federal statutes. and so we know she's a liar, that's number one. we know it from benghazi. we know that she sells the obama playbook. she says bowe bergdahl served with honor and distinction. she also went on those five sunday talk shows and said benghazi was all about a video when we know why that wasn't the case. hillary clinton wasn't going to get caught up in that, but this woman was willing to do it. now the question is, if she is engaging in the obama playbook, she's going to and admit9 that possibly she asked. she's not going to say that if she knew that it was ordered, but now she comes around to the end of the story and says there's always -- there canning be a legitimate reasoning for the unmasking of these names, for national security purposes, whatever law enforcement purples there might be. stuart: it might go further than this. if they've got these spread sheets detailing all these conversations including donald trump, you've got a spread sheet

out there, then president obama makes it easy for that information to be released to all other intention agencies, that's asking for a leak. that's setting it up. >> that is called circumstantial evidence so that as a prosecutor i'm not so much looking at what she said, although it seems she made an admission. you tie that in with what this marilyn farcus said, what you got is the circumstances of these ledgers along with what she has done and what she has asked and the timing, and you might be able the make a case. the leaking of this information ultimately to the media was to destroy donald trump. the timing of it was pretty much after he got the nomination. they're like, whoa, this guy may be president. stuart: political dirty tricks at the highest level. looks like, looks like. >> it looks -- stuart: hold on, i've got to save some time -- >> my new show. stuart: i want to run a clip. it's called "you, the jury." roll the tape. >> you killed her.

>> in a country divided to the core -- >> jeremy, are you a racist? >> -- we had the full power of the law to the biggest jury in history. welcome to the new face of american justice. this is "you, the jury." ♪ ♪ >> the issues that we see play out in the courtroom are issues that play out in courtrooms across the country. they can be about discrimination, social media, neighbors hating each other. and now for the first time america gets to sit as a jury and actually vote. stuart: wait a second. [laughter] the audience -- you try a case, is to speak, or is it a case or an issue? >> well, we try, actually, a case. some of the hottest issues ripped from the headlines, the kinds of things that we talk about at the water cooler, you know, the clash of gay rights and first amendment, the limits of free speech, trolling on the internet. i mean, these are all issues that america talks about. we've got the best lawyers in the country.

and then ultimately, america votes. stuart: but the defendants, are ey real defendants? >> yeah. these are real cases -- stuart: what happens if jury, the audience -- >> america's the jury. stuart: what happens? >> these are civil cases, nobody's going to jail, don't worry about it. [laughter] >> america decides and in the end, you know, i'll come out, and we don't know the answer, and i'm going to say, america, you got it right or wrong. stuart: friday, april 7th, 9 p.m. eastern time on the fox news channel. >> the big one. stuart: oh, very funny. you mean we're the little guys? [laughter] >> i'm just quoting someone else. you know who i'm talking about. stuart: subtle impulse. [laughter] you know, you're all right -- >> this friday, 9:00. you've got to vote though. you've got to vote. you can vote on your fox now app and text it. it's going to be good. stuart: thanks very much indeed, judge. good stuff. check that big board, up nearly 50 points, 47 to be precise, 20,700, that's where we are. back in a moment.

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stuart: well, look who's with us, chris rondo, the ceo of planet fitness, and he's joining us live from the floor of the new york stock exchange. i'm going to say that planet fitness is the gym for every man, the average guy. but, chris, before we start, i

think you've got some news for us. tell us. >> yeah, sure do, stuart. thanks for having me. we actually in march for the first time ever broke ten million members, so it's a big milestone for us, for the industry. we now currently have over ten million members. stuart: okay. now, i have to be honest, i've never been in a gym in my life, and i've never used a piece of gym equipment in my life, so how are you going to get someone like me into your gym? >> that's a great question, because that's what we focus on mostly. our whole gym model is based on the first-timer or casual gym user, 80% of the u.s. population does not belong to a gym stuart. so we're really going off the -- after the 80%. membership's $10 a month and the right equipment. stuart: $10 a month, that's it? >> very affordable. stuart: i don't have a contract to stay with you for 15 years, $10 a month? >> yeah, that's it. since the '90s. stuart: i'm told you have pizza

night the first monday of each month. >> sure true, nationwide at all 1300 locations. it's kind of our way to break down the barriers, come as you are, you know, camaraderie between the members and the staff a like. if you work out a couple days a week, you deserve to splurge once a month. stuart: i'm told that's the largest membership of any gym group in america. is that accurate? >> yeah. my estimate is at least double the next closest. correct. stuart: okay. so who's your competition? >> you know, people ask me that all the time, and i feel like bawdz i'm going after the 80% that doesn't have a gym membership, i look at my competition as the movie theaters and restaurants, quite honestly. [laughter] you know, we have a lot of competition, the next closest has about half the amount of units we have. we have 1300 stores, we opened 195 last year, we plan to open 200 this year as well. stuart: forgive me for saying this, but i'm of the opinion

that maybe the gym industry has peaked, that maybe the next generation of 20 and 30 and 40-somethings won't be quite as interested in gyms. how are you going to counter that? >> yeah. i think just the opposite. we almost look like the rest of the industry is getting fitter, and we're going after that first-time or casual gym user. i look at our competition fighting over 20%, and i'm going after this whole group of people that is underserved for so long. just the general awareness of wellness continues to accelerate, and i think we are really in the sweet spot for that. stuart: don't worry, we're all narcissists, so we'll keep on taking pictures of ourselves, and we all want to look good all the time. chris, thanks for joining us. great news, ten million members. >> appreciate it. yes, sir. stuart: we will have more "varney" for you after this.

. . stuart: they're all laughing at me. not been in a gym in my life or

used a piece of equipment. i do want to thank, elizabeth and ashley and peter kernen for not lag the at me too much. here is the opportunity for the next guy, neil cavuto, to have a good ol' chuckle at me. neil: i live in a big glass house. who am i to, unless you count subway sandwiches curling them. not the same. not the same. thank you, stuart. we are following up on what you have been reporting all morning, with the president focused on jobs, jobs, jobs. holding a ceo town hall. infrastructure a way to bo way beyond our roads and bridges is on tap. take a look. >> we're talking about building roads and highways. we're taking about a major infrastructure bill of trillion dollars, perhaps even more and we have to do our jobs. if we say we're giving to new york city hundreds of millions of dollars to build a