said 59 minutes ago. liz: here is the problem for this country as bill mcgurn also argued. the special counsel's office sits outside the constitution. it is extra constitutional. what is going on in this country? stuart: division is going on. time's up. neil, it is yours. neil: let's get to the point where all this started. we were sliding on concerns trade pact with china is getting delayed and delayed. mr. mueller came to the microphones as you know and essentially threw out all these imuponnerrables, there is no way to say that the president committed a crime, no way to say he did not. if we had confidence that the president clearly did not commit a crime we would have said so, clearly implying he did not, there is apple room for the house to take the baton to do something. the markets further slid on that, uncertainty of that brings a summer-long hearings of

impeachment to get to the bottom of this, they would be dead on arrival in the united states senate. president commented, nothing changes from the mueller report. tweeting there was insufficient evidence, therefore in our country a person is innocent, the case is closed. thank you. but apparently that is not the end of it. wall street as he like to say abhores uncertainty. 28 of the dow 30 stocks are feeling very uncertain about the prospect for not only individual companies could be a disruptive summer between hearings, no progress on the trade front. signs china is playing hardball with us. throughout all of this, we've been watching interest rates slip slide away right now, we have inverted yield curve. we have three months paper, overnight paper, that is yielding more than paper you commit to for 10 years. that almost always brings on a slowdown, or at very least a recession. add it all up with the ten year at 2.21%. you have growing fears something

bigger could be afoot. this too shall pass, but not the underpinnings that are a concern in wall and broad. let's go to the white house. blake burman is following developments. reporter: we heard first reaction gave from president trump sending out a tweet, at this point, in his estimation the country needs to move on, move forward. this is the tweet in full from president trump earlier this afternoon, write, quote, nothing changes from the mueller report. there was insufficient evidence and therefore in our country, a person is innocent. the case is closed. thank you writes the president. he is reacting to one part of robert mueller's eight to nine minute press conference from earlier today as mueller did not fully exonerate the president from the potential charge of obstruction of justice. mueller said his team did not go down that road because you cannot indict a sitting president. so mueller said, that was simply not an option.

>> after that investigation, if we had had confidence that the president clearly did not commit a crime we would have said so. we did not however make a determination as to whether the president did commit a crime. reporter: mueller laid out the initial case for the investigation saying there was widespread effort by russia to target the 2016 u.s. presidential election and to harm without mentioning her by name, hillary clinton. >> the first volume of the report details numerous efforts eminating from russia to influence the election. this volume includes a discussion of the trump campaign's response to this activity as well as our conclusion that there was insufficient evidence to charge a broader conspiracy. reporter: the top democrat on the house judiciary committee, congressman jerry nadler releasing a statement within the last handful of minutes. he says the president is lying

on multiple fronts and adds quote, given that the special counsel mueller was unable to pursue criminal charges against the president, it falls to congress to respond to the crime, lies and other wrongdoing of president trump and we will do so. speaking of congress, neil, robert mueller says, going forward, that he is not going to testify before congress. he says that 440 plus page report is out there. it was written carefully. that is his work. he wants to move on. as you know many democrats are hoping that mueller will testify publicly. however, mueller also announced that the special counsel's office is done. it closed up. he personally is moving on. he is going out into the private life. because of that, he doesn't have protections, meaning in theory he could be subpoenaed, even though robert mueller says this is the last we have heard from him, that is still very much appears tbd. neil? neil: blake, thank you very,

very much. we're hearing from the top republican on chair of the committee, jerry nadler, republican doug collins speaking of russia probe, it is time to move on from the investigations. we've also gotten a station, a comment, a statement from sarah sanders. the special couples sell, she writes has completed the investigation, closed the his office and closed the case. mr. mueller said specifically he has nothing to add beyond the report. therefore does not plan to testify before congress. the report was clear. there was no collusion, no conspiracy. the department of justice confirmed there was no obstruction. special couples sell mueller also stated that attorney general barr acted in good faith of handling with the report. after two years the special counsel is moving on with his life. everyone else should do the same. so what happens now? to former federal prosecutor fret tease see on if -- fred tecce if robert mueller's

comments give -- cory booker adds there is more need for impeachment hearings. is he right on that fred? >> no, he is not right. quite frankly i find mr. mueller's comment to be absolutely reprehensible. in the part that bothers me the most is that the bedrock of our system of justice is that people are presumed innocent unless proven otherwise by a beyond a reasonable doubt. he could have said, this is the part that i have a problem with, his report could have said that our investigation has revealed probable cause to believe that the government, that the president committed a obstruction of justice. he could have made that report and made that findings known to the attorney general. he did not. it is not his place to exonerate the president. that is absolutely never the place of any prosecutor. it is not his place to comment that we couldn't say he was guilty, we couldn't exonerate him. that is not his place.

i think that what he did today really was one of the most political things i have ever seen a prosecutor do. i'm deeply disappointed in the justice department for his conduct. neil: fred, you're a very good lawyer, i'm not a lawyer at all, but i watch it on legal shows to qualify as one. >> "law & order" is my favorite. neil: there you go. what i didn't understand having covered ken starr investigation he did make recommendations t was up to congress to accept or reject them but he did highlight crimes. >> correct. neil: on the part of the president, lying under oath, et cetera. that he thought you know, were prosecutable. probably using the wrong term. in this report, no such recommendations because that as mueller went into this, you know, he was limited by the notion that you cannot indict a sitting president but you can charge him with crimes. you can go ahead and do that and he didn't. so there i'm a little confused. >> right. so, actually you're not confused

because this whole thing is a giant where's the ball under the cup. mueller could have gone to congress, he could have issued a report, the report has been made public, he could have said our investigation revealed the buzzwords which are cornerstone of our justice system, probable cause to believe that obstruction was committed. these are the facts, this is the evidence, this is the evidence of his intent, gone to congress as did ken starr who was following the law, i ask that you undertake impeachment proceedings, ultimately they did. not mueller, he has to backdoor the whole thing to keep this political firestorm alive for another two years. he doesn't make those recommendations that information is not in his report. he comes on national, comes on television and makes these comments which then are nothing more than chum in the water for the democratic sharks to start going into a feeding frenzy. that is what you're seeing now. neil: the market particularly picked up its losses. i know you safely avoid

discussions like that but i do know the market started cascading further south when mueller came the comment, if we had evidence exculpating president on obstruction we would have noted it, clearly saying we did not. so we did not. he just could have easily said if we had evidence clearly connecting the president to obstruction we would have noted that as well. obviously by focusing on the fact we didn't have enough to exonerate him, he was throwing it in congress' hands but adding fuel to the fire, right? >> but here's the problem. it is not his place to exonerate the president or any individual for that matter. neil: if you don't have it either way why say anything at all? >> correct. if you have nothing, by definition you don't have enough evidence to establish probable cause. his job, the job of any prosecutor is not to look for evidence of that exonerates.

it is to look for evidence that incriminates. that is what you're supposed to do. if he had evidence that this guy, donald trump engaged in obstruction, we could talk about that all day long why i think he didn't do it, he has evidence that incriminates him, he thinks there is sufficient evidence to incriminate he needs to make a recommendation as to probable cause as to prosecution. not, i have never in all my life, i've been doing this for 30 some years, i never in my life seen a prosecution or a prosecutor say, well, i can't tell you that the guy is innocent, because he is presumed innocent. everyone is presumed innocent. that is the travesty of all this. neil: if something shouts obstruction as in the ken starr report, coverup in the clinton white house, monica lewinsky, other issue it was so stated in the starr report. it was left to congress what to do. we can make arguments whether republicans were overzealous in

retrospect because the president's popularity rating soared. that is not up to the president. it is not up to us. it is not up to very smart lawyers like yourself to decide. that is up to the prosecutor in question, or in this case, mr. mueller to state one way or the other, not leave it as a jump ball and leave it open-ended. millions went into this investigation to draw some conclusions. when you boast about the fact that you could decide neither way, you haven't helped the cause, right? >> right. in criminal law, when you're the prosecution, if you can't decide either way you lose by definition because the burden is beyond a reasonable doubt. so if it is 50/50, if it's a coin toss, juries are told day in, day out, you lose. president trump may have done things that may have hundreder didded the investigation, he may have said things, that is not obstructs. if you take $7500 out of the bank and withdraw it, teller decides to call the fbi to say

you stole it. you told fbi go away. tell your friends not to talk to the fbi. that is not obstruction. you never did anything wrong. it has to be corrupt. you're not doing anything wrong you're trying to hide. the time the president talked to comey, we're getting substance of this, he didn't know the investigation about flynn. he had every right to fire him. so that's what, mueller did up to rosenstein and barr to determine whether or not there was obstruction. both came out and said we reviewed the report. there is not sufficient evidence to charge with obstruction. checkmate. end of case. move on. neil: if you had compelling evidence either way, you would have stated it. to say there was not enough compelling evidence either way, to brag essentially about indecision, it does complicate, muddy the waters here. fred thank you very, very much. >> it's a political sophistry, what it was. neil: well-played. that is exactly what it is. fred, thank you very, very much. >> thanks for having me. neil: kamala harris is on the wires tweeting about all of

this. what robert mueller basically did return an impeachment referral. now it is up to congress to hold this president accountable. we need to start impeachment proceedings. it is our constitutional obligation. no one has heard from nancy pelosi on this. speaker of the house. she is going to be speaking before the commonwealth club in san francisco at 3:00 p.m. eastern time today. this might be her first moment to sort of tip her hand what she will do, growing call on the part of certainly many in the democratic presidential candidate community, to go ahead and pursue impeachment hearings right now. the whole process. begin it right now. the tone she says, remarks she makes will be closely scrutinized. in the middle of all of that, why you have wall street selling off ahead of these developments rand -- an uncertainty that can follow you have inverted yield curve. you get more holding your money

with government paper overnight than you do for 10 years. you get more for that money, holding 3-month bill than holding it for 10 years. we are at multiyear lows right now on the 10-year, at 2.21%. a lot of people seek out haven what they think will be economic slowdown because of china disruption. added more buying, when you buy a bond, the price goes up, yield goes down. so that yield went down as the price was going up. as more people even after impeachment kind of mishmash we got out of mr. mueller. i'm not here to trash the guy. he added to uncertainty in the markets. so that has added to the selling pressure on stocks. the buying momentum in bonds. jackie deangelis following all of the above joins us right now. hey, jackie. reporter: good afternoon to you, neil. the uncertainty was there before mueller made his remarks. you see it reflected not just

what we're seeing in the dow but also the 10-year treasury note. that is really crucial. 2.2%. as you mentioned, what is happening here? investors are flocking to the safe haven. they're worried about volatility in the marketplace. that is when the yield goes down. additional concern over china on the table too. it might restrict the export of rare earth minerals. these are used in the production of electric cars, wind turbines. they are important to security and defense industries as well. then the backdrop we've been discussing over the last couple weeks, even the last month, auto industry layoffs. ford was saying it would lay off 10% of its workforce. that took auto industry layoffs up to 20,000 up to the month of april. the auto industry is struggling here, partly because of tensions with china, higher prices for steel and aluminum having an impact. executives from some of the largest u.s. companies already said they're bracing for higher prices from industrial equipment manufacturers to semiconductors

to toolmakers. deere warning a combination of higher material prices and lower demand because the farmers are suffering. they will not order equipment. that is taking sales and profits targets for the 2019. ceo of jcpenney saying a second round of tariff could be a problem for that company. macy's, reiterating those kinds of remarks as well. finally not just a domestic concern but of global concern. the ecb in its financial stability review, cautioned weak growth, continued trade tensions could spark larger declines in the global financial markets. neil? neil: jackie, thank you very much. as jackie is speaking i'm going through the presidential candidates caught tweeting or asked about it press. eight of them said this fully justifies beginning inpeachment pods against the united states.

elizabeth warren, cory booker, kamala harris, a host of others says this is more than enough ammunition to get impeachment hearings going. add to that uncertainty and trade, how much it potentially will roil the economy if this impasse lasts a while. we have former dallas fed advisor danielle dimartino booth. to you first. this fixation, a lot of people have with the yield curve right now, that shorter term rates are now rising above longer-term rates, like a 10-year note, normally presage as slowdown, sometimes a recession. do you think that is what it is signaling here? >> i think it has been and there is an added pile-on effect because rates continue to delve deeper into negative territory. speaking to the trade war fallout, germany saw the first rise in unemployment since 2013 overnight.

as well as continued consequences in south korea and country of australia. to that you add this potential increase in, excuse me, decrease in exports of rare earths, electronic cars, a lot of our military equipment depend on them. as jackie was saying 80% of what we import of rare earths we get from china. we woke a lot of ratcheting up in tensions and global economic fallout. of course you will see this, see this reflected in the yield of the 10-year. but i don't think a week ago any of us would have been saying the 10-year was going to be cruising down to 2% in very short order. look at what happened in dallas manufacturing yesterday. that was a huge disappointment from the biggest u.s. exporting state. we're in trouble, neil, if the trade war is truly going to come home to roost. neil: if we stay around these levels or go even lower for the 10-year note, mark, many have said all right, the gap now to

getting to be a little bit, over 12 basis points, last time i checked between a 10-year note, three month bill. that is among typical yield curves that we look at, does that worry you? >> i think it will be a drag on financials which are lagging, getting hurt in this rally. especially european financials are really weak but here in the u.s. it is hurting earnings. financials are a huge part of the market. we need them to a leader. we heard disruption and derivative effects of this. the way farmers are not buying equipment is a good point jackie made. it is not just a one layer of tariffs we're looking at, a trickle effect, the lack of planning. the lack of planning and vision corporations are dealing with was only exacerbated by the press conference with bob mueller. all this uncertainty. this disare you shun. supply side shocks, very hard to capital to work. only hope u.s. is strong enough to withstand this, we get

progress, visibility with china, hopefully some of this calms down. neil: i want to thank you both. to review we're looking the dow down 326 points. after the worst lows of the day when we were down 400. we have a 10-year treasury note yielding about 2.22%. keep in mind that a 2-year note is 2.08%. a three month bill is 2.34%. if you want to compare traditionally one they use a lot, three month versus 10-year, or overnight money 2 1/2%, you are getting more for your money going for a day, going up to three months, then committing it for ten years. that is wall street's way of saying yikes! we'll have more after this. ♪

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>> this is freakin' huge, huge tornado! absolutely huge. >> why that thing is rotating

like crazy. neil: that it was. more storms expected across the plains and mid-atlantic today. fox news meteorologist adam klotz is in the weather center. reporter: neil, it has been a mess these are the storms the last 24 hours. back across the mid-atlantic down into the plains into texas. it has been a wild month, a wild spring. these are the tornadoes we've seen, everything in gold bars is average. red is what we've seen. 250 more tornadoes than typically we see in may. it has been so active the last 12 days. maybe more active today before things calm down a little bit. everything highlighted in the yellow box that sis a severe thunderstorm watch. it stretches back down into the plains and texas. it be unheard of if tornadoes spun in the regions as we get into the heating of afternoon? this hold as very similar pattern. same places we are seeing severe weather, thunderstorms,

tornadoes the last 12 days again this afternoon from portions of texas up in arkansas where they have seen a lot of rain, running back across the midwest into the mid-atlantic. all areas concerned about severe weather today. tomorrow we see a slight chance. this is across the mid-atlantic back into the midwest. it is going to be significantly less severe tomorrow. so we're finally getting closer to the end of this whole situation. the only problem is, even if the tornadoes die down for as you little bit, there has been so much rain over the last week, anywhere, widespread areas from six to eight inches in some cases, flooding doesn't to away that quickly. unfortunately a big area we're under flood watches, warnings advisories, across the plains. everywhere from the midwest out to the plains, running down to arkansas, the gulf of mexico. that flooding will stick with us for weeks and weeks, neil. maybe this is the last big day of big storms. unfortunately the flooding will

be with us a little bit. neil: just incredible. adam, thank you very much. the historic flooding across arkansas. matt finn live on the ground in fort smith, arkansas. reporter: neil, fort smith is arkansas's second largest city. all across the region we've seen flooding in industrial zones, business districts, unfortunately a lot of residential communities. this is engulfed by the arkansas river. the water is up to the roof of some of the houses. we've been in arkansas a few days. we've seen the river rise and rise every day. forecasted to finally crest this afternoon at about 41 feet which would be a record in most areas, nearly double the flood stage. but unfortunately right now we hear thunderstorms moving in. what that additional precipitation might mean for all the flooding is to be soon. they found a man dead in his car the past 24 hours. he was found in a submerged car, rescued by crews. the car was towed out of the

water. people in neighborhood, rip up carpets, took out valuables and cleared their homes. >> i'm fine for my age. the stress has been tremendous. but, i'm a christian and i got awful lot of tremendous family and friends. this neighborhood is just made up of beautiful people. reporter: all the water you're looking at in fort smith is headed south. there are a lot of counties and areas of concern. national guard is doing sandbagging right now. the mayor of north little rock already declared an emergency. neil? neil: matt, be safe yourself. matt finn in the middle of all of that? back to the robert mueller press conference. he made a brief statement, about eight minutes, but shook the political world, stressing that russia did interfere in the election if there were any

doubts. take a look. >> i will close by reiterating the central allegation of our indictments that there were multiple, systemic efforts to interfere in our election. and that allegation deserves the attention of every american. neil: all right. former deputy assistant secretary of the army van hipp. van, what do you think? >> well look, we all know the political shenanigans are going to continue but i think that last statement by mueller, that multiple systemic efforts took place to interfere with elections, i think he is spot on. the question what do we as a nation, we as people do about it moving forward? i think that is the big question. i think jeh johnson, president obama's homeland security secretary got it right couple years ago when he testified to the house intelligence committee. he said we have to treat our elections system as critical infrastructure. secondly we have to look at our voter registration database. do whatever it takes to make

sure it is not vulnerable to cyber attack. that brings a question why is this country been asleep so long about cybersecurity? that is a big question. the president made good steps recently addressing the cyber workforce issue. we don't have people adequately trained to thwart worst kind of cyberattacks. i was glad to see the president with the workforce initiative. and president created a office in the white house. why is that important? whoever wins the quantum race will win the cyber war. whoever wins the cyber hand will have upper hand in the next major military conflict. neil: i don't know if they're paying attention to the russian role potentially in the next election, secretary, i worry about that. >> i do too. neil: to a man or woman running for president of the united states, you're more intrigued about the possibility now

probability that the house can go ahead and conduct impeachment hearings. virtually 20 of the announced presidential candidates, that mueller's remarks will fuel justification for hearings. beto o'rourke among them saying there must be consequences, accountability, justice. only way to insure that is begin impeachment proceedings, off we go. what do you think? >> they have their talking points, neil. they have all the same talking points. i think the majority of the american people are ready to move on. why? we have got china, we have got russia, we have got iran, we have north korea, we have venezuela in our own western hemisphere. we have the most complex, i believe the most complex foreign policy landscape facing a commander-in-chief, a commander-in-chief we probably ever had. by the way, we have a crisis on the southern border. those are the things that we as a nation need to be worried about. the reason we even have a

federal government in the first place, the reason states came together was to provide for the common defense. we have tough decisions to make, neil. these next few years will be critical. china is out spending us 30 to one on quantum computing. they're stealing intellectual property from our businesses, our universities, our, they're hacking into government infrastructure. you have putin trying to reconstitute the soviet union. oh, by the way, we have north korea, iran, i do think the sanctions are working. president has done a good job there, because this president does understand the real link between iran and north korea. if you can cut off the money supply and deprive them of the cash, that is the best way to bring them to the negotiating table. neil: van hipp, always good having you, my friend. thank you very much. >> great to be with you. neil: we're still waiting to hear on nancy pelosi on all of this. 3:00 p.m. eastern time, 2 1/2 hours from now, she will no doubt responding to the growing chorus call upon many in her party, including many running

for president of the united states that mueller's comments today justify impeachment proceedings now. we'll have more after this. if you have medicare, listen up.

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neil: all right. we've got the markets down, continue to be down. oil prices are sinking. has people talking a slowdown, interest rates are tumbling. so that idea as a result of this rift between the united states and china has actually gotten worse over the last couple days, things will slow down mightily in the economy. morgan stanley putting out a report that it could lead to recession. others follow inverted yield curve, that almost invariably will. that is what the worry of the moment is but there are other factors at play here. could be uncertainty where impeachment goes. we just don't know. what we do know there is little drama developments within the market, not the least of which is occurring in the telecom arena where sprint and t-mobile are trying to get a merger going but that is proving to be a very

tough task. charlie gasparino is following that. >> this is a potential roadblock to the merger. i'm not saying it is not going to happen. as we reported on your show many times the economic advisors in the trump administration want it done. that is why fcc chair ajit pai approved it. and doj chief makan delrahim -- neil: his staff is recommending. >> his staff is recommending. this is potential roadblock. the companies have to take it seriously, and we understand they are. doj antitrust is worried that state ags, mainly california and new york, could sue and win in lower courts, making them look like toothless tigers. here's the other kicker. what they are worried about, what makan delrahim is worried about, state ags in california, just to make him look bad, to bring a case, there are grounds for a case because we're going from four to three major wireless carriers. the new combined company plus

verizon and at&t. they could win in lower court and think call, what he is worried about, makan, call the doj staffers opposed to deal as witnesses. that is when this gets really murky. you call the staffers, subpoena them, tell me, mr. x, y, doj antitrust attorney why you're against the deal. that is getting murky. in lower courts could play out many years. could lose before a federal judge a obama appointee, not a bush appointee, not that i think, i know from sources close to the doj and close to the companies that makan delrahim is worried about this. here is how you know he is really worried about it, these same sources that doj antitrust continues to meet with the state ags of the there is dialogue, what could you be willing for

companies to give if they other concessions? they're giving up something, selling thing boost, prepaid wireless service for basically for people with less income. you can prepay for your service. will they sell off some of the other prepaid carriers they control? other things? this is the type of dialogue that's going on. i'll tell you, neil, i think this thing could get wrapped up this week. neil: really? >> yes it could, next two weeks are obviously critical you about it could happen this week. i think, i'm not saying it is not going to get done but i can tell you this whole notion that new york and california jumps in, they call the u.s. department, doj staffers as witnesses, saying why are you guys against this deal? why do you think it will lead to higher pricing? this is a real concern of makan delrahim. i tell you, if he votes against it, if he comes out says, i will sue, because he doesn't think he can get the state ags on

board. he basically goes to the companies, saying listen, i have to sue too and i sue with them. that is an existential threat to the deal. you have to take the threat seriously. i'm not saying it is going to happen. i know larry kudlow the deal to go through, one of the top economic advisors. trump wants it to go through, he wants us to win the 5g race. neil: what about the drama with huawei? >> that has an impact. huawei is equipment-maker, not carrier. so it's a little different. the fact chinese make headway in the 5g area, in terms of equipment and broadband and all this, the whole nut, you know what i'm saying? neil: right. >> is an argument that the companies used effectively to get fcc approval and gain approval from the white house economic advisors. delrahim is looking differently. i'm the antitrust chief, if new york and california can sue, call my guys as witnesses, if they can possibly win at lower

court, lower federal court with obama or clinton justice who says listen this fails the antitrust case, goes from four to three, they have pricing power, you know, this thing could play out forever and make me look bad, maybe i have to sue too. or maybe tell them not to go forward. that is where we are. i would watch the stock today. i think the stock is off on this report a little bit. neil: we're watching closely, my friend. thank you very, very much. we'll have more also on number of democrats calling for impeachment of the president of the united states. i will give you a hint. they're all running for president after this. you wouldn't accept an incomplete job from any one else. why accept it from your allergy pills? flonase sensimist relieves all your worst symptoms, including nasal congestion, which most pills don't. and all from a gentle mist you can barely feel. flonase sensimist.

neil: on impeachment, you're not for that, you're opposed going in that direction because it would be divisive. you still stand by that? >> i do. i do. i think it is important for the american people to make the decision in 2020, to defeat donald trump because his policies have not been good for our country. this is why i'm running. i'm offering to serve them as their president, to bring about that change, that puts well-being of the american people first and foremost. neil: all right. that was hawaii congresswoman tulsi gabbard. she is running for president at the time. she stood out from the presidential pack, not too keen on pursuing impeachment

proceedings in the united states. said there were more important issues to be addressed. i don't know how she would feel today, in light of bob mueller kind of confirming what he already mentioned in his better than 440 page report, maybe this is prosecutable case but that is up to congress. the one that everyone is quoting, including a lot of these faces you're seeing here, candidates running for president, including elizabeth warren, cory booker, kamala harris and others who are pouncing on this comment from mr. mueller. if we had confidence the president clearly did not commit a crime, we would have said so. so they are leaping on that as proof that he did. now they're saying so. let impeachment process begin. to democratic strategist, danielle mcglocklin, pollster chris wilson and "real clear politics" white house reporter phil wegman. phil, all the candidates, not surprising, maybe with the

exception of congresswoman gabbard are now going full throttle on impeachment. we'll hear from nancy pelosi later today. what do you think she is going to say? >> well i think what nancy pelosi is realizing is that if it wasn't already impeachment, quickly become the litmus test whoever will take the democratic nomination. nancy pelosi now herself is in a very awkward position, like you said a moment ago, robert mueller seems to be saying all right now it is congress' job to decide what to do next. i think what ought to be remembered here, right after the report dropped, initially, you had steny hoyer who basically said, there is just not enough time to do impeachment. we have 18 months before the election. this will be all-consuming. that is what nancy pelosi will have to contend with. one logistics are incredibly difficult and two, political will in her party is pushing her towards moving forward with impeachment. neil: so, danielle, if they

would have to cram a lot in in 18 months. will they? >> well, one thing i want to clarify, there wasn't anything new today in this statement. neil: i agree with that. i agree with that. >> what is different this creates sort of inflection point. there was a study by business insider, 5% of americans read report. 8% of the reports said they didn't understand the question. what happened hear. barr letter came out. capitalized on by republicans. neil: maybe they watch cnn? >> i don't know what they are doing 448 pages long. this sin flexion point. summary mueller wanted to go out in the first place. i do think actually democrats will capitalize on it because it's a very clear and understandable, i guess distillment of what the report actually said. neil: you know, you could interpret it any which way you want but i do agree with danielle, chris, in this

respect, i didn't see or hear anything new out of mr. mueller in his abbreviate minute statement, whatever it was. he was more or less parroting the bullet points the report it outlined there was not enough to exonerate him on obstruction, nor was there enough to stick it to him on that. so it is a jump ball. now he is giving congress the opportunity to jump on it. what are the risks if they do? >> well, i'm old enough to remember this was all about russian collusion. that didn't come up at all today. what the risks are for congress they won't be able to get through this in 18 months. it will become an absolute chaos fest in the process. that's why, nancy pelosi has been smart to try to stay away from it. she remembers what happened -- neil: i don't think she can stay away today. >> she want now. she very well remembers, she lived through congress when republicans were in charge, went through it with bill clinton.

it didn't end up well for republicans. pelosi sees the future. in her mind it's a positive path to victory there. now she will be as you point out she will be dragged into this. joe mower is starting process, and as move further and further into this. it is exercise in futility, it will accomplish nothing, alert the american people how far left the democratic party is coming. every person running for, recycle tweets two years ago when they needed to be impeached. copying, paste them, sending them out again. there is nothing new for every single democrat, tulsi gabbard as you point out. saying she should be impeached. neil: you can make the case president being such shoot from the hip kind of guy, between the tweets and public states he talks way too much, tweets way too much. you know, implicates himself way too often, but because,

throughout this process, he was just that, a lot of americans would probably shrug their shoulders say, who isn't keen on this? we could very well see just him wanting this to all go away. because of that, it is actually weirdly working in his favor. obstruction usually implies something behind the scenes or secretive, unknown. i'm not trying to exonerate the president nor indict him. there was nothing unknown about his point of view on this and hough he felt, forget about obstructing a case, he felt throughout there was no case. that is what he pounded. that is what americans remember. so in a way, i don't see it changing minds one way or the other? >> you're absolutely right. the strategy of the while house hand been to walk away from this. we saw very toned down tweet trot president. he was even polite. case is closed. thank you. obviously that is a different interpretation of what special

counsel mueller said at the podium. others clearly disagree. but what was striking was the statement sarah huckabee sanders released, after two years there is no evidence of collusion and no evidence of obstruction and her statement was, it is time for everyone to move on with their lives. the question is going to be, whether or not president trump can actually step away from this at a moment when he is going to be continually attacked by the 2020 field and by congress. because they would love for this to go away, whether or not the president can ignore some of the attacks, that is another question. neil: danielle, talking to tulsi gabbard, she is polling very low, single digits, she is invited into the debate but she did say something very interesting to me, this economy strong as it is, she doesn't envision it being this strong a year from now. she is looking at fallout from the trade situation, hostilities that have been created. this is her point of view, mind

you. i want to posit that. that democrats shouldn't be running away from talking about the economy but talk about it more because it will work to their advantage when this sort of peters out. her view in another year or so what do you make of that? >> well you know a year from now anything could happen. what are we, 524 days from the election. neil: you knew that down to the day? touche. >> aren't we all? this is the bubble we live in. i think democrats still have to make the case, yes the economy is on fire. is it working for you? what is happening with your pocketbook? what did you see from the 2017 tax bill? was it just shared -- they can make the case to everyday americans, regular working folks, are you seeing a difference, but what about the children's children who will inherit $1.5 trillion deficit. neil: they had that in the past when barack obama was in, you're right, those are issues that could be brought up. chris wilson, then, how would

republicans sort of pivot to an economy still strong, not as strong, if that were indeed the case? that is what tulsi tulsi gabbars hanging on? >> it would be interesting place for democrats. cheering for higher unemployment. that is thing really donald trump's greatest accomplishment run on for re-election. you have the lowest female unemployment ever. lowest hispanic unemployment much. wages going up for working class families. all those things are setting records month after month, quarter after quarter. puts donald trump in strong place for re-election. 56% of the americans approve his handling economy. all democrats can cheer against the economy. hope it begins to dissipate. i think that is a difficult place for them to be in. as they run toward november of 2020, to hope that somehow more

americans are out of work, more americans are making less than they do today, it is not exactly a message that will resonate well. >> democrats are not cheering to have more people unemployed. they are not cheering for people's waynes to go down. i think that is unfair characterization. >> they can't beat donald trump under this con. they're exactly in that place. >> what they say working for you. stock market very high. historic highs. half of americans own stocks. what does that mean for half of americans? nothing. so i think difference -- >> jobs because of stock market. neil: we will watch. we remember from the george bush, sr. experience, after invasion of kuwait, things were looking good. weakness in the economy took hold. he is one-termer. that was then. this is now. what happens after this. all in . because when it's decision time... you need decision tech. only from fidelity.

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but dad, you've got allstate. with accident forgiveness they guarantee your rates won't go up just because of an accident. smart kid. indeed. are you in good hands? neil: all right. the selloff continues now after bob mueller in about eight minutes or so explained his findings. i didn't find anything new that wasn't already in his report. we will talk to judge napolitano about that in a second. this is not necessarily controlling the tenor of the markets. i will say this. we showed an inflection point when he began speaking. when that started, that's when we were really beginning to get a sense of wait a minute, wait a minute, we were already worried about china trade, already worried about the fact this is not going to be resolved any time soon, and in an environment

where investors abhor uncertainty, now the uncertainty of what could be a long, heated summer of hearings back and forth, impeachment or otherwise. edward lawrence outside the justice department with more. reporter: yeah, here we go. as the temperature's heating up, so is this debate. former special counsel robert mueller announced his resignation, saying he's going back to private life and he will not discuss the mueller report again. he has no plans, he said, to testify in front of congress. his statement closed the door on collusion but gave democrats a platform. just listen to how he carefully worded when he talked about obstruction of justice. >> if we had had confidence that the president clearly did not commit a crime, we would have said so. we did not, however, make a determination as to whether the president did commit a crime. the introduction to the volume two of our report explains that decision. reporter: mueller says the

department of justice rules says that he could not charge a sitting president with a crime, but he alluded to congress. >> the opinion says that the constitution requires a process other than the criminal justice system to formally accuse a sitting president of wrongdoing. reporter: some democrats already sounding off about impeachment. the house oversight committee chairman elijah cummings tweeting out this. quote, the statement today confirms both evidence of obstruction by the president and the critical role of congress under the constitution going forward. the calls for impeachment are growing and republicans are saying that the russia probe is now put to rest, there's no collusion, they say the department of justice did not go forward with charging the president or moving forward with any criminal grounds on obstruction of justice so in their minds, this is over. back to you. neil: thank you very, very much. now to blake burman at the white house with reaction there. reporter: we are starting to see the argument that the white

house and those affiliated with president trump are starting to build out. on the one hand when we heard from robert mueller today, seemed to close the door on collusion but on the other, it also seemed to leave it wide open as it relates to obstruction, and the press secretary sarah sanders in her statement somewhat hit on that or at least is starting to lay out how she will defend the president, saying quote, the report was clear there was no collusion, no conspiracy and the department of justice confirmed there was no obstruction. special counsel mueller also stated that the attorney general barr acted in good faith in his handling of the report. after two years the special counsel is moving on with his life and everyone else should do the same. the important part is noting her reference to the department of justice because here was jay sekulow, outside legal counsel to the president, who said quote, the attorney general conclusively determined there was no obstruction by the president. in the words of attorney general barr, the report identified no actions that in our judgment

constitute obstructive conduct. so step back for a second here. when you look at the dynamic in all of this, democrats have been saying for awhile essentially that the attorney general william barr has been acting as a shield to the president, trying to protect the president, as in some cases even misrepresented the mueller report to help out the president, but the white house and republicans have been saying william barr is a man of integrity, a former attorney general who is on his second go-round who has been respected for decades inside washington, and now, neil, the white house is once again leaning on bill barr, the attorney general, and his words as to how to defend the president as it relates to obstruction. neil? neil: what a mess. blake thank you very, very much. now to fox news judicial analyst, liberty file host andrew napolitano on what this changes, if anything. what do you think? >> i think bob mueller has put a different spin on things, and a different emphasis on things. none of which is new, if you have read the entire report.

on the so-called collusion which to lawyers is conspiracy, he's made it clear there was -- the conclusion was not there was no evidence of conspiracy. there was. there just wasn't enough evidence to charge. neil: between the trump campaign and the russians. >> correct. we could not establish a broad-based conspiracy meaning we could not prove it beyond a reasonable doubt, therefore, we couldn't charge anybody with it. on obstruction, it's a little murky. for him to rely on the office of legal counsel opinion, office of legal counsel is the academics, the gurus in the doj who basically tell the rest of the doj what the law is. if you're not sure what the law is, get an opinion from the office of legal counsel. so in october of 2000, the office of legal counsel issued an opinion saying the president ought not, ought not, not may not, ought not be charged with a crime while he's a sitting president because of disruption to the constitutional order. he's going to be more concerned with defending himself than

defending the nation. yet the doj violated that opinion just 45 days later when it charged bill clinton with obstruction of justice and lying under oath and a month after that, president clinton pleaded guilty to one count of perjury. neil: judge, did i miss something when mueller was going about this process, heads up that look, when all is said and done, i can't really indict or go after or even infer guilt on the part of the president of the united states, so you should be prepared for that? >> i think he did infer guilt on the part of the president of the united states. i think he made it clear this morning that if donald trump were donald trump the private citizen, they would have indicted him and the only reason they didn't is because of the disruption to the constitutional order. neil: ken starr had that, right? >> ken starr used the word guilty about ten, if i recall, or 13 times in his report. neil: i thought, judge -- >> different tone, different tenor, different attitude. neil: and i know different

times. i thought twhahat's what we wou get in this report. >> here's the difference. ken starr was not subject to the attorney general at the time. because of a statute that created his office. bob mueller is subject to the attorney general and the attorney general at the time the report came out, bill barr, made it clear, no way is the guy who appointed me attorney general going to be indicted on my watch. mueller knew that. neil: that i understand but what's to stop mueller from saying i'm sorry, long before you came here, i was well through this process, what, three quarters through the process, and these are the conclusions i made? what would have happened if he had? >> if bob mueller had said i want to bring this to a grand jury and ask for an indictment and bill barr said no, bill barr could arguably, arguably be charged with obstruction of justice himself. this would be very out of character for mueller, the ex-marine, to challenge a boss publicly on something as profound as this. neil: this has gotten into the world of politics.

we have been waiting to hear from nancy pelosi. she will be at this event in san francisco later today. ahead of that, she's saying it is with the greatest respect for special counsel robert mueller and the deepest disappointment in the department of justice, holding the president above the law that i think special counsel mueller for the work he and his team did to provide a record of future action both in congress and in the courts regarding the trump administration involved in russian interference and obstruction. she goes on to say that congress will continue to investigate and legislate to protect our elections and secure our democracy. the american people must have the truth. we call on the senate for the people act to protect our election system. she's still dancing a tight line here on whether we have impeachment hearings. >> she's on a tightrope. that's a brilliant statement because it pleases both the moderates that don't -- in her party, that don't want anything to do with impeachment, and the progressives whose voices are

now growing louder, who want to begin impeachment. neil: then she says the congress holds sacred its constitutional responsibility to investigate and hold the president accountable for his abuse of power. judge, if they go the impeachment hearing route, you say that that gives them a lot more oomph here, right, to do what? >> it expands their subpoena power and it shrinks the president's privileges. it shrinks his executive privilege down to three areas, military secrets, diplomatic secrets, national security secrets. everything else, everything else may be inquired about by the impeaching authority. neil: so if these witnesses are subpoenaed, he can't do what he's been doing. >> correct. correct. listen, bob mueller, as of 5:00 this afternoon, is no longer a doj employee. when that subpoena shows up probably tomorrow afternoon from jerry nadler, he will have no choice but to comply with it or on his own go before a judge and

move to quash it. neil: sounds like impeachment hearings are going to happen. >> something is going to happen. we have not heard the last from mueller. i believe he will be interrogated by the house judiciary committee and i expect it to happen soon. i just hope it's not in secret. if it's in secret, the republicans will come out and give their version of what happened in secret, the democrats will come out and give their version of what happened in secret, and we are adults. we should be able to watch this. neil: it does strike me in the end, whatever you think of mueller, he walked a fine line, i can appreciate that, but he came out with a report, not enough to exonerate him on obstruction, not enough necessarily to stick it to him on obstruction, so where does this go? >> he closed one door and opened another. that's what he did today. the democrats are running en masse through that newly opened door. neil: very well put. that's why you were tops in your class, right? like one in 20 are accepted at princeton. that's actually true. >> my classmate sam alito now on the supreme court had better grades. neil: what were you, a tenth?

can you imagine one out of 20? my school it was 19.9 out of 20 were accepted. scary smart. meantime, some other scary smart people are looking at the market reaction to this. i know more are responding to trade, gentlemen, but not ignoring the uncertainty that could weigh on them maybe in the months ahead as a result of mueller and this fine line or whatever you want to call it. david, to you first. does this change your view of the market? does this noise you don't want to hear? >> no, it means absolutely nothing to me and i honestly don't think it means anything to the markets. i don't just say that about today. i say that -- neil: go ahead, explain that. >> i say it every single day since special counsel was appointed and the huge rally up in 2017, all the volatility we had in 2018 around the fed and

around the trade war. the last thing markets have cared about was this special counsel investigation. i'm not getting to my opinions about what mueller did or didn't say and where it goes politically although i do have plenty of opinions i will be happy to share with you sometimes. the fact of the matter is, it's a non-event for markets. you have a ten-year bond yield at 2.25%. that's an event for markets. neil: absolutely. i want to posit that. that's something that's palpable and real and presents a host of worries. what i do think is that this added uncertainty of summer-long hearings and the rest is something wall street probably doesn't need or want in the middle of this trade imbroglio and the collapsing interest rates. your thoughts? >> well, you have ten historical examples. the 1973-1974 stock markets during watergate were horrible. the market bottomed in august '74, the same time nixon resigned from office, but then you have the bill clinton

example and the markets shrugged it off. i think trade is a much bigger deal. i'm not worried about falling bond yields because i think technology has a much greater impact on inflation than a lot of people realize. allan greenspan has come around to that point of view and you see it every day, the suppressive effect of technology. neil: we did talk a little about ten-year note collapsing, now down to 2.21%, lowest in more than two years. it's so weird to see this inverted yield curve. a lot of people look at it and say all right, you are getting more bang for the buck, committing money overnight, or three months, than you would committing it for ten years and that usually leads to worrisome things. are you worried? >> yeah, but i'm not worried about that per se, being the action itself. i'm worried about what's causing it. i think that the reason for the declining bond yields is

directly related to lower expectations around economic growth. i see global trade collapsing. gross volume of trade. not just bilateral u.s./china but around the world, trade is dropping, the supply chain is very multilateral. there's a lot of actors being affected. i don't think this economy needs this ongoing trade war, so it's sort of the collateral damage to that that i'm worried about. i think we see it showing up in bond yields over the last three or four weeks. rich is completely right, there is a disinflationary pressure from technology on bond yields. i think that's a good thing. but nobody can believe that the curve inverting and the ten-year being at 2.2% captures that. we need business investment. we were getting it at the first part of the trump administration's economic platform and the trade war is taking it away. neil: so that trade war is going to be the big decider for this market continuing or not, rich.

>> yeah, it will be. we have a real disconnect. large company ceos that lead companies with a global footprint have been -- have negative sentiment for some months now. small business owners within the united states and consumers feel very good about the economy. one of these two camps is wrong but when you get to the size of investment, you probably tilt it more toward the large company ceos who are seeing the impact of trade. neil: gentlemen, i want to thank you both. we should also provide a little bit of history. those who have failed to pounce on market fall-offs when they occurred because of something on china trade have been punished for adding that. that has been the steady stream and repetitive part of history here. if you buy when the markets fall off based on some disappointment about how china talks are going, you have been richly rewarded. that will drag for awhile. it's not going away. more after this. nah. not gonna happen.

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ellison barber is surveying the damage now in ohio. reporter: this is where one of the more severe tornadoes hit overnight on monday, an ef-3, a severe tornado with winds between 136 and 165 miles per hour. this apartment was hit particularly hard. this, we think is part of the roof that somehow managed up in this stairwell. this apartment is open. whoever lives here seen to have come, get what they could and leave. you can see what happened in here. the police department says this apartment, the buildings in this area were filled with people when the roof came down. there is nothing left above. nothing. if you come in the kitchen, you will see more of the same, where pieces of drywall, pieces of the ceiling are down on the ground. what should be food in pots are pieces of insulation. same goes for the sink. we spoke to one person who lived in the apartment building here. he said that he was not in the building, he was a little bit further down the road when the

tornado struck. listen to what he said it was like when he was told to move to the back of a walmart to try and stay safe. >> tried to call my dad, tried to get upstairs to him. once we got upstairs to the bedroom, couldn't get the door open. the neighbor came over and kind of knocked the door down. when they got in the bedroom, the roof was gone and he was under some rubble and the bed was on the front yard. reporter: that is actually sound from a woman we spoke to a little while ago who lives in another part of this town where she was talking about her mother trying to find her dad, the woman's husband, after their roof collapsed. right here in this apartment building, though, you can see one thing that stuck out to me was there's this remote perfectly sitting on the counter. someone had been watching tv and left it there. now their entire home, their belongings are ruined and this entire area has no power. the people who are still able to

stay here or stay somewhere in the area, they are under a water boil advisory because it's not safe to drink the water. neil? neil: wow. remarkable reporting. thank you very, very much. be safe. meanwhile, historic flooding, that's forcing a lot of evacuations across the midwest and southern states. on the phone with us, arkansas congressman steve womack, who is assisting efforts in fort smith, arkansas. thank you for taking the time. how are things looking by you? >> well, neil, looking a little bit better. we got a report at 10:00 this morning that the crest on the arkansas river at the fort smith van buren measuring station was going to be a little shorter than was previously announced. they said it would go to 42 1/2 feet but revised that downward to 41. still a lot of flow coming through, more water than you have ever seen there. it's beaten the historic high of 38 and some change back in 1945. so to get to 41 feet, obviously

it's created some problems for the arkansas river navigation system. we have had hundreds of homes flooded in the greater fort smith area. van buren is pretty dry and the levees are holding so we are hopeful with fingers crossed that the predictions by the corps of engineers right now demonstrate that we reached the peak of 41 and slowly but surely maybe that river will start receding, although there is still a lot of flow to come through. neil: wish you well, sir, and your constituents. everyone there. thank you, sir, very, very much. the congressman on the phone with us. when we come back, what robert mueller had to say today and how that could impact a lot more things than stocks, after this. carvana is six years old this year

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i'm gerri willis from the floor of the new york stock exchange. welcome back. the markets off their lows of

the day, the dow now down 272 poin points, the s&p down 21, the nasdaq down 58. the dow opened at a four-month low. boeing, j & j, goldman sachs leading the way down. but the dow took another leg down intraday, 182 points, after special counsel mueller made comments that democrats now interpreting to mean that impeachment is the next step. traders down here don't necessarily agree with that. as neil said at the top of this fine show, not likely with a republican senate, but one trader said were it to happen, it would be brutal for the markets. >> that's something that the market would not be able to sustain. something like that would take a long time, it would take a lot of time and effort and a lot of attention. i think our attention would be so shifted to that and would get away from the basic fundamentals of our economy and our markets. gerri: meanwhile, it's trade, traders, investors have been so focusing on today, the thing

that got the markets toff to th wrong foot this morning, china signaling its willingness to escalate the trade war, willing to use rare earth as was discussed before to penalize the u.s. that's really what's being focused on here. we see every sector trading lower. we see chip stocks lower. we even see electric cars lower because those are the products that use these rare earth materials. back to you. neil: thank you very, very much. bob mueller saying there were multiple attempts to interfere in the 2016 election, no collusion that was provable between the russian operatives and the trump campaign itself. still, former director of national intelligence john negroponte on what he makes of this. what do you think, john? where does this go now? >> well, first of all, i think it signals an end at least for the time being to the justice department phase of this, at least as far as the president is

concerned, so i do think that if there's going to be any action in the short term, that is to say during the time that the president's still in office, it would have to be by the congress and going that route. whether the congress will do that or not, i don't know. we see that debate unfolding in front of us. it's been going on for quite awhile. just one other point. as the person earlier referred to the impact on the market, markets, of impeachment proceedings, i think just the very fact of this internal political dispute is already distracting from our ability to play the important leadership role that we ought to be playing in the world. neil: know what i also wonder about is how far it goes. if we go the route of impeachment hearings, i'm old enough to remember they were dismissed the summer of '73, we were going into them between the house and the senate and what was going on in the house, what

was going with in the senate, and the president's approval ratings were still high, then the hearings and then we find out about tapes and found out about other stuff, and obviously you know what happened. now, i'm not saying history is going to repeat itself here. two very different cases, very different presidents, very differential gagss. but to slough it off that this is just noise, to your point about the uncertainty it adds to the market, that's real. >> oh, yeah. i was there, by the way. i was in the government at the time. i was working in the national security council and i went to an overseas assignment at the time that president nixon resigned. but yeah, i think there's already an opportunity cost for us in terms of our ability to deal with problems in asia, in the middle east, latin america, all these hot spots, venezuela, the persian gulf, korean

peninsula. these issues require time and concentration on the part of our national leadership so there's already a cost in terms of distraction. if the distraction becomes intense as it no doubt would, were there to be some kind of impeachment proceeding, that would even reflect further and deflect further from our ability to play an international leadership role, at least in the short term. neil: that's an interesting insight to this i have not heard from anyone. i'm wondering what you remember about when the neixon stuff started. of course, that was not near a presidential election. it was near a midterm ones republicans would lose badly and by that time, nixon would have resigned. again, it's always hazardous comparing two very different types of investigations. but we generally dismiss them at their start. i'm wondering, you raise nothing

getting done. that's probably an understatement. but our leadership role at the time, we are the strongest economy by far, whether that is dinged. >> we are the strongest economy, the strongest military, and notwithstanding even our reluctance sometimes to play a leadership role, other countries in the world look to us to play that role and want to know what the united states is going to do and think. so that responsibility is out there. i think it's unavoidable. for the sake of the country, i hope that this political situation can be managed in a way that we can continue to play a responsible role on the global scene. neil: that is impeccable insight. i appreciate you sharing that with us. we have heard a lot from a lot of people on other angles, not quite like that. former u.s. ambassador to the u.n., former ambassador to mexico, director of national intelligence, man, oh, man, thank you, sir.

very good having you. meantime, take a look at the falling treasuries and the yield there. obviously that's telegraphing lower interest rates on the horizon. the flipside of that it could provide a foundation for stocks. we haven't seen that yet. that's usually what happens and it ignites interest in people applying for mortgages or refinancing the homes they are already in. little evidence of that thus far but the longer this goes, the more you wait for that. after this. let me ask you something. can the past help you write the future? can you feel calm in the eye of a storm? can you do more with less? can you raise the bar while reducing your footprint?

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hey rick, all good? oh yeah, we're good. we're good. termites never stop trying to get in, we never stop working to keep them out. terminix. defenders of home. neil: all right. those ongoing trade tensions between ourselves and the chinese continue, escalating to the point where people are continuing to sell stock in this environment and buying bonds so interest rates are going down. so are stock prices. hillary vaughn in washington with the very latest. reporter: china is reportedly thinking about restricting rare earth exports. those are materials used to make smartphones and other networking gear, restricting those exports to the u.s. which would or could

significantly paralyze production of new technology products here, but also things like electric vehicles and wind turbines. fox business's maria bartiromo asked secretary of state mike pompeo about this very issue today. maria: should we be worried about them lashing out at the united states? now we know that china is considering u.s. rare earth export curbs. >> somehow this idea that president trump's decision to push back against china caused problems for the american economy, when in fact the challenges have been the fact that the chinese were in a trade war with us long time ago. i can't predict what the chinese will ultimately do, how they will make their decisions, will they attempt to respond. they did and put some counter tariffs on when president trump initially put his tariffs on. i'm sure they will take actions in response. reporter: pompeo says he's confident even if china does weaponize strategic materials as the latest ramp-up in the trade fight, that the u.s. economy about continue to grow. he also says they have a comprehensive strategy to fight back against china and said they

may need to execute that if china crosses the line. neil? neil: thank you very, very much, hillary. right now, all this uncertainty is weighing on stocks. certainly it's pushing up bond prices and sending yields crashing down. the ten-year, for example, is at its lowest yield in about two years. you heard a lot about this inverted yield curve where rates on the ten-year are decidedly below what you can get for your money overnight, even to the point which you can get for committing about three months. bankrate senior economic analyst mark hamrick on that. when you have these inversions, does it worry you? is there an issue to how long it lasts before it gains traction? >> as we know, neil, it should worry us because it has a pretty good track record of telling us that a recession is down the road. i would back away from this and just say, you know, the length of this current expansion which is coming up on the ten-year

anniversary this summer, we kind of knew that it was long in the tooth. the question is, when is it slated to end and the real answer is we don't know that answer now any better than we did a few months ago. but obviously, the bond market is flashing the signal that don't take this expansion for granted. neil: i'm wondering if it's flashing something else as well, that inflation certainly is not a worry. the one good thing about going into a trade war with someone is even though tariffs go into effect and all of that, it slows things down that whatever price gain you are getting on the materials, there are a lot of them, it's more than offset by just a general slowdown, that makes inflation a non-issue. what do you make of that? >> i think you could have stagflation, right, because the more the tariffs begin to creep into the economy and actually end up causing price increases, then you also have a coinciding slowdown in economic growth. that would be a real problem for the federal reserve because on

the one hand, it needs to combat inflation if it were to be seen, but obviously, it cannot apply monetary policy in the traditional way of trying to basically encourage economic growth by cutting rates. so i think this is probably raising a little bit of blood pressure among members of the federal market committee a little bit. neil: i bet you're right. is there a point at which you do say all right, these prior times we have had this inverted yield curve, now we will have a recession, was there a point at which inverted yield curve was going on that it then went to that? in other words, if it was only a day or two event, then it went back to something approaching whatever normal is these days, what's the rule of thumb? >> i think you need to see it for a sustained period of time. neil: what is that? >> you know, i can't give you a good number on that. neil: barron's put it at about a month. day in and day out for about a month. >> that sounds like a good estimate to me.

but let's also remember that we do tend to throw around these words such as a recession as if they are one singular thing. for those of us that were let's say adults and aware of what was going on in the last version of that a decade ago, that was unlike anything that had happened since the great depression. we can think back to say around the year 2000, and the years since then, maybe a few years before that, we have seen very short and shallow recessions. so i think the real key question now is does this trade war get resolved sooner rather than later, help to reduce the sense of uncertainty that's really filtering on through the global economy, or if it escalates in the case of, for example, in the rare earths we just talked about. so we don't know how bad this can get but we know that it's bad enough already and so i think many of the messages we're getting from markets right now are telling us the same thing, that there's a high degree of uncertainty, we don't know how it's going to be resolved and we really need for it to be

resolved in a way that basically takes care of the questions the united states has raised about the way china treats its trading partners. neil: well put. thank you very much. your calming perspective comes in handy. we need that. mark hamrick was referring to some of these precious goods that china controls, like oxides that go into a lot of our technology, smartphones, intel uses them. rare, rare earths. that's what they're called for good reason. 70% to 80% of the world's rare earths happen to be in china. that's not an issue. they control about half the market pricing wise for getting those out into the world. they are the only guys who have them. someone must have let the chinese know hey, we're the only guys who have them and now they are a bargaining chip. not the kind that we like. after this.

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when a prosecutor can't reach a decision, that's the decision. so there's no case on obstruction, there's no case on collusion. the reality is, he offered his opinion on collusion, he offered his opinion on obstruction, opinion on collusion was there

is no case. his opinion on obstruction was that he couldn't conclude that the president committed obstruction. neil: all right. president trump's lawyer, rudy giuliani, on the mueller conclusions. the 2020 democrats, most of them, anyway, are already calling for impeachment hearings to begin. nancy pelosi walking a fine line saying that they would be justified but didn't spell out word for word she thinks that's where the house should go right now. to chris bedford and axios reporter caitlin owens. she did walk a fine line, nancy pelosi, in her statement to the press. she might elaborate on that a little bit more couple of hours or one hour from now, when she addresses an audience i believe in san francisco. what do you think she does? >> so far, she's really been trying to let the investigation process play out in the house. nancy pelosi has withheld a lot of members of her caucus who do want to begin the impeachment process. i'm not sure yet how today

impacts that process. bob mueller essentially said look, the way to charge a president with misconduct or a crime is through the impeachment process. essentially put the ball in congress's court. so what does that do for the pressure on nancy pelosi? i think we are going to see pretty quickly here, especially if the calls for impeachment do start increasing from democrats. neil: you know, chris bedford, then you have to wonder what mueller said today that was different or what he outlined in his report. i didn't think much, then again, i'm not a lawyer, but i guess he emphasized more some of the things he couldn't dismiss with the president, fully exonerating, for example, on obstruction, feeling limited constraint, that he couldn't indict a sitting president. that didn't seem to mean to me that he couldn't use words like guilty if he felt the president was guilty of something but again, i'm not a lawyer. now, so what did this prove today? >> i agree with you on that. rod rosenstein and bob barr have

a different interpretation of what mueller was allowed to say there. they have made that fairly clear. there's nothing i can figure out about this press conference, any reason for it, except to give tak tacit approval to the democrats and the impeachment process. that seems to be the only take-away. he didn't even outright say that. he doesn't seem to be much of a character for outright saying much these days. he seems to send the signal that it was okay to move forward with impeachment, saying this is congress's job, which is what the democrats have been pushing. my first thought was speaker pelosi's job just got a lot more difficult because since she doesn't control the white house or the senate, passing democratic legislation is really out the window. what her job is essentially to do is to help the democrats take the senate, help the democrats take the white house. i don't think impeachment is a very politically salient idea, a good course to take for winning this election but she's going to lose control and mueller just gave the democrats who have pushed for this basically the keys to the car and said i kind of agree with you. neil: so what happens if we begin impeachment proceedings? i'm told by lawyers that they

give in this case the house judiciary committee a lot more room and opportunity to subpoena witnesses and the rest, and make it harder for the white house to reject those subpoenas. so play that out for me. >> right. axios has reported the same thing, it becomes easier for congress to collect information, at least partially because you know, they can make the argument that that information is relevant to what congress is doing, which is an impeachment process. so i think that we could see a lot more information come out from this, but look, as axios has reported, as democrats begin the impeachment process it's going to be really hard for them to conclude that process by saying you know what, this guy is squeaky clean, he's legit, we are actually not going to impeach after we have investigated that option. neil: so they would then impeach him, it would move to the senate, where unless something stunning develops, it's not going to go anywhere. >> right. right. because republicans still control the senate and at this point, representative justin

amash out of every single republican in congress, that's the only one that seems willing to impeach. so yeah, then you have an impeachment in the house and it dies in the senate and goes back to the 2020 election, where the american people then decide what to do about president trump. neil: i'm old enough to remember, as i probably told you guys and you roll your eyes when you hear it, but i'm old enough to remember that with the nixon impeachment proceedings in the summer of '73, they went into that summer with the president himself, despite the allegations back and forth in the press, was holding on very well, was a very popular figure, and these were not expected to drag on or be very, you know, reveal much. we all know what happened. they did drag on, there were revelations, there was discovery of tapes and a taping system. john dean and the cancer on the presidency, et cetera, et cetera. something that was dismissed, all of a sudden became something that everyone had to watch and be tuned for.

does that part look like it could repeat itself here? >> i'm very doubtful that it could. president nixon knew he was done when senator mccain's predecessor, barry goldwater, the conservative -- neil: that's right. >> -- said i don't believe this anymore, sided with the democrats. that's a senator. that's a long way away from justin amash and it seems to me that the entire report, what mueller has done, his power to get these interviews and get to the truth, what he laid out in his report is going to be the final statement. so now it's just going to be a matter of whether it's political theater because they are not going to be able to impeach the president. they are not going to be able to peel off the republican senators to agree with them because unlike the watergate problems, we are not uncovering new information every day. of course, that could end up being wrong. there could be something massive out there that mueller missed but i'm extremely doubtful. neil: we do have this report that we didn't have in the nixon case going into those hearings, right, so that could be a little different. what do you think? >> well, another point that i think is really important is when nixon was president, the

parties were really different than they are today. there was more idealogical diversity within the party system. democrats weren't all liberal democrats, republicans weren't all conservative republicans. so just the politics were really different, a member of congress flipping on a member of their own party. right now, we live in such partisan times that i think no matter what comes out, it's hard to see president trump getting impeached and kicked out of office when his party controls the senate. so you know -- neil: that was something richard nixon did not enjoy, was a democratic house and democratic senate that went after him. we'll see. still early on in the process here. thank you, guys, very, very much. >> thank you. neil: we don't know where the markets will end today. we know that right now, they are on pace, that is the dow, s&p and nasdaq, for the first down month of 2019. and one of the worst days we have seen in quite a number of years. i believe nine. don't hold me to that. charlie brady is a genius and

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neil: bob mueller speaks and everyone is talking about it. couple hours from now 4:00 p.m. on "your world." i will speak to north carolina senator thom tillis, what he makes of mueller's remarks, whether they are different from the report itself. it could be interesting back and

forth. looks increasingly the house is moving towards impeachment hearings. today might have provided ox again. they might be getting ahead of themselves. to charles payne, digesting all of that, a lot more in the hour to come. hey, charles. charles: neil, a tall order indeed. good afternoon, this is "making money." robert mueller says he is resigning, he is closing the special counsel's office and his report speaks for himself but his comments whether president trump committed obstruction of the investigation is now being seen as encouragement for congress to pick up on that investigation and go down theism peach be the impeachment path. already weak stock market plunged more after the mueller statement. this was enough to fan flames of those who think there was presidential obstruction. you couple that with the china trade saga. investors began sel