yes, ringo starr shares a birthday or i share a birthday with ringo starr. he is 80, however. i'm a mere child. ashley, lauren, susan, thank you very much, for all the hard work you did over last couple weeks. i appreciate it. thank you. my time is up now. here's neil. neil: welcome back, stuart. belated happy birthday. the market obviously celebrating. i should kill that rally in a matter of a few minutes. good to have you back, my friend. look at the corner of wall and broad. the dow is racing. the pfizer and biontech getting fast-track approval for remedies that not necessarily cures, they're promising vaccines, here. that is all the market needed to hear. that and a couple big deals in the works today, including a big, big combo we'll tell you about in just a second but this is something happening across the board leading to the nasdaq having a record today and the

dow and s&p, you know if they keep going at a pace like this they will be at a record pretty soon here. we'll be monitoring that. monitoring true to our name, coast to coast, what is going on around in our fabulous country including in florida where cases are heating up and i mean really heating up. we're in atlanta where the cdc is reporting when it comes to the young, more of the cases are going up for them as well. and in texas, where joe biden's poll numbers are going up and up. one has him in the lead, in the lead in texas. then, back to washington, d.c., where the, shall we say dr. fauci ain't all that rhetoric is heating up as well. so we've got a busy couple hours ahead my friend. i hope you had a wonderful weekend. get latest numbers and stats out of the cdc for that we go to jonathan serrie in atlanta. reporter: florida released

latest numbers, 12,624 of new cases overnight. only time that was higher, what they reported on sunday, all-time record not only for florida but any state, 15,300 new cases. that is what they reported on sunday. the median age among those cases though, is a relatively young 38. governor ron desantis says the high case numbers are at least partially due to widespread testing. >> want to see it continue to go up and up. we tested 2.4 million people. that is one for every nine people in the state of florida. reporter: despite the surge in florida cases, disney world which reopened its magic kingdom and animal kingdom theme parks saturday. they plan to open two more on wednesday, epcot and disney hollywood studios. that drawn some backlash and peoples on social media, questioning safety of doing this

while covid-19 cases are surging in florida. but disney is limiting crowd sizers and cast members nudging customers not failing to social distance or not wearing masks properly. texas had 10,410. texas hospital became ill after attending a covid party, a event where people knowingly exposed themselves to a infected person. >> before the patient died, they looked at their nurse and said, i think i made a mistake. i thought it was a hoax but it's not. reporter: president trump retweeted a rant by game show host chuck woolery that states in parts, the most out rage just lies by cdc, democrats, doctors, not all, but most that we are told to trust. this is growing riff between

president and some of the nation's top health experts about the risks and benefits to rapidly reopening schools and the economy. back to you. neil: my friend, thank you very, very much. jonathan serrie on all of that. i want to to to blake burman at the white house. we're seeing governor cuomo is not sitting idly by allowing some assaults not being addressed. he is saying president trump was wrong on the economic reopening. goes on to say he is wrong on schools reopening. the governor, blake as you know has not indicated whether definitely all schools will reopen in the state. there is concern in new york city it might be be a camaral affair, some will reopen, some will not. it's a mess. heat between both sides is increasing, isn't it. reporter: see what is going on in florida, governor talked about if you can go into

walmart, you can put kids back into school. you can see going on in the state of new york, and new york city where they are at least in most recent weeks taking a more conservative approach going forward. neil, there is what is happening back over here at the white house, athlete as it relates to question so many parents are looking going forward what will happen with schools across the country and specifically with the community and upcoming weeks. we heard from president trump describe the cdc guidelines put out, tough, expensive impractical. we heard from white house press secretary kayleigh mcenany earlier today, describe the guidelines what she essentially said would be a perfect world scenario, but she also noted, neil, how it will be the local leaders at the end of the day who will have the ultimate say. listen. >> so we leave it to localities as to exactly what guidelines work, because guidelines in a state like north dakota need to look different than a locality like miami. the cdc guidelines are out there as a best case scenario.

reporter: we just heard from the president's top economic advisor larry kudlow who said moments ago schools should reopen as long as a handful of conditions are met. four basic guidelines need to be met, right? the masking, the distancing, personal hygiene and the testing. now geography, spacing of desks, whether you break the school day up into four hours or six hours, whatever, i'm not an expert, we could figure this out. reporter: back over here at the white house, neil, we'll hear from president trump in the 2:00 hour at an event he will take part in. at top of the next hour the press secretary will be briefing. one of the questions likely, at least one of many questions will be about this relationship between the president and dr. fauci, the government's top infectious diseases expert, how dr. fauci is viewed within the white house. peter navarro, one of the president's top advisors did not hold back in a statement he put forward on fauci saying quote,

in part, dr. fauci has a good bedside manner with the public but he has been wrong about everything i have ever interacted with him on. navarro says when you ask me if i listen to doctor fauci's advice, my answer is only with caution. when the press secretary was asked about this, dr. fauci this morning he is noted one of several voices on the coronavirus task force, one of several voices in which the advice makes its way up to the president. neil? neil: if memory serves me right to be fair about this, the president himself minimized the risk of the virus early on saying that the flu, typical flu was going to be a lot worse. that he trusted the chinese were being very transparent. that wasn't dr. fauci who said that? reporter: and president at one point said the caseload would go down to zero. i believe we're somewhat over three million. as this ramps up nationwide, the caseload, as we see more states

potentially having to reevaluate where they are, and we've already seen the president point the finger at china over the last few months, it is one of those, i guess, neil, surveying the landscape from a whole bunch much sides with a lot of fingerpointing, as a lot is going on. dr. fauci right now is clearly caught in the middle of it. neil: you know, maybe the administration could be chafing at poll numbers forever fickle, blake as you like to remind me, in polls 67% of americans seem to trust dr. fauci. 26% the president on the coronavirus. further when they were targeting dr. fauci they were taking a comment that he made back in february 29, when he said there is no need to change anything you're doing on a day-to-day basis, referring to the outset of that virus. what they left out in highlighting that remark is the next sentence he used when he said the risk is still low but

all of this could change. so why did they do that? reporter: you know, it is a great question. i don't know. remember, neil, at the beginning of this the line coming out of the white house from the vice president and the president himself was the risk to everyday americans was low but clearly, you know, depending on how you want to look at it, you can say that has changed too. there have been a lot of movements. i was speaking with one senior administration official earlier today, neil, who was sort of taking issue at something they were quoted on earlier saying look, it was at that moment in time this person was telling me and they felt it was sort of disingenuous to go after them for what they had said. when you stand at this moment of time see where we are and see the comments that were made, there are people who feel that the whole picture necessarily, needs to be, needs to be put into context is what i'm trying to get at but the bottom line

with all of this, neil, especially now that they are looking at dr. fauci is going forward as we get closer to an election here, there is going to be a lot of fingerpointing and a lot of blaming and we saw one aspect of it, kayleigh mcenany, the press secretary saying fauci is one voice. you saw on your screen another aspect, peter navarro, basically fauci is wrong, don't listen to him. neil: all right. last time i checked he is a doctor. we'll see what happens. blake burman, thank you very, very much. do want to get, if wall street is worried about this bickering back and forth, wall street knows on right and left this, is election year, these back and forths are fairly common but carol roth is following all this and runup seems to be virus related or hope for vaccines that could move forward a little more quickly, now they granted fast-track approval with attention and pfizer and biontech and a host of others, is that what's going to decide

the markets course at least you think in the near future? >> i still think the market is in a drunken stupor for all of the fed intervention. you have to remember this goes all the way back to 2007, or 2008! this is a long time we've had ridiculously low interest rates. so i think that is a large part of what the allowing the market to be a little bit cavalier in saying we're going to push this aside, assume that it recovers but neil, where i am concerned about, even if you believe the revenue recovers there, is not enough talk about margins and productivity. we were in this environment where margins were at very high levels and with the virus, even if you get it somewhat contained you will have a hit to productivity, you will have increased operating expenses. you might have increased liability as a business. oh, by the way, based on the

debtloads of everyone you will not be buying back the stock anymore to prop up the stock price. so i think that the entire equation around margins which brought down to earnings, how profitable these businesses can be going forward. that is the part that wall street isn't paying attention to, what really concerns me going forward. neil: you know, i guess they will worry about it tomorrow. they're not showing it today. the disproportionate interest in tech stocks like amazon, apple, tesla, that you know, seem to hit a record, in fact are hitting records each and every day, many argue, i don't know where you stand on this, carol, that is justifiable froth. is it to you? >> well i certainly think some of those names are more justifiable than others but if you think about their models and the scalability of those models and the fact that a lot of them don't have people walking into a business that aren't going to be as affected, i got to believe

amazon has been cleaning up during this period, helping to provide us with goods and services, powering websites with aws, to help the rest of us get the goods and service services we needed while being locked down i certainly think businesses are are going to benefit and the tech side of business will benefit. is this completely sustainable? do those multiples make sense on an ongoing basis? that may be a little bit difficult to argue, but on a relative basis, vis-a-vis the market, who will be surviving or thriving two years from now, or five years from now, a name like amazon is one of those out there. neil: carol, always good catching up with you. carol roth following all this closely. speaking of those names, amazon and tesla, put it in perspective, jeff bezos is closing in on a 200 billion-dollar net worth.

that is his worth 190 billion if you add up allison shares he owns by the price of $3,000 a share. elon musk is worth more than warren buffett thanks to the tesla runup. he is averaging 11 billion-dollar pick up in wealth today, on top of a 20 billion-dollar pickup last week, 6 billion alone on friday. it is good to be king. more after this. liberty mutual customizes your car insurance, so you only pay for what you need. i wish i could shake your hand. granted. only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪ maria had to do everything for me. [maria] she had these awful blisters on her back.

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♪. neil: all right, new york governor andrew cuomo we're monitoring. he said something that caught my attention. he said the president's covid-19 scandal, makes former president richard nixon's watergate scandal look innocent. what is he talking about there? what was scandalized? the president's response to this some came too little too late. or that he is focusing on all the wrong people and not himself? maybe that is fair game to say, scandalous might be a bit of a leap here. we're following that, you're going to notice on the right or the left politicians will feel free to seize on events and sort of recreate their own truths. maybe you can get this president

on delayed response to the covid-19 situation but to call that a scandal compared to watergate, come on folks. let's get real here. meantime, i do want to talk about the washington redskins getting very, very real recognizing the new environment we're in right now, saying that name, the redskins won't fly anymore. junking it today, they didn't telegraph what other names they will come up with. connell mcshane is following it closely. connell? reporter: it is interesting, neil, they didn't telegraph the name because they don't have one yet. sports business journal, follows business out of court, they say trademark issues are pending. looks like the team wanted to get out the news it was scrapping the redskins name this started at the beginning of the month on the money side ever things at least pause -- because the redskins are big sponsors publicly-traded companies. fedex, for example, nike, pepsi

and a group of investors 87 investors sent a note to the companies, they said, if you want to keep doing business investing with you you have to come out against this name. fedex on the 2nd of july did exactly that. t moved fast, amazon, walmart, target. these retrailers removed redskin merchandise on their online platforms. that started with the sponsors. once that gets rolling, because there is pressure on the owner dan snyder to do this for years but things changed after the george floyd killing and pressure was finally too much for him. he gave in and, is going to change the name. remember fred smith, of fedex is minority owner in the team. fedex field where you see where they play in maryland, that deal with fedex is worth $200 million for 27 plus years, they signed it in '98. once fedex said they need to see the name change.

everybody knew that was going to happen, now it is, connell mcshane on fast moving developments. we're getting a lot of bulletins on airlines hoping on a wing and a prayer that business will pick up because southwest says it needs to triple the number of passengers it has by the end of the year or looking at some layoffs. this is a message from the ceo to all employees. this after united airlines renegotiated some contracts with thousands of its workers. and on the heels of american indicating that it is going to still stuff fannies in the planes to the max to keep revenue coming in. for all of them, the same dilemma, to keep flying when a lot of people are not interested in flying. stay with us. you're watching "coast to coast" this selenite grey is so pretty isn't it?

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neil: you know joe biden might be making some gains in the polls right now but he isn't winning any points with police unions across the country, given the fact that many of them feel former vice president has thrown them under bus. they were big fans of his, thought he was straight-up guy a few months ago. that was then. does the vice president have to worry about police union support is worried about it right now. hillary vaughn on that, hillary. reporter: police union support of biden is backtracking because a lot of police officers around the country do not feel joe biden has had their back but before this biden has had a loyal support system in police unions. in fact he helped deliver police union support twice for barack obama from the national association of police organizations that represents unions around the country. napo endorsed obama in 2008 and 2012 because biden was on the ticket. this time around with biden back on the ballot, some unions are

rethinking their support of the presumptive democratic nominee. >> joe biden was a very strong supporter of the police years ago and he has been kidnapped now by the anti-police rhetoric. there is a big question amongst our members if joe biden is going to stand up to support the police. reporter: police officers i talked to were disappointed that leadership in the democratic party have not denounced the defund police movement that they say denigrates police officers and some see biden as being part of the problem when he says things like this -- >> surplus military equipment for law enforcement, they don't need that. the last thing you need is an up-armored humvee coming into a neighborhood. it is like the military invading. they don't know anybody. they become the enemy. they're supposed to be protecting people. reporter: director of. [apo said last month, for joe biden police are shaking their heads because he used to be a stand-up guy that supported

law enforcement. in his old age for whatever reason he is writing a sad final chapter supporting law enforcement. that final chapter could be for at least napo for their pick for president. they will make the endorsement announcement on wednesday. we are learning president trump will call in to talk with nape poe to make his pitch. as of this morning they had not heard official word from the biden campaign, if the former vp will make himself available before their vote on wednesday. neil? neil: hillary, thank you very, very much. it is a unique quandary to be in right now. who does joe biden hold his allegiance too? if it is far left extreme element of the progress scif democratic party he might have to adhere to the thinking of alexandria ocasio-cortez who says the defunding movement is real and the party should endorse it. take a look. >> maybe this has to do with the fact that people aren't paying their rent and are scared to pay

their rent. so they go out and they need to feed their child and they don't have money. so you maybe have to, they're put in a position where they feel like they either need to shoplift some bread or go hungry that night. neil: all right. well a lot of these protests which she is referring, they weren't shoplifting for bread. they weren't stealing those kind of items. the fact of the matter is, the violent wave we've been seeing in the country goes way beyond protesters looking to feed themselves or make an economic case here. carol markowitz, "new york post" columnist on all of this. she is doubling down, carol, on that view it is the protesters we should remember, be sympathetic to them, not targeting police. she doubled down on it. the very clear message to joe biden, you should as well. >> look, none of the democratic leadership are challenging here whatsoever. she gets to get away with

pretending new york crime spike is not about bread and shooting and murder. that is what the crime spike is happening. that is what numbers represent. she gets no pushback. joe biden said, last week, yes we should take away funding from police. nobody ran with that story. it was muted story in most of the media because there is a narrative that they want to believe that joe biden is pro-police but he has to, he has to, you know, satisfy the ocasio-cortezs of the world. neil: i don't see i guess i'm showing my age, sister solja moment, when he challenged extreme progressive views, they werep main left-wing of america.

joe biden is not hinting of anything of the sort. i'm just wondering, still early, we have months to go but whether you know, he is hurting himself right now doing so? >> i think joe biden is not going to have that kind of moment. for one thing the clinton universe apologies for that moment at this point. neil: you're right. >> [inaudible]. far left. i don't see them reaching out to say the right or even moderates at all. i think that the idea right now is just to keep the left together and defeat donald trump and that is really the only goal. so no i don't see him challenging any leftist rhetoric. he really needs their votes. he is going to try to earn their support. neil: you know while i have you, carol, if i can indulge me, switching gears a little bit, both parties are still planning their conventions but, in the middle of this virus, now with the escalating cases in florida and republicans still on for jacksonville, you know, you got

to begin to wonder whether they're putting all their heart and soul into these quadrennial events. what are you looking at? >> conventions are sort of an old school beat as it is. i don't know that either party can really proceed with a giant convention, the kind we used to have. it is sort of a weird moment in history where they will have to rework what works in the past and take a new direction. i don't know, i don't see either party going forward with their conventions honestly. neil: i'm also wondering, forget the crowds they generate, whether, let's say they're sparsely attended, which it would be nature of what is going on right now, what would move the needle? normally crescendo events where each candidate stresses his view where he wants to take the country. might we have to wait until the debates for that? in other words, all these

gy h, aut ahe ot have debates is a big question mark also. joe biden is being encouraged by "the new york times" not to have debates. i don't know when we see the candidates talk directly to the people. benefit of twitter for donald trump, he does do that. go straight to the people to deliver his message. joe biden has been doing that as well. we'll see whether or not they need these other typical events in order to get their case across. neil: yeah. you're right, it could be possible, i guess first time since 1972 we might not have debates, if that is true. then is was richard nixon avoiding them like the plague. he still won in a landslide but he wanted toe avoid that whole scenario, right? >> that, it's a tricky proposition. if joe biden really does avoid debates, he might be seen as somebody that stays out of sight. that would be a real problem for him. i hope we do have debates.

the american people deserve to hear from both candidates. they deserve to challenge each other. we deserve to see them in action. neil: especially these two. it's a pay-per-view event. we can't ignore that, carol. good catching up with you. >> thank you. neil: we had barbara corcoran, thank you. we had barbara corcoran, the real estate maven of new york with us last week in a special town hall forum. she said something interesting to me that the future lies in residential real estate, not so much corporate real estate, not exactly a fox alert. what she said what is happening in the cities that my next guest concurs, real, alive in the cities around buying in the cities, real estate in the cities, not very promising, after this introducing stocks by the slice from fidelity. now you can trade stocks and etfs for any amount you choose instead of buying by the share. all with no commissions.

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♪ "sweet home alabama" neil: great song, for alabama, a great real estate market too. we try to do it together, you're welcome, america, it is just what we do. caldwell banker president and ceo echoes the theme here that alabama is one of the hotter spots in the country for real estate growth. we've certainly seen that in some early figures. in fact we're seeing nationally across the country right now where mortgage applications are on a tear and, you know, existing, new home sales, starts they're all on a similar tear but not for everyone, not for example, in all the urban areas. new york city comes to mind. ryan, very good to have you. how would you define the real estate market right now? >> well great to be here, and the real estate market i would say in many areas on fire. we certainly seen a significant return, much more quickly than many had anticipated and especially i would say especially strong of some of the

markets you mentioned and are some cases out side of the urban core, and some cases well outside of the urban core. neil: barbara corcoran was here, familiar with her as she is with you. >> of course, places like new york city, other urban areas, people sheltering at home were working from home, realize i don't need to go into the city to do what i do, furthermore my boss is rethinking the wisdom of him or herself, but what we're seeing in the corporate real estate side is an early sign of trouble there. enough i can remember there was similar talk after 9/11, after the financial meltdown more than a decade ago. >> true. neil: it didn't last long so what about this latest fear-mongering about big city real estate and purchases? >> yeah, i could think it's a bit overstated. i think you're right to be cautious there but i think there

is some there there as well. what we're seeing a lot not necessarily people deciding they will have their entire workforce work remotely forever but they're rethinking that urban location. the company may stay where they are, but trend of denseification of urban environment, you talked about this before, going 300 square feet per employee, to 200, 100. that has been a trend companies utilized to increase collaboration and decrease expense. today's dilemma, we're seeing companies allowing people to work work at home more frequently. when you're in the office be spaced out a lot more. neil: i'm curious on that point, ryan. you've heard about these spikes in cases, normally very hot real estate markets. florida comes to mind. texas. >> sure. neil: i'm not lumping the entire state with the problems of spikes there, but i am wondering if that slows the recovery here of the country and that some of the housing data might have

gotten ahead of itself? >> well, certainly interesting. what is happening economically with regard to the virus is a little different in the housing market. we've got historically low rates. we have the value of housing being more understood perhaps now than ever before. we've got a lot of people who are valuing interior square footage as well as outdoor space more highly than they were before. on the interior side looking for home office space. that is driving a lot of life decisions, life events. accelerating long-held life plans. maybe moving from the city to suburbs. moving from north jersey to north carolina. that acceleration of life plans drivers the real estate market. i'm not sure the spike in cases will cool oaf the market unless there is a more larger but the fundamentals of real estate remains sound on the residential side. neil: a lot of homeowners have yet to give up the beef.

they feel their own homes are undervalued even in this market so they're reluctant to sell. this is kind of, limited the supply, increased the demand but where do you see that going? >> well, many cases people are staying put because of the perceived, exactly as you said, value might not be there. they worry about selling during a pandemic. they worry they won't be able to find a suitable home or location where they're going. the best advice right now, in addition to speaking with caldwell banker agent explore inventory. inventory is constrained. some older homeowners came through other program through aarp. that agent will explain inventory for their home is constrained this might be a uniquely viable time to put their home on the market on destination side they're dealing with truly record low interest

rates. less paid in interest, more of the same monthly dollar going to the home you're purchasing. it really is an excellent time to get some expert advice. neil: depending where you're going to be, right? caldwell banker president and ceo, joining us via skype. ryan, very good catching up with you. as ryan was speaking we're at intraday highs for the dow up 465 points. this is reminder to investors never know a good time to get in or out but a reminder to those with the beginning of the march fall-off with the virus first appearing we started heading into the bear market territory, then some, averages down 30 to 45% from their highs. the nasdaq is now at a record. the dow is, less than double digits away, double percentage digits away from a record and the s&p, less than 5% from one. a reminder sometimes these issues that come up when you're

in thedown draft of a sell-off but they don't last forever. after this. instead of trying to decide "should i invest in stocks or not?" meaning, "are stocks going to rise or not?", let's instead stop looking at the investments, which we can't control, and let's now look at our goals, which we can control. in other words, we only want to take as much risk as is necessary to achieve our goals. we need to protect the money that's there. and that says you should be investing in...

we need to protect the money that's there. 49i found you! good job. now i'm gonna stay here and you go hide.

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neil: all right. if you are interested in flying a plane doesn't have every seat occupied, jet blue has a promise for you. haceks extended guarranty of blocked mid middle seats. american has opened up all the seats including that middle seat. this is their way of saying this might be a way we go down the road but for now we're not going there. delta has a combination of this. we'll have fully staffed and occupied planes but won't push the issue. they will let you know if the plane is full. apparently the only one i know of, that disbanded that empty middle seat issue all together. we'll keep you posted on that. i don't know what senator ted cruz and a host of others including marco rubio were planning to do this summer, maybe this fall, maybe fly to china, well, china just let them know you're not wanted here. you can't fly here.

all because you have intruded on our policy and how we might or might not treat minority religious sects in our country. so i don't think that is causing any lack of sleep right now on the part of these gentlemen, right now benjamin hall is covering fallout from this, what triggered this this is another reminder of our fractious relationship with that country. sir. reporter: yeah, precisely, neil. on paper this is more symbolic move by china, that the u.s. senators involved can't travel to china. if they had any assets in china those are frozen t shows this growing tit-for-tat relationship between the two and growing deterioration of relationship between china and the u.s. now the chinese foreign ministry said these new sanctions against senators rubio and cruz and congressman chris smith, u.s. ambassador for religious sanctioning chinese officials four days ago. that was over the abuse and

forced detention of hundreds of thousands of uyghur muslims held in camps northwest china. bejing has been long accused of suppressing this minority groups and rights, practicing forced sterilization. the four u.s. politicians have been vocal critics of china's policy. the relationships between the two countries are getting worse the u.s. is warning citizens of increased risk of being detained in china, being locked up, unable to leave. the u.s. state department is now warning americans to exercise increased caution when in china due to the chance of random detention. and elsewhere in the world we see china nearing a trade and military partnership with american enemy iran. this deal now gives china discounted oil for 25 years in exchange for military and financial cooperation t would potentially undercut all of d.c.'s effort to pressure tehran to get rid of the nuclear build up, giving beijing a foothold in the region. lots of moves for china. reaching out to american enemies.

taking control of hong kong. we're seeing military build-up by them. this is by far the most aggressive the country has been a long time. exerting expansionist, even. neil. neil: benjamin hall. thank you very much. i want to go to jonathan hoenig about a lot of stuff. jonathan i can't let the chinese latest wrinkle go. if we're expecting to see trade resume between our countries, now you have them say some u.s. senators can't fly there, that doesn't look like making of warming in trade relations. your thoughts? >> neil, keep in mind before the virus it was exactly those trade negotiations, phase one, hopefully, ultimately phase two and phase three of a great trade deal the president promised for a long time. a lot of that deal-making seems to be on hold. we're not even sure that the deals made will be made. behind those deals are hundreds of billions of dollars worth of

mutually beneficial trade between two countries. we hope these leaders can pull some of that friendship, if that exists at all, ultimately try to find a solution to this trade impasse. neil: to your point, it is not really registering on wall street today. maybe hope eventually it will, but they're obviously focused on fast tracking these potential vaccine makers and all of that. i get that but are they getting ahead of themselves? >> well, the markets, neal, certainly could make the argument it is getting ahead of itself. some of these biotech have been strong lately but pulling engine ever the market is five or six big tech technology stocks, microsoft, apple, tesla, the last couple months. they have been the engine. ironically although a lot are expensive on a valuation basis but they are seen -- access to

capital, a lot of it is stimulus is almost guaranteed. a lot of smaller companies don't have access to capital. there is lot of fundamentals buffeting the market. big tech cap is where it as been and for now where it's at. neil: no doubt about that but i'm thinking too about the pandemic, hope for vaccines all of that, governments are involved spending a lot of money, making sure a new stimulus, the white house is talking about that, maybe more stimulus checks, but ultimately it will cost and a lot of rich folks, people like you, jonathan, all right we can afford to pay more. abigail disney, chief among them, daughter of the founder, you know what? i can pay more. i warrant to pay more. and dozens of other millionaires signing off on a similar letter of intent, tax us please. what do you think of that? >> i mean, abigail disney, she is, i think she is a very sad story ultimately.

she was born into a tremendous amount of wealth and she seemingly spent her whole adult life denouncing that wealth. not just the wealth, but the people who created it. her family, her uncle created disney world. you know, so, neil, not just that she goes against people who create wealth but she wants government to go after them. no matter what you think of disney, whether you think they should be opening or shouldn't be opening, pay their employees, too much, too little, they succeed by voluntary trade. they make people incredibly happy. their employees included. abigail disney and all these millionaires and billionaires who are advocating for more taxes, they're not saying we're going to pay more taxes. they're saying we want government to go to your house with a gun to make you more taxes. that is immoral on its face. it is so sads comes with denouncing i think the heroic americans who make the economy, disney of the world, jobs of the world, bill gates of the world, they are the ones that create the economy.

it is government we should be putting down, not great innovators of our world. neil: real quickly, i don't think they're coming to your house with a gun. maybe a knife, i don't know. you mentioned bill gates there, quickly, johnny, bill gates said he thinks the rich should pay more. he never exactly outlined much more. this is the direct they're going now. what do you think of that. >> it is kind of commonplace. neil, there is not a fundamental, i think moral opposition to that. you know the rich in effect have already paid. they have paid and they have made by providing these incredible values. you know, is the world better off because if we take more money out of those who have been most product of it? the best thing bill gates would do, save, to continue to invest his money, create more wealth, to produce more values. that ideology is lost certainly on people like abigail disney. even among so-called conservatives. we need to return to free-market

capitalism, the particularly morality of free-market capitalism. you earn it. you keep it. neil: got it. thank you my friend. not at all surprised you took that view. g at is what you are, you are a capitalist. more after this this is totally customizable, so you focus only on what you want. okay, it's got screeners and watchlists. and you can even see how your predictions might affect the value of the stocks you're interested in. now this is what i'm talking about. yeah, it'll free up more time for your... uh, true crime shows? british baking competitions. hm. didn't peg you for a crumpet guy. focus on what matters to you with thinkorswim. ♪

neil: all right. we've got stocks on a tear right

now. we are also minutes away from a white house briefing. kayleigh mcenany will no doubt address questions that the administration has raised about the performance of dr. fauci. some are indirect slaps, others, nothing indirect about them. peter navarro and others saying the guy lahas been wrong more often than he's been right. this comes on the face of polls that show 67% of americans trust dr. fauci on the virus. only 26%, the president of the united states. obviously, that chafes a little for the white house here, enough to alienate dr. fauci but he's not been seen in any public forum talking about administration, coronavirus task force policy so there has been reported friction between he and the president. fauci himself has said over the weekend that he has not been meeting one-on-one with the president or part of that task force in a small group in quite some time. this will likely come up here just as we've got a spike in cases going on around the

country right now, three days in a row of 60,000 plus cases, so in the course of the weekend, more than 100,000 cases. that is a record for this pandemic. in florida, while things ebbed a little bit, to a little less than 13,000 new cases just yesterday, more than 15,000 cases so over 48-hour period in the sunshine state, we have seen more new cases than we have ever seen. in this environment, keep in mind that florida is going to be the spot for the republican convention, at least the important part of it, where the president of the united states will address the nation and his party and now you have all of these new cases spiking in that state, which was one of the big reasons and guarantees that was afforded that state because the president was sick and tired of the north carolina governor saying that he couldn't guarantee either that the same crowds could gather there for the republican convention.

the read right now from the north carolina lieutenant governor, north carolina one of those odd states where the governor is a democrat, dan forrest is a republican. lieutenant governor, very good to have you. do you think, sir, that the president regrets leaving your state for florida when, in fact, things are a lot worse in florida than they are in your state? >> well, i think he really didn't have much choice. he wasn't getting any guarantees certainly from the governor and this administration but he wasn't getting any warm and fuzzy feelings either that somebody was really willing to work with them. when those conversations started, that was three months ago and at that point in time, our governor should have at least been willing to work with the administration to come up with a plan for three months down the road. so we are getting closer to that. we talked a lot about cases and the number of cases rising and they are rising in north carolina, too. the percent positive on testing

has maintained the same, the hospitalization rate is about the same, the icu beds are fine, our hospitals aren't overrun. we have about 30,000 -- well, 30,000 active cases and you can assume that 40% of those are asymptomatic cases. what we are seeing is that 99% of all people who test positive for coronavirus get well and they get well at home, and 1% has serious complications, even death. so you know, we know that there's certainly a fear and panic campaign going on there, but we also need to push the positives as well. neil: all right. that's a fair enough point. obviously they are trying to push the positives in jacksonville, governor, but the fact of the matter was the president wanted assurances from the governor in north carolina about what he could or couldn't do months out and now, you know, it looks like the governor might have been wise to just say all right, i can't commit, now is

not the time, and now it looks potentially unwise for florida or jacksonville in particular to make promises now it might not be able to keep. what do you think? >> well, i think the goalposts keep moving on this thing. we talked about flattening the curve, neil. now for four months, the whole purpose of flattening the curve was to make sure the health care industry was not overrun, to make sure our hospitals weren't overrun, our icus weren't overrun, our ventilators and so forth. that curve has been flat all along in north carolina. we have never had anything but a flat curve. so our testing is going through the roof. we have hit about, i don't know, somewhere about 10%, maybe 11% of our population being tested now. people are obviously testing and tracking into the areas where they know there are infection so we know the percent positives on those tests are going to increase but all those things are good data points, but the real data point to track is the one about hospitalizations, and the folks that really need to be taken care of, especially those in nursing homes and those people that are older and those

types of things. so we really, in north carolina, we have just been missing a lot of data and a lot of information. neil: i know you are not only running against the governor for that job but also suing him over these business restrictions he put in place since the pandemic and actually through the pandemic. you think they are too much. he says he's looking out for residents' health and safety. what do you think? >> those are two different things. the lawsuit is about the constitution and the rule of law. we didn't want to go that path, but the legislature wasn't able to make any headway there. we are a little different in north carolina. we have the group called the council of state and the governor is supposed to by law come to the council of state and get approval for large sweeping things like shutdowns of the state and he hasn't done that. so he's bypassed the authority of his office in doing what he's done. now, that being said, that's one thing. we are suing him for the constitutional authority that he is overreaching, but the other piece of it is the

inconsistencies in decisions related to business openings. if you go back to the beginning, we all heard of the stories of the big box retailers versus the insta small mom and pops and walmart could open but the main street shop couldn't. then it went to restaurants with bars could open but bars couldn't open. then brew eries and wineries could open but bars still couldn't open. it's just inconsistencies of decisions. university gyms can open so football players can work out but people that own gyms can't open up. i think there's subjective decision making that's going on that's really hurting the economy right now, about putting trust in the people, in the american people, what has confounded a lot of people related to decision making all across america. neil: real quickly, do you think there is any link between governors of both parties who opened up states and allowed businesses to resume, indoor, even outdoor dining, businesses that limited capacity but some capacity, or the spike in cases we have seen?

>> you can attribute that to lots of things. everybody wants to attribute it to everything, they don't want to attribute it to protests and people gathering in mass on the streets and those kind of things but they want to attribute it to restaurant openings. i don't know, neil. there's so much information out there that we don't have, there's so many things that we do better as a country on the process of making sure all americans have a thorough look at all of the data and it's all there and transparent. i would just say if any of the states don't have transparent data, then you have to start wondering whether any of these decisions are being made for political purposes. neil: we will watch it very closely. dan forest, lieutenant governor of the beautiful state of north carolina. we did put out a call to governor roy cooper. i don't believe we have heard back. hope springs eternal. we are all for fair and balanced. each side gets their positions on the table. meantime, we are all for keeping you abreast of other developments when it comes to states and the money they want for a variety of reasons. minnesota's governor has been asking for money to rebuild parts of the state that were damaged by riots and the like

and the president has denied that request. edward lawrence with the details on this one. edward, what's going on here? reporter: hey, neil. yeah, the minnesota governor says fema sent a response back to him saying that the damage caused by the looting during the riots there is something the state could handle. that's exactly what that state was saying with governor wolf was saying during the riots, they can handle the situation. remember on june 1st president donald trump criticizing governors for being weak on handling these demonstrations and not being able to handle the violence that was happening inside their cities. minnesota eventually mobilized the national guard to protect minneapolis and st. paul. now, wall says he's looking at $15 million in damage and cleanup costs that would be eligible for federal help. since may 25th when george floyd was killed and the protests started, the total damage in the state was some $500 million, mostly to minneapolis and st. paul. the governor's spokesperson said as we navigate one of the most

difficult periods in our state history, we look for support from our federal government to help us through. the argument for minnesota that they are making is the request is that the coronavirus wiped out an anticipated $1.5 billion surplus in the state, leaving a $2.4 billion hole in the budget. the denial comes a few days after minnesota representative tim emmer wrote the president asking the administration to undertake a thorough and concurrent review of my state's response to the violence. he also wants the federal government to offer recommendations to states to see if -- to make sure that level of violence never happens again. now, the governor of minnesota has 30 days now to appeal the decision of the denial. back to you. neil: edward lawrence, thank you very very much. i want to take you to seattle right now. we literally are coast to coast which is a good idea that we named the show that, because we are looking at developments that

posed all the problems there. there's the issue of paying for things right now and the target seems to be on businesses. right now, dan springer is following that and much more. dan, what's this about? reporter: yeah, neil, they are not calling this specifically the amazon tax but there's no doubt that this is targeting this huge new tax is targeting the goose that lays the golden tech egg here in seattle. four months after seattle businesses were shut down by the coronavirus, and then boarded up after widespread looting and vandalism during riots, the council delivered another business dagger. a $200 million tax on high-paying jobs. >> we just had huge demonstrations and disruptions. we had riots and violence and mob activity in the city. that has created an atmosphere in which members of the city council are afraid to vote against this proposal. reporter: on a 7-2 vote, the council passed a huge payroll tax that will hit nearly 900 businesses and their 78,000 workers earning more than

150,000 a year. it's expected to raise $214 million with an average tax of more than $2700 per high-paying job. the biggest target, amazon and ceo jeff bezos. >> we are coming for you and your rotten system. we are coming to dismantle this deeply oppressive racist sexist violent utterly bankrupt system of capitalism. reporter: neil, you may remember two years ago, a head tax passed here in seattle but that was quickly repealed under public opposition. the politics are different now and now this huge head tax -- payroll tax which is four times higher than that head tax two years ago passed with a vit vito-proof majority going after most of the high-paying jobs the country is trying to attract. neil: dan springer in seattle. i want to pick kelly jane

torrance's brain on this. this is an ongoing developing story, as you can imagine, but i don't suspect that seattle will be the only city to look to, you know, sticking it to the rich and some of the biggest wealthy employers to make things right. i'm wondering if they also risk chasing those businesses away. what do you think? >> well, that's an excellent question. of course, you know we are seeing that possibility right here in new york. a lot of the democrats in the assembly want to make up that big budget hole because of the lockdowns with the coronavirus, they're not getting the tax revenue that they would normally be getting. of course, there was already a huge gap even before that. so you know, it's a problem and some of the democrats in the assembly want to tax the rich but even governor cuomo has said we can't chase these taxpayers away. people are already looking at fleeing the city because of the

increased crime and i'm sure that's the case for some people in seattle as well. neil: i'm wondering if there's something in the coffee here, no pun intended in seattle, but to go after the gazillionaires. i mean, right now, given the runup in his stock, jeff bezos is very close to being worth $200 billion, a little north of $191 billion right now. that's a tempting target. as is the tesla ceo, elon musk, given the runup in that stock. he's picked up about $25 billion in value over the last week or so. so a lot of these cities, states, even the country, might be looking at this as a convenient source of money and a lot of it. what do you think? >> yeah. and of course, we know that so many small businesses in america are suffering as well as other big businesses, but some like

the tech sector especially are actually doing quite well under the lockdowns. people are staying home, ordering in, streaming, so yeah, some of these companies and the people who own them are doing very well and it is going to be tempting, but again, if someone like jeff bezos, he already, you know, left seattle in a way for another home in washington after he bought "the washington post" so it's obvious that these people have places to go. when you are that rich, you can go anywhere in the world. i think it will be tempting to want to get money from them but it's also very dangerous. again, it's killing that goose that laid the golden egg. certainly i think new york again is going to have to really think about this because of the people leaving because of the high taxes and because of changes in society, we may be seeing because of the lockdowns that may end up going on for, you know, months and months. neil: that's right. kelly jane, i throw breaking

news at you and you handle it with typical aplomb. thank you. good catching up with you. >> thank you, neil. neil: be well. we were mentioning elon musk and what's going on with tesla right now. there might be other factors at play with the enormous runup and electrically charged stock. see what i did there? anyway, what is happening right now that maybe we don't appreciate that goes beyond just whether battery or electric powered cars are all the rage. it could have something to do with that stock becoming a member in an elite club. charlie gasparino on that after this. as you get older, staying sharp

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neil: rocking and rolling at the corner of wall and broad, the dow up 516 points right now. the way's the moving right now could be just a matter of days before it, too, like the nasdaq gets into record territory. still a ways from that. i believe about 8%, maybe 9% or so, the s&p about 4% or so away, probably not exact on those numbers. but we are following that. a lot of this is based on optimism about a couple vaccine treatments that are sort of getting fast track approval but there's also just a lot of

optimism that even with the spike in cases we have seen, we will get through it because the spike in hospitalizations and certainly deaths isn't nearly so high. those are more lagging indicators and people could be getting ahead of themselves on this and the world health organization right now indicating that this won't be going away any time soon, talking about the global pandemic, and we have seen spikes in the likes of india and japan, whathave you. so much so in japan where they are really cracking down on large crowds. we will get into that in a second. but again, right now, if it's worried the market has a funny way of showing it. among the more stellar performers is what's been going on with tesla. that has added billions of dollars in market value, certainly, to that company among the ten most valued companies on the planet right now, thanks to this surge. elon musk, at least $25 million richer over the course of the last week, about $10 billion coming just today. charlie gasparino has been following all of these moving developments. charlie?

charlie: neil, wasn't too long ago when everybody thought tesla was going to blow up, elon musk, its ceo and founder, was considered a crazy man, they were under regulatory review. now the stock is trading at levels that what was it, the number he said on the buyout that never happened, something like $420? now we are talking about $1420, almost. but i will say this. one thing you have to be careful with this stock is that there is a huge technical reason why you have shares spiking recently as they are, well above $1,000 a share. what we have now is the possibility and probably the likelihood that tesla is going to be added into the s&p 500. if they have three consecutive quarters of positive -- of profits and they are embarking on that, july 22nd, even if they have a small profit, they are likely to be included in the s&p 500. that means indices have to buy

the shares, etfs have to buy the shares, and that's what you got right now. you've got a massive runup in shares as etfs and indices are buying tesla's stock in anticipation that it gets put in the s&p 500 and if it gets put in the s&p 500, people buy it because people buy indexes and it's part of that index. there is a huge word of caution here, though. if you are thinking of buying individual shares of tesla, if you look at the street, what the street is projecting for shares of tesla, i think the highest is something like $700 a share. that is 12 months going forward. this is a highly overvalued stock by traditional measures. it's also highly shorted. still, a lot of people believe the numbers don't add up. one of those is jim chenos, the famous short seller. we should point out tesla probably produces the best electric car out there, the most well-known. it's a brand, it's still

producing them, people are buying them, it's a good product. but the numbers, if you talk to skeptics, don't add up. i would just say this going forward. there's a technical reason why the stock is going up now. if you believe it's going to hold these levels, you know, you really roll the dice because there's going to be some sort of come-to-jesus moment with this stock where people will say is it really worth $1400 a share or whatever it's trading at now, and is this a technical factor. just be prepared if you are buying shares now, it could get really rough. back to you. neil: it's going to be a crowded field. we are already hearing another company is looking to go public, merging with a firm at around a $2.9 to $3.25 billion merger valuation here. so there are other players in this field. but he is -- charlie: first in. you benefit from being first in. and for having the brand.

i think that there's some brand value on that that defies the fundamentals of a stock where it's just three-quarters of straight positive growth. that said, god, you got to be really rolling the dice thinking this is a $1400 stock given traditional metrics of wave stocks and it's definitely spiking because of this technical factor. be prepared if you want to buy it. you know you're risking but people have bet against elon musk in the past and lost a lot of money. back to you. neil: yeah. remember the thing he did with the red shorts a couple weeks ago? that was very funny. but it's a family show. we don't have time to get into that. always good catching up with you, my friend. you're the best. charlie gasparino. he broke the mold so he's the first in that sort of break the mold field. maybe he has that in common with the tesla founder. we also want to keep you updated on startling developments in polls. we know they are fast and fleeting and go away as soon as

they're snapped but right now, one in texas has joe biden and the president dead even. another that has the former vice president ahead in texas. more on that after this. experience the adventure of a bigger world in a highly capable lexus suv at the golden opportunity sales event. lease the 2020 nx 300 for $339 a month for 36 months. experience amazing at your lexus dealer.

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medicare supplement plan. call today for a free guide. neil: all right. we are monitor iing the white house right now. kayleigh mcenany taking questions from reporters. the president is planning on meeting with those who benefited from law enforcement, her theme as well as the president's theme is we are on the side of law and order. it's a popular issue that many republicans say should put the president in good stead. others say that it looks like he is taking sides on this issue and ignoring minority concerns. be that as it may, all of this with the backdrop of police budgets being pared or look to

be cut dramatically in some cities and states, they want to get rid of them all together. jackie deangelis is following what's going on in the big apple and the new york police department budgets. they have already started with a billion dollar cut and are now looking for more than that. jackie: that's right. that cut came on july 1st, $1 billion as there are all these cries to defund the police. something else is happening as budgets are being cut. you have a lot of police officers saying i don't need to do this anymore, i should retire or do it sooner than they were planning and leave the force. in new york city, you can look at the numbers here. there has been an increase in police retirement applications, more than 400%. between june 29th and july 6th, 179 cops saying they want to file for retirement, so many that the city may actually have to cap the application. most cops retire after about 20 years on the job, but many could work longer than that. however, if you are under 65, you wouldn't qualify for medicare and the city would pay

the entire cost of your health benefits. there is also the pension program. that's one of the incentives of becoming a police officer. now, in 2018, the nypd spent $2.8 billion on pension and there's a concern this number will jump drastically if there's this rush to retire. so we took a look at the map and it doesn't make sense. listen to this. >> there are almost $3 billion in annual pension costs and then another billion dollars in annual health costs so you put it all together, the $6 billion figure that people who have been following this debate here, it's actually a $10 billion figure. jackie: the police have be demonized but their budget in new york city, considered in the scheme of things, it's not that big. in 2019, it was $6 billion but it was a mere 6% of the city's $95 billion in total spending. when people call to defund the police, they are not necessarily

thinking there were 15 shootings in weekend in new york city in 15 hours and they are not thinking about who they are going to call if they are the ones that are in trouble. what they don't realize is all the cops go and rush to retire, they are still going to be paying for it without receiving the protection back so it does raise this question of, you know, be careful what you wish for and really think about what you are trying to do here in defunding the police. neil? neil: jackie, thank you very very much. jarring numbers there. speaking of jarring numbers, take a look at a poll out of texas right now. the lone star state, which as things stand now, the president faces an uphill battle in what has been a traditionally red and reliable state for republicans. right now, joe biden leading in that state in one poll by about five points. the realclear politics trend on some other polls that have occurred there have him leading by a little bit less than that. but it does come at the time when the president's numbers in some battleground states have been shifting a little bit,

collapsing, some say. but it is still early. karl rove likes to remind me of that. the best-selling author, former top aide to president george w. bush with us right now. karl, do you buy that? could a republican lose the state of texas? i don't know when the heck the last time that's happened. >> well, last time that that happened was in 1976, but yeah, republicans could lose the state if they take it for granted. they almost did in the senate race in 2018 and that was a wake-up call. at the same time ted cruz is beating robert francis o'rourke by less than 3%, our republican governor and -- is winning re-election by i think it was like 14 points and the rest of the statewide republican ticket was winning largely comfortably. so the republicans need to wake up and get their act together and the good news is they have, since 2018. senator john cornyn who is up for election this year has helped set the tone and we have

a very aggressive voter registration effort and a very large get out the vote effort planned for the fall here in texas. i'm involved as a chairman of the board of the voter registration effort and it was a useful wakeup call. it will be closer than we would like it to be, no doubt about it. but i think at the end of the day, the president and republicans will prevail in texas. neil: even if they do prevail, they will be exhausting ammunition on a state where they normally in the past have not had to do stow. how do you feel about that? >> well, demographic changes in texas were going to make it more competitive. the state is becoming majority minority state, that is to say, whites are going to be shortly a minority of the voting age population. large amounts of latinos. historically, we have been a state in which the percentage of african-american voters is larger than the national average. latino voters, much larger than the national average. asian americans larger than the

national average. which means white voters have been a smaller percentage than the national average, yet we have been a red state and it's because our party at a state level has been inclusive and for example, when george w. bush ran for re-election as governor in 1998, a minority of the statewide ticket were white men, a majority were women, latinos and african americans. to the degree we have that kind of diversity in our candidates and our outreach, the republicans will be all right here for the foreseeable future. but only if they don't take it for granted and we have gotten in this state in the habit of taking it for granted. we have been in a position of authority the last time the democrats won a statewide race was 1994, and since then, we have gotten fat, dumb and happy and complacent and fortunately, this time around, the republicans are not. neil: by the way, we don't use fat, we use calorically challenged. one of the things i wanted to get your take on as well is whether any of this is attributable to the president

and the statements and some of the actions he's taken that get him off message. i only say that because it's not just texas, it's reflecting itself early as it is, and you love to remind me of that and i think you are exactly right, but if the election were right now, and you were to buy even a fraction of those polls, right now the president would be in a world of hurt. >> yeah. well, the president is behind today and -- but he does have 113 days. i was talking about this last night with a friend. i remember the summer 2004 when george w. bush was behind, yet we had a plan and executed that plan and came up with a convincing victory. same is possible for president trump. but look, texas is different than a lot of other states. i grant you that. we really are. but we also are same in many respects. the president's problem in texas is similar to his problem in other states like pennsylvania and florida. that is to say, college educated suburban ites, particularly women, who might tend to agree with a lot of the things he's done but don't like how he

handles himself or how he's done it so the president can win those people back but he has to do so by, a, reminding them briefly what it is that he's done, b, telling them importantly what it is that he wants to do over the next four years, what's his second act, and c, contrasting himself in a disciplined, focused way with what joe biden is suggesting is the future of the country and particularly think about texas, where our economy is powered in large part by energy. joe biden wants to end fracking which has given us prosperity and brought us big construction projects along the gulf coast for chemical facilities. he wants to end drilling in the gulf of mexico which powers the houston economy. then last week, he has endorsed in his climate package the language of the green new deal which upsets agriculture and manufacturing and a lot of other people in the state of texas. so if there's an effort by the president to say here's what i want to do and here's what joe biden wants to do, i'm confident texas will end up in his column comfortably. neil: but he's got to stay focused. >> and disciplined.

neil: okay. got it. all right. always a pleasure, my friend. thank you very very much. karl rove on all of that. karl must be magic to the markets. they are up about 545 points right now. we have been also looking at the nasdaq, that's hit record territory. a lot of attention to technology stocks. a lot of attention also to issues like facebook. some of those meetings with critics have not gone well so facebook now has a new plan. this would be plan number 712. but this one should be the charm. they exaggerate but to make a point. so far, it's not staying on point. after this. this is decision tech. find a stock based on your interests or what's trending. get real-time insights in your customized view of the market. it's smarter trading technology for smarter trading decisions. fidelity.

neil: you know, never mind the pile-on that continues with so many groups saying the company encourages hate speech and all the rest, the stock in and out of all-time highs even with

that, up almost another percent today to $247, a little north of that per share. susan li on how the company is trying right now to change that entire i guess story line. she joins us right now. hey, susan. susan: neil, according to several reports, facebook is considering banning political ads in the days running up to the november elections. a topic that's apparently been discussed since last year, according to the "new york times." it would be a reversal for founder mark zuckerberg's stance to not be the arbiter of truth or censor political campaigns and he's already said political ads help the smaller, less visible candidates to grow their voice. it has been said facebook is a platform that proliferates hate speech, violence and misinformation. more than 1 1,000 companies sai they were pausing advertising including coca-cola and starbucks and this was the result of a movement started by civil rights groups including the naacp who are unhappy with facebook's hands-off approach on

certain posts and yes, that does include president trump. facebook's own internal audit that was released just last week concluded the company has not done enough to protect users from discrimination and also what they see as discriminatory ads and posts. zuckerberg has said that revenue from political ads were negligible so it's not really a big financial issue for the company. twitter has already banned political ads since last year. now, president trump's campaign has a much bigger community on facebook, over 30 million followers compared to biden's 2.3 million and in terms of spending over the past 30 days, the trump campaign has spent around d$7.5 billion, biden's campaign around $4.5 million. some say president trump's strong social media game in 2016 and yes, that does include facebook, was one of the reasons he got elected in the first place. no decision yet from facebook. i guess we will have to see. neil? neil: all right, susan, thank you very very much. before we take a break, with the

dow up about 560 points, interesting story coming to us from our friends at the "wall street journal" that the united states is now ready to formally reject some of these maritime claims that china has staked in the south china sea. you might recall over the course of the last six years or so, it has been militarizing islands it technically doesn't own. not only militarizing them but i mean from stem to stern, they are now launchpads complete with, you know, missiles and planes and the whole shooting works, no pun intended there. we are now going to claim that this is a big no-no. we are taking a harder line against it. washington said it sees beijing's expansive sovereignty claims over much of the south china sea as unlawful, quoting the "journal," the state department is preparing to issue a position paper that officially rejects such claims but doesn't leave out the possibility what we do if china still makes claims to these disputed

islands. is it too late to demilitarize, for example, the ones that already have been militarized or are we telling china right now, you continue doing that, things are going to get nasty? we'll see. stay with us. hike!

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neil: well, as bad as it was, we are told it could have been a lot worse. this navy ship explosion off of san diego that took 17 sailors and four civilians to the hospital with multiple injuries. william lajeunesse on what they know about it right now. william? reporter: not very much. there were 57 soldiers or rather, sailors and civilians who were injured in this fiery blast but only five were still being treated this morning, most with minor burns at hospitals. let me show you what's happening right now. basically, down below, you've got hundreds who are fighting the fire directly, because the fire started about three decks lower than the flight deck. then up above here, you have three helicopters water dropping, you have a ladder truck dropping water on top as well, and then previously, you had several tugs doing that. you can see it listing to the right. that's because they dumped millions of gallons of water into the ship and they are pumping out that water as quickly as they can as well.

the fire started yesterday around 9:00 in the morning. the ship was undergoing maintenance. it was a sunday, about 160 aboard. the good news is there was no ordnance, we don't see any fuel burning. it's white smoke, not black smoke so video was provided to us by the navy of training. now, there is supposed to be a dedicated crew, safety crew, whenever work is performed on the boat, whether it be electrical, welding, grinding, that kind of thing. something happened. these pier fires like you see here, this undergoing maintenance, these are pretty rare but they are very dangerous, right, because you know, the ship itself is watertig watertight. you can't just cut a hole in it and ventilate the heat out of the fire. you have narrow gangways, difficult to navigate when they have air packs on and galleys can be blocked by cables and equipment. >> -- situations like it's completely dark. you can see the amount of smoke that's spewing out from the actual side of the ship and all

that. the hallways are exactly like that. reporter: so think of this as like a floating apartment complex, right. you've got basically 1,000, maybe 2,000 aboard so you've got bedding, you have furniture, you have offices, and you have multiple layers of oil-based paint. that's the kind of thing that can burn for a long time, difficult to put out. i will send it back to you. we have a newser coming up in a few minutes. i don't think we will find out the cause right away but they hope to salvage the ship. neil? neil: all right, thank you, my friend, very much. william lajeunesse on all of that. we will keep you posted. also keeping you posted on this story right now with the united states set to reject certain chinese maritime claims in the south china sea. they have been busy militarizing these islands that technically aren't theirs to militarize or do anything else with, frankly. dan joseph, china learning curve author, what do you make of this? this has been going on awhile. we are now establishing an official position, it's got to stop. then we've got to enforce that, right? >> yes, well, we have never really recognized the claims on

the part of china, or anyone, for that matter. we kind of remained neutral while saying we would appreciate if china followed, you know, the global naval rules on that issue. now we are going to come out with a little firmer position. i'm sure the chinese will shall irked by that. i always thought at the end of the day where the rubber will meet the road on this is when people start trying to harvest the economic benefits, whether it comes to fishing rights or drilling. this takes the united states a step closer, in fact, if you listen to some of the wording that supposedly is going to come out with our statement, we directly refer not having one side dominate the economic interests in that region, and that's where i think you could get a little more heated. neil: i'm wondering, dan, you are the expert here, if we are telling them any future militarization of the islands that don't belong to you, we are going to do something because it's not as if the chinese are going to reverse the dozens of islands they have already militarized, right? >> yeah. i think stow. look at it this way. getting tough on china might be

one of the most popular issues in the united states right now, exists on both the left and right. one of the few areas where the left is actually saying donald trump needs to be tougher. this is a popular issue, it's the united states stepping forward to take a harder line against china, trying to find ways to do that. is it going to disrupt the economic relationship, we don't know yet. but it's another example of the united states pushing back and china will probably again, push back again because we don't see that yielding very much. it's another slight escalation in tensions and will it continue to escalate, will it bubble over into the economic side, that's what we don't know yet. neil: well, we already know it's escalated to the point where our lecturing and forcing the chinese to recognize that they are being very cruel to muslim minorities there has already prompted them to say all right, senators and congressmen raising that are not welcome in china. i'm wondering, all this together, it's not a good trade environment. >> no, it isn't. i mean, it's more of the tit for

tat. both sides have had in the past seemed to want to let the economic side continue to develop on its own, maybe move forward on trade, although i don't think we see anything before the election, but the more intense the non-economic side gets, the more possible it is that it spills over or percolates even higher and ends up having a broader impact. so again, it's more tit for tat. we will get tough with them and they're not going to back down. on the political side, there's really little reason for optimism. neil: got it. dan, thank you very very much. more after this. .

neil: all right, disney world in florida stays open even with a spike in cases. disney world hong kong closing because of a spike in cases. we'll keep you posted. charles payne right now. hey, charles. charles: neil, thank you very much. good afternoon, everyone, i'm charles payne, this is really making money. talking about right now, the major indices firmly in the green today. that put a spark in the market already looking higher. i'm calling this the changing of the guard rally. new leadership in semiconductors, retailers. automobiles go with new thinking when it comes to investing. changes already made eel lon musk one of the richest men in the worm. they should inform your investing. president trump set to hear from americans helped by the police, amid a nationwide push to defund law enforcement. we'll take you there live. the