money where his mouth is in terms of trying to let everybody have a voice. real quick. >> no, i mean, i think that it's an admirable goal. i guess i'll leave it at that. >> i just think it's remarkable able that when you're that rough going out and buying something like twitter is not a big deal for you. dagen: yup, i know it's about 11 %, 12% of his network, thank you, ashley webster, take it away for stuart. ashley: i will, indeed, good morning, dagen, i'm ashley webster in for stuary varney who by the way will be back tomorrow all right, futures are down, as investors prepare for a big week of earnings ahead. you can take a look at the futures board, modestly down, a tenth or two, and ibm, netflix, tesla, among the many big names reporting first quarter earnings this week, and speaking of tesla , elon musk agreeing with a social media post that says the

game is rigged if he cannot buy twitter. well, 30 minutes from now we'll see how investors have digested all of the news, including reports of twitter using a poison pill tactic. so much to talk about on that story. the 10 year treasury yield hitting the highest level in more than three years, right now , hovering around 2.82%, down just a fraction, let's take a look at bitcoin. bitcoin down another 400 bucks, under 40,000, at 39, 400 and take a look at gold just hitting very close to 2,000 for the first time in five weeks , up 24 bucks. now, to oil. the white house announcing it would allow oil & gas leases on federal land to resume crude up nearly 108 bucks a barrel 107.81 the national average for gas still hovering right around $ 4.09 and take a look at diesel. expensive, $5.03 for a gallon of

diesel in the u.s.. meanwhile, overseas, ukrainian forces have ignored russia's ultimatum to surrender mariupol, the port city remains surrounded but ukraine vowed to fight absolutely to the end. ukraine's forces were also able to free more towns near the city of kharkiv. this as russia attacks the western ukrainian city of lviv, at least four missiles hitting three warehouses, including a car-tire service center and now, president zelenskyy says president biden should visit ukraine. as always, a big show ahead for you, pete hegseth, maritime and a divine, steve forbes, and joe concha, "varney" & company is about to begin. ♪ let's dance, put on your red shoes and dance ♪

ashley: the late great david bow ie, let dance on a monday morning blue skies mostly in new york city what a great shot that is, let's get right to this on this monday morning, elon musk now thinks the game is rigged if he cannot buy twitter. good morning, susan li, what's the latest on this? >> well good morning to you we have twitter up in the pre- market because a lot of people on wall street are expect ing a second bidder, or possibly a higher bid with a musk-like consortium, now poison pill is usually a drag on the stock price but there's a lot of bullishness that somebody else might be coming in there. now that's the defense by the way, the poison pill that's the defense tactic, twitter's board adopted to protect itself against this elon musk takeover bid, and it has musk and others questioning if the board is acting really in the best interest of shareholder s. now, musk points out and he points this out in this tweet that with jack departing the

twitter board collectively owns almost no shares objectively their economic interests are simply not aligned with shareholders and now technically dorsey is still listed on twitter's board which i did point out on twitter and jack responded with this in this tweet that he already announced a full resignation from the company including board back in november. yes, he did, but he technically doesn't step down from it until the next twitter board meeting which is close to the end of may , so you know, i would say that if you look at the twitter response and the tweet response, ashley, it looks like jack dorsey is with somebody taking twitter private because that's how it best operates in this type of environment. ashley: got it, all right, susan , thank you. let's bring in jason katz to talk about this and other issues jason, good morning to you. how does this musk saga affect twitter shareholders, because there's a clear disconnect, it appears, between the board and the shareholders. >> so, ashley, while i can't o

pine on whether the stock is a buy or not i will say from a shareholder perspective, it's a hat trick of wins. either elon succeeds or as susan pointed out, a strategic buyer steps in, or lastly, if none of that comes to pass, the bar is simply meaningfully raised for management and the board, and look, the stocks reaction is exactly as it should be. you have a credible buyer, albeit with some hair on it, a poison pill, and so the stocks trading up, no surprise, but not quite to the offer price. ashley: very good. well let's broaden out a little bit if we can, jason. i want to talk about inflation. there are growing number of people now say they believe we've hit peak inflation. would you agree? >> i would. i mean, beneath the headlines there's indications that inflation and all the distortion s relating to the pandemic are starting to fade, albeit a little bit. core cpi was down modestly.

used car prices were down, commodity prices were down, so look, the fed has really nothing to lose at this point, ash, by talking the talk, because at the end of the day, they could slow the pace of tightening and town down some of this hawkishness if we continue to see inflation numbers come off the boil. ashley: well, we'll have to follow that data very carefully. jason katz, thank you so much, jason, for joining us on this monday morning. we do appreciate it. thank you. >> thank you. ashley: by the way, we've got a lot of major companies reporting this week, susan? take us through the list. >> how about tesla? so it's another week of elon musk and tesla reports earnings on wednesday, and then the other big report card because we are getting into the heavy parts of the earnings season, and that includes netflix out on tuesday, the united, american airlines also out with report cards along with at&t and verizon and stu will be closely watching blackstone on thursday, so that's one of his big holdings and lots of fed speakers as well

since we are that 50 basis point hike next month but how much tighter do interest rates get and of course the imf world bank spring meetings also start this month as well and this week. ashley: and oh, yes by the way, tax day deadline, right? >> 2020 mid-may last year, youe getting an extra three days than the usual april 15 deadline, but so far, 91 million have already filed as of the start of this month on april 1 and tax refunds are huge this year, averaging over $3,000 so far, so hurry up and get those tax i guess those tax receipts in, and i'm just talking about bitcoin and crypto with this guy next to me right now, pete hegseth, who knows a thing or two about investing here, ashley. ashley: i think he does. pete: i haven't done my taxes yet, so sorry. ashley: [laughter] susan thank you very much. now let's get to mr. hegseth. new york mayor eric adams weigh ing in on the rising crime

rate in america. he's putting some of the blame on progressive politics. my word, take a listen to this. >> the scales right now would shift very heavily in favor of the form of progressive left and what we have as a result is this growing fear of crime, this growing actual amount of crime, that's evidenced in almost every major american city >> commissioner? >> yes, i believe he is right. major mistakes made throughout the years that destroyed the trust that the police commissioner is talking about, but we can't rebuild that trust by allowing those who are dangerous and that have, they have a repeated history of violence continuing to be on our streets. ashley: yeah, it's not rocket science, is it, pete hegseth is here. pete, good morning to you. pete: good morning, ash. ashley: do you think though it's one thing to acknowledge it but is the mayor going to make any substantial changes to address these chronic problems? pete: that's the question, and that is the point. it's one thing to acknowledge it

at least it's an improvement from bill deblasio. it's a hard to get worse to acknowledge the reality of what, you know, his side of the aisle has done. if you defund the police, you get less police and if you have less police, in a dangered environment, dangerous environment, you get more crime, and then when you release those criminals, of course you're going to get more crime. this is common sense basic stuff but his party gone down a dangerous path. he ran as a former cop as someone whose going to do something about it but if you actually look at what he's done versus what he's said, yes, there's a new plain clothes unit but it's not clear they are able to be as aggressive as they have been in the past. crime remains up in new york city, just walk outside your door, so it's nice to hear an acknowledgment of bill braton and the broken windows policing of the era that brought this city into a golden era which many of us have had an opportunity to enjoy, but to take it back from the precipice, ash, you have to allow cops to do their job, you have to keep criminals in jail.

he hasn't shown the willingness to actually take on his own d. a .', take on others, the activists in his own party. until he does that, it's a lot of nice words. he speaks well about what he thinks could be done, but not a lots changing. crime is up 35% in the city, so far, on his watch. that's what matters. ashley: action speaks louder than words, especially in this case. all right let's turn to the white house, pete. take a look at this tweet from cnn's white house correspondent. he admits, that president biden has a host of problems and says doesn't seem like the president can do much about it. what's your response on that? pete: [laughter] it's just not much he can do, you know, he's just the president of the united states, he just controls the house and the senate. don't blame old joe, you know, he's doing the best he can. even that's giving a bit of a pass but the reality is, the 33% approval rating he has right now is a product of policies he has

proactively pursued since day one, from saying he was going to crush covid that was never possible, and let alone be successful, crime up, border out of control, afghanistan in the hands of the taliban, did not prevent the war that's going on in ukraine, crushing our energy industry, wanting to bring more spending that leads to inflation, supply chain crisis, and i'm sure i missed half a dozen more. all of them are not accidents. they're not accidents. that's the thing. voters are not dumb. they look at choices, this white house has made, to go with the left wing, as opposed to practical or common sense and they are wanting an alternative and the problem is we got 2.5 more years even if the republicans were to take over the house and senate. ashley: well, other than all that i think he's doing great. pete: yeah, other than that, we're doing great. bitcoin, you know, i mean, let's talk about other things. ashley: all right, yeah. we have to move on now, pete. i'd like to talk to bitcoin with you but we'll have to move thanks so much for being we're.

now this. the biden administration announcing new lease sales for oil & gas drilling locations , susan? what do you got? >> he's auctioning off leases that drill on 145,000-acres of public lands in nine states and this is the first new fossil fuel leases to be offered on public land in this new administration. still that's around 80% less than what have been outlined in previous administrations and it really comes with a lot of handcuffs so higher royalty fees that oil & gas companies have to pay up to nearly 19% that's pretty high because that's about 7% more than the previous 12% royalty rate, also you have more environmental restrictions that come with these new leases and a report suggests that the government had lost up to $12.4 billion in revenue from not drilling on public lands over the past nine years or so. ashley: yeah, again, not rocket science, all right, susan thank you very much. let's take a look at the futures , the higher bond yields

having an effect on the market, pre-market, dow, s&p and nasal down a tenth or two. meantime, parents are taking one school district to court. they say their children were told to change their pronouns and names, without the parent's knowledge. we'll have more on that you can believe me. ukraine says at least seven people have now been killed after russian missiles struck the western city of lviv. we've got a live report from there, next.

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ashley: russian forces launching a missile strike in lviv, leaving at least seven people dead, griff jenkins is in lviv this morning, griff, what's the latest? griff: good morning, ashley. well this is a surprise, when i left lviv four days ago to come here to the capitol of kyiv it was pretty quiet in lviv. that city is mostly spared, for a missile strike on a fuel depot, now here comes four missiles on a monday morning hitting three warehouses and one tire factory, as you mentioned, killing at least seven injuring 11 others among the injured a child. now, this is certainly a surprise, the tire factory had some people there that were working and as as they dig through the rubble, ashley, we expect that casualty count could indeed go up. the mayor andre sedovi condemned the attack saying there's no military targets in that city to

hit and he added that this is a city that is a hub for refugees and that these are the first lviv city deaths that have occurred although some have died in this war, that lift indiana the lviv area. meanwhile the attacks in kyiv in the capitol have been increasing as well over the weekend, we had two strikes, one hit an armored vehicle east of the capitol killing one person as well as a residential strike in a suburb in a place called boveri, there were no deaths reported there but with the up-tick in strikes in the area, the mayor is asking residents who fled to not return yet because of the obvious and real danger that strikes could come at any minute. meanwhile, we are watching very closely, ashley, is this situation in that southern seaport city of mariupol. the situation becoming dire yesterday russian forces issuing a surrender or die ultimatum to the 2,000 or so ukrainian forces that are dug in in a

steel plant, trying to hold out. ukraine's prime minister saying that those forces will not yield , they will, indeed, fight to the end. ashley? ashley: very interesting stuff, griffin kyiv, this morning, sorry i thought i said lviv earlier, but you are in kyiv, so we appreciate that, griff, as always. let's bring in kurt volker, former u.s. ambassador to nato. president zelenskyy warned about russia using nuclear weapons, moscow says no, about how concerned should we be? >> well it is part of russia's doctrine, if they find that they are in a situation where they are losing, they have a doctrine of escalating meaning nuclear, in order to deescalate so we do have to watch out for that. at the same time, just as we're seeing with these attacks in lviv, the use of nuclear weapons would not achieve any objectives

for russia other than destruction. it's not going to break the ukrainians, it's not going to turn them into russians, it's not going to give russia an ability to take over ukraine, so there's no reason to do that other than a punitive measure, simply to punish the ukrainians for fighting back. ashley: very good. all right, ambassador president zelenskyy calling on president biden to visit ukraine. take a listen to this and then i'll get your comments. >> do you want president biden to come here? >> yes. >> are there any plans for him to come? >> i think he will, and i think it's his decision, of course and the safety situation depends but i think the united states and that's why he should come here to see. ashley: i would find it absolutely very unlikely, a

security nightmare, but do you think president biden, ambassador, should make a trip to kyiv? >> not at this time. not at this time. we need to be helping ukraine win the war. it is an active war zone, as we just saw a missile attack can happen anywhere, even far away from the front lines in lviv, which the russians, they can't do anything militarily to take the country but they can fire missiles and attack and they are willing to do so, so now is the time to lean in, give ukrainians all the equipment we can, all the support we can, help them win the war, and then pay a visit when we've done that , but i think right now, it be more symbolism and less real for the president to go now. ashley: very quickly, ambassador , can ukraine hold off russia? >> absolutely. i don't think that russia comes out of this winning at all. they already have demonstrated they can't take the whole country. now, we know that their forces are in disarray. they are having a hard time taking territory, even the east

now, ukraine is willing to fight and defend their territory. no doubt that they can hold them off. ashley: very good. we'll leave it there, ambassador as always, thank you very much for your insight this morning. we do appreciate it. >> my pleasure. ashley: thank you let's get a check of the futures, slightly lower, the bond yields are ris ing, putting some downward pressure on equities, but it's all very muted, is it not? the opening bell is next. ♪ i feel so close to you right now ♪

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ashley: all right, let's get right to twitter and bring in our good friend keith fitz-gerald. keith, good morning, what's your assessment of mr. musk's take over bid? >> well, i tell you what. he's playing for real in the woke are in full panic mode, ashley. this is serious. twitter has gone even so far as to adopt a poison pillment and for viewers who don't know exactly what that is it's a defense called shareholder rights where they often go to dilute shareholders, ideas to make it less attractive to an

activist shareholder or somebody with an agenda. unfortunately it's also a tactic to use by inept management that wants to stay in place so i think the better bet is still tesla. i think he's going to make twitter an interesting stock but i wouldn't buy until after he owns it. ashley: i want to get to this very quickly, gold hitting 2,000. we had a guest earlier and we've had many guests who said we've reached peak inflation but it seems to me that the gold price is not telling us that at all. what say you? >> i agree with you, ashley. i don't think we have hit peak inflation, as nasty as those numbers are i think they are going to get worse. i think gold has to be viewed subjectively more than it has in the past because of the influence of cryptocurrency and all sorts of other asset classes that have historically been a part of the historical gold pricing pattern. ashley: very good. we've got a lot of earnings this week. want to take a look at a few of them, costco. i know you own it. what are you looking for? >> well, costco is really an

indirect piece. it's not necessarily going to come out this week but what i'm looking at is all this other data because it's going to feed into a retail play like costco, if we have stretched consumer, we have higher inflation, if we have banks and financials, and production, and all these other companies coming out showing the impact of inflation, costco is the one safety valve for the american consumer and i think that's going to play well for the stock. there's a big drop i hope i'm smart enough to buy. ashley: talking of elon musk tesla reporting this week, what are you expecting? >> well, again, i think we're going to see some more inflationary impact, but to all of the other things that are going on with twitter, i've got the position i want right now, but if i get a good drop, i'm going to be hard pressed to resist going shopping. ashley: we also have alaska on the board there, alaska airlines what the are your thoughts? >> this one is interesting. iona class ca, because i fly, because i really love the company's attitude and i think that all of the headlines

regarding how they are going to get people where they go, it's the one airline that really does things right. it's a much-smaller scale, they pay very careful attention to their travelers, to their staff, to their people i think the company is tremendously under valued right now particularly as the world reopens. >> [opening bell ringing] ashley: always highly rated in the customer satisfaction rating keith fitz-gerald, thank you, thanks very much, keith, the opening bell and we're off to the races, everybody is smiling, of course the markets were closed last friday, so we haven't been trading since last thursday, and right out of the gate, you can see the dow top 30 here, chevron, united health, caterpillar on the up side, salesforce and apple on the downside. i think the higher bond yields are certainly putting some pressure on the tech stocks. let's take a look at the s&p if we can as we get the day under way, just down as we were in the pre-market, just ever so slightly at 43.90 on the s&p let's take a look at the nasdaq,

all the tech stocks in there, down a little bit, only a tenth of a percent for the nasdaq, down 14 and let's take a look at the big tech stocks if we can. they are all moving ever so slightly higher, except for apple, down more than half a percent at 164.27. let's get back to twitter. jack dorsey weighing in on issues with the company's board. let's revisit this story, susan what did he say? >> well, even founder and recent ceo jack dorsey called the twitter board disfunctional, so dorsey was responding to a tweet about the back-stabbing amongst co-founders and board members at twitter acknowledging that yes it's true tweeting that it's consistently been a dysfunction of the company and many fingers are being pointed at the twitter board right now and if they are really acting in the best interest of twitter stockholders by rejecting the musk bit at 54.20 and implementing a poison pill strategy which dilutes and hurts everybody else.

now dorsey is stepping down from the board next month but remember that the fact that twitter stock is trading higher is because there's an expectation that there will be a) a higher bid, $60 a share seems to be the magic number according to a lot of market watchers up there, and will there be maybe another bid coming from a new musk-led consortium which could include private equity groups like silverlake, which currently has a twitter board seat, or musk could call up the tesla board member larry ellison, and oracle could jump in because oracle has been interested in social media companies because they look pretty closely at buying tik tok during the trump adminitration. ashley: so many options. let's take a look -- >> i just want to note also that this headline just came through with twitter by the way and they are offering from what i see a dividend here, and a rights dividend with an extra share for current stockholders so again they are trying to make it more attractive for stockholders to say yes we are doing our dye diligence and our

fiduciary responsibility by lining the pockets of shareholders but wall street is saying are you really doing that if you're rejecting a bid that's offering 54.20 and there isn't a second bidder right now and if elon musk puts in 60 and he's saying no, then there will definitely be questions to that. ashley: very interesting developments, every other minute it seems, let's take a look at tesla talking of elon musk. there's a new court filing in a class action lawsuit against musk. what's the latest? >> well remember that 2018 funding secure taking tesla private at 420 that series of tweets got him in trouble so a new court filing suggests the judge in this case will say and rule that that statement by musk was false and elon musk in a tik tok said he did have the funding secured and he was forced by the sec to settle in that case. it wasn't he lied. he actually had the money to take tesla private. now musk is trying to get that settlement thrown out but you

have tesla, well was out performing in the pre-market we had tesla up because they resumed one production shift at their shanghai factory, which has been shut since the send of march owing to record covid cases in china and i want to say that shanghai was important to tesla, they lost 40,000 cars during that covid closure in shanghai, they make around 2,100 cars a day at that shanghai plant but not only sell to china but export around the rest of the world. cathie wood a big tesla bull, ark investors calling 4,600 for the stock by 2026. ashley: wow. 4,600. >> and that's after a stock split. ashley: [laughter] all right, well we'll see if she's right. another one for you, we're talking about some major banks who reported before the bell. how did they do? >> not bad actually bank of america i thought was pretty impressive and said something about the strength of the u.s. consumer, second- largest american lender and boa beating on top and bottom line, strengthened

consumer lending they say because the number of borrowers that fell behind on their payments dropped 50% from a year earlier, and that means less people are defaulting and actually paying off their loans which is a great thing for bank of america also great sign of the u.s. consumer. now meantime we have bank of america new york mellon, beating by a penny a share, higher interest rates helping out and we are anticipating that 50 basis point hike from the federal reserve next month, as you know, wall street is anticipating three 50 basis point hikes, that's going to be pretty tight and that means roughly around 2.75% for interest rates at the end of this year which is the steepest rise we've seen since 1994, remember those days? ashley: oh, my goodness, i don't remember what i did this past weekend, but i'm sure it happened. also, i guess it was, show me rivian, susan. they're warning about battery shortage for electric vehicles. >> yeah, so we've been talking a lot about the global chip

shortage but according to the founder and the ceo of rivian, the fact that you have a shortage of batteries, that's a big deal for the entire electric car industry, and they're looking at trying to go from millions in cars right now, most of that coming from tesla, to tens of millions in the future but if you don't have say any batteries to put in the cars that's a big problem and then you have to remember that rivian said they will hit their 25,000 production target this year, after seeing they would miss it by 50% at the end of last year, and rivian has been touted as that tesla killer with the electric pickups and trucks and the only sold 120 oh, cars in the first quarter of this year but rivian remember this was $100 billion valuation of this truck-maker that only sold around 900 cars and vehicles delivered them last year, so really if they are already putting in these asterisks to say it's not our fault, we're coming up short when it comes to batteries, that's a problem for a company that's been valued at such a

high, high multiple and it hasn't really been delivering. ashley: it certainly is. all right, susan, thank you very much. want to take a look at the winners so far on the dow now that we're almost seven minutes into the session. caterpillar, goldman sachs, amex , intel, jpmorgan chase all moving higher, caterpillar the biggest winner among those on the s&p 500, gap, norwegian cruise line, royal caribbean, mccormick and solar edge technologies those are your big leaders gap up 4% by the way , the nasdaq winners you have biogen, vertex pharma, broadcom cw corp. and amazon as well those are the leaders on the nasdaq. the quick check on the big board the dow up 138 points hovering right around 34, 589. now, there's the 10 year treasury yield down almost more than half of a basis point at 2.82 had been floating with a

more than three-year high but the treasury yield on the 10 year down ever so slightly. take a look at gold we talked about this close to 2,000 up $18 at 1,993, bitcoin meanwhile has been under 40,000 it stays think , down $275, crude oil though continues to march higher , that's not good news for your gas prices up another $ 1.20 over $108 a barrel on crude, nat gas up four and one- third percent at 762 for nat gas and the average price for a gallon of regular still up there isn't it $4.09 it costs a lot to fill the car. it was $2.87 by the way, one year ago and we always like to take a look at california. life ain't cheap out on west coast and california paying $ 5.71 for a gallon of regular. that is what they do. coming up could another stimulus check be coming? what?

we're going to tell you which state is pushing a plan to handout $2,000 checks. a new poll shows a shockingly low approval rate for president biden from one key demographic. we're going to tell you all about it, coming up, and steven moore has a new warning on inflation, he says it could get a lot worse before it gets better, he is here, next. ♪

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ashley: all right, let's take a look at these markets for you, the dow up one-third of a percent, the s&p up, the strong sector is energy because we have oil at over $108 a barrel let's take a look at the 10 year

treasury yield that have been flirting with a more than three- year high it's still in that region, down ever so slightly, but the yield still is at 2.827% on the 10 year treasury. with inflation skyrocketing, so are president biden's disapproval numbers. hillary vaughn is at the white house. good morning, hillary. breakdown the numbers for us. reporter: good morning, ashley. i want to show you the first chart that shows as inflation rates have risen, president biden's approval ratings have consistently dropped, but i also want to show where the disapproval is mostly coming from. a gallup poll showing the change in approval by generation, gen z dropping 21 percentage points, millennials 19%, gen x 15% drop, a quinnipiac poll showing more bleak approval numbers, 58% of people 18-34 disapprove of the job that the president is doing, but this is not a mystery to progressives.

congresswoman alexandria ocasio-cortez told me earlier this month that she thinks the reason for the big drop among young people is because president biden is not doing enough to fulfill some of his progressive promises. >> folks may think that these are kind of independent or swing voters that are contributing to his polling and whatnot, but it's actually young people who have not really been served student loan debt and significant forgiveness of student loan debt is what the president can do to serve them. reporter: while some democrats are pushing for more government spending to win over younger voters, republicans that are eying a takeover of the house and the senate in the mid-term elections are iing more government spending as a way to win over some of those voters on the fence. >> no we're not overconfident but the one thing you have to look at is why is the president 's approval numbers are so low? it's the wasteful, irresponsible

spending that has led to higher prices and inflation. reporter: so ashley, we'll have to wait and see whether or not democrats, particularly the president, tried to win over some of the progressive voters that they've lost by doling out some of these new programs and new initiatives that are going to cost a lot more money. ashley? ashley: yeah, buying votes i think they call it, all right, hillary thank you very much. now i want you to take a look at this. new york post op-ed, the banner reads, fears of recession are everywhere except at the clueless white house. let's bring in steven moore, good morning to you, steven. >> hi, ashley. ashley: the piece we're talking about, it says that the white house is in denial over a potential recession. what say you? >> well, i wanted to make one comment about what hillary was just talking about, those poll results, ashley, because i find it fascinating that approval from young people, for biden has collapsed, but i saw that with baby boomers i'm a boomer myself, that approval rating is

right around 50% which is surprising to me, ashley, because inflation is a killer of savings, of lifetime savings so when you're talking about folks over the age of 60, they spent their whole life saving and maybe have a $500,000 or million dollar nest egg and that inflation, they haven't felt it yet but they are going to start to see the devaluation of those savings so that's interesting. now, the question on the table this morning is whether this recession is inevitable and i'm here to tell you know. i do not think that it's inevitable. i think we could still skate around this , but it's going to take, you know, just what kevin mccarthy was talking about. you got to start cutting government spending, yes the fed has to get more aggressive with respect to, you know, what is it a quarter to 50 percentage point increase in rates is in sufficient at this point, and we've got to start, you know, producing more of our energy. if we change the direction, i still think we could get around , look, a recession.

the job market is strong right now. ashley: well that was my question very quickly, stephen. we've got the fed putting the brakes on, there is the fear that they hit the brakes too hard. what say you? >> no. too hard? how could anybody think that they hit the brakes too hard? ashley, we have 8.5% inflation it's a disaster. they have been way behind the curve i think they should be much more aggressive in terms of getting this tiger by the tail. look you and i lived through the 70s. if you don't get the inflation under control, quickly it leads to a crash. ashley: yes, a very ugly crash, stephen moore as always, great stuff, stephen, thank you very much appreciate it. >> you too. ashley: by the way, car prices are expected to remain high, but for how long, susan? >> at least through the end of this year, 2022 so average car prices and tell me if you think it's high, because it sounded high to me, on average you're paying $43, 700 last month,

according to j.d. power that's 26% above the pre-pandemic level s, still. now they are easing off their record levels they say, but you had used car prices falling the most since 1969 in that march inflationary report that's coming from an elevated level. car inventories are still near historic lows and car executives say with supply chain woes, depleted car lots strong consumer and lower factory out put there aren't going to be enough cars so forget about negotiating on those incentives, those msrp's right? ashley: right. >> i haven't bought a new car in a while. ashley: there you go. it's expensive. >> yeah. ashley: susan, thank you. what are twitter employees saying about elon musk's take over bid? ray wong has got the insight and he's here, next. ♪ are you happy now, are you happy now ♪

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supersonic wifi only from us... xfinity. ashley: battle over twitter take a look at twitter down 1% at 44.63, ray wong joins us now, and ray, good morning. you've been speaking to twitter

employees, so i'm fascinated to know what do they think about a potential musk takeover? >> good morning, ashley. there's a wide range of opinions out there. i think most people are worried, i mean, any takeover people are worried about all the emotions, all the suspense, all of the anxiety of a takeover, but a lot of folks actually talked about some of the things that could be done and they are really looking forward to things for example, right now when they do moderation it requires a lot of manual processes, if there's ways to take advantage of some of the technologies that elon musk has been great at, you see automated space landings from spacex, you see autopilot from tesla, well there's a way to be able to actually use automation and ai to improve content moderation, right? if you're looking at rolling out new products a lot of people talked about the fact that it's really slow getting new ideas. twitter spaces versus clubhouse, it took a long time to get space s out there, and it's really because there's been a lot of work that has to have been done on the platform. so people are excited about it,

some people are really scared that the fact that other voices maybe allowed there, you know, in terms of viewpoint that may not fit within the twitter interest but it's a wide range of things in common going on with employees over there. ashley: uncertainty, we'll put it there, quickly, ray want to talk about earnings coming up, netflix on tuesday what are you looking for? >> we're really looking at subscriber growth on netflix, i think the key metric is to see if they can get more 2.5 million adds, also, we're looking to see if like some of the shows are holding and if people are excited to get out or if they are watching there's too many streaming services and people worried about that. ashley: very quickly, tesla on wednesday. what are you looking at? >> people worried about the shanghai factory closures but you're also looking to see if berlin is opening up, texas is opening up and tesla can get to the volume they are at they are about to, each plant can actually crank out 500,000 vehicles, and the question is really can they optimize more

quickly, but as you heard earlier, rivian is having trouble getting batteries but tesla doesn't have the supply chain issues and that's what people are looking forward to, to see if they can hit those numbers and continue. ashley: very good. covered a lot of ground, you're a pro, ray wong. thank you so much for joining us this morning. we do appreciate it. thank you. still ahead, miranda divine, patrick dahan, steve forbes and joe concha, an all-star lineup, the 10 a.m. hour of "varney" & company is next. ♪ ♪ with my hectic life, you'd think retirement would be the last thing on my mind. hey mom, can i go play video games? sure! ...after homework.

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♪. ashley: ac/dc to wake you up on this monday morning. a shot of new york city. shook me all night. let's get straight to your money. the markets a little bit tepid this morning. first time we've been trading since last thursday and markets are subdued. dow essentially flat, s&p down a 10th. nasdaq down half a percent.

look at the 10-year treasury yield. it has been flirting with more than a three-year high. no, let's not do that let's get to the crude oil. 108 bucks. this is the story this morning. this and gold. crude up $1.50, $180.41 a barrel. the energy sector doing well on the back of that treasury yield, there you go, up half a percent basis point. the yield at 2.83%. that has impact of dampening down if you like the trade in equities. let's take a look at bitcoin, maybe have a look at that. still under who thousand. down just over $1000 at $39,346. gold, dave asman, sent me an email, with gold at this price, you better believe it inflation has not hit a peak yet. very close to $2,000, up another 22.60 on gold, 1997. by the way we just got the latest read on homebuilders

sentiment in april. guess what? it fell for the fourth month in a row to 77. that is down two points from march. making this the longest losing streak since april of 2020. the housing home building business under a little bit of pressure. stocks generally mixed. pulte group up half a percent this morning. now this, a boston university prosever, ibrax kennedy, blasting republicans in a op-ed, danger more republicans should talk about. kendi says this party is not any group of parents but a party of white supremacy. hmmm. miranda devine joins me. good morning to you, all i can say is really? what do you make of this? >> well look, we're talking about a problem with crime in new york city which has been escalating because of left-wing

policies, that is all there is to it. you know albany has been abandoned just before the, just before covid hit bail. we're talking about a deliberate, manufactured crime problem and you know the mentally ill on the streets, the upending of the jails and allowing lots of felons on the streets is obviously going to cause crime and disorder. ashley: yeah, you know, the mayor of new york city, eric adams, says the rise in crime is a national issue. roll the tape. i will get your thoughts. >> national problem, i say over and over ben, there are many rivers that feed the sea of violence. this a national issue. not a red state, blue state, in fact red states higher murder rate of blue states. tulsa is three times the murder

rate of los angeles. kentucky, mississippi, louisiana, those are the highest murder rates in our entire country. ashley: i would disagree. i think those states have most lenient laws in place allow criminals back on the street when they have no business being there tend to be democrat-run governments. i don't think that is a surprise but what do you make of it, miranda? >> sounds like the mayor is trying to off-load blame. he has been in there i guess only four months but he is talking, he talked a lot during the campaign about crime. that was really why he won the election and now he is expected to do a very difficult job, something that really only rudy giuliani was able to get on top of but he is not imposing the same sorts of really decisive changes to laws and emboldening, empowering the police like rudy giuliani did.

he is sort of trying to walk both sides of the street. on the one hand he is obviously dismayed, up set by the rise in violent crime and disorder but on the other hand he doesn't really appear to take the really draconian steps to fix anything. he talks about guns being the problem instead of the people firing the guns who really need to be locked up. ashley: very quickly, miranda, want to get back to the first point i was trying to make, the boston university professor you are white, you belong to the republican party, you are a racist and member of white supremacy. i think that is the beyond stupid comment what do you say? >> it might be stupid, it is now the policy, unspoken, of the democratic party. this is what, this is what joe biden and nancy pelosi and

the rest of them, this is how they portray trump supporters. you know the capital rioters are all supposedly white supremacists even though it had nothing to do with race in their protests. as bad as it was, they were just angry about the election of joe biden. it had nothing to do with white supremacy. so they're injecting this rancorous and poisonous idea into the political debate, just to win power and points and i think it is so divisive. from a president who feigns to be the great uniter it is just so bad. ashley: yeah. i forgot that but, just another eye roll moment, is it not? miranda, thank you so much for joining us this morning. appreciate your comments. >> my pleasure. ashley: by the way the -- my pleasure. the mayor of new york city calling out social media giants. he said they must step up to

identify users talking about violence. roll that tape. >> i think social media must step up. there is a corporate responsibility, when we're watching hate brew online, we can identify using artificial intelligence and other methods to identify those who are talking about violence. ashley: there you go. brings us to our next topic very nicely, twitter. take a look at this, elon musk agreed with a tweet saying that the quote, game is rigged unquote if he cannot buy twitter. now let's bring in our good friend jeff seeksa. jeff, hi to you. you think musk needs to get wall street to go along with his plan in order to successfully take over twitter which i know you're by the way not a huge fan of? >> not a huge fan, ashley, not even close but i will say the whole idea of the game is rigged, i mean i've been doing this for 30 years and i won't

say the entire game is rigged but a lot of it is and what elon musk needs to do, first of all, he is at are war right now. last week on the show i said that two scenarios were going to evolve. either he is going to take over twitter or he is going to figuratively burn it to the ground. now the next phase in that war has got to be for elon to get wall street on his side. if you look the holder, holes of twitter -- holdings of twitter, the top is vanguard, elon musk, morgan stanley, blackrock and state street. a lot of institutions that own twitter stock own it through their exchange traded fund program. essentially there is about 127 exchange traded funds that own twitter. so essentially these institutions own twitter by default. they're just buying them because twitter is lucky enough to be

included in these indexes. so if the wall street really cares about value, because this is a garbage stock, to say this is a dog of a stock, i can't even say that because i like dogs because it is offensive to dogs but what i will say they need to unlock value of this company. wall street needs to push. if you take all the institutions, put their holdings together, what you will fine is they have a lot of power and they have to put it forward now. ashley: yeah. just marking it down, jeff sica definitely doesn't like twitter. by the way, jeff, do you see a recession? i want to get your thoughts on that. some people say we can get through this without one. what are your thoughts? >> i think either we're going to hit a recession or we're already in one and the reason i'm saying that is higher energy prices, this inflation right now is

paralyzing the consumer. 70% of the economy is driven by the consumer and the consumers are hurting thousand. they were able to, they were able to sustain themselves through a good part of this for various reasons. now that you see interest rates coming up, you see the housing market begin to turn. i think we're on our way into a recession. i think what is going to happen, now that the fed is saying they're going to get more aggressive because they're finally acknowledging that this inflation is real, i think we're going to see consumers pull back and that's the worst thing that can happen right now. ashley: well, on that happy note, we'll have to leave it there, jeff zika. speaking your mind. on fire this morning. great stuff as always, jeff, thank you very much. >> thank you. ashley: staying on elon musk, we seem to do that a lot these days, spacex falcon 9 rocket

successfully launched a spy satellite from a base in california. the falcon 9 is first rocket to launch multiple satellites. air force contracted to space x in 2019. it launched 147 fall con nine rockets with 107 landing, quite remarkable. still ahead, iphone goes woke. you can now use a pregnant man emoji with the newest update. we have all the details on the gender neutral emojis later on in the show. covid cases on the rise in the big apple. should new york bring back restrictions and lockdowns? i will tell you what the governor said. lawsuits are mounting in philadelphia as the city reinstates the indoor mask mandate. many business owners try to get it overturned so do they have a case? i will ask pennsylvania

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♪. get down tonight, get down tonight ♪ ashley: kc and the sunshine band, get down on daytona beach today. what a beautiful shot. it is 76 degrees. if you're one of those lucky people out there i don't want to hear about it. check the market as we're trading on this monday morning, open for an hour and 16 minutes.

the dow essentially flat. things are turning around a little bit. the s&p barely up two points, the nasdaq up a 10th of a percent, basically where we started. take a look what elon musk just tweeted, quote, twitter board salary will be zero dollars if my bid succeeds. so that's about $3 million a year saved right there. oh he does love to poke the bear, doesn't he? shares of twitter, look at those, up 3 1/4%, at 46.54. meanwhile u.s. health officials say china's zero covid strategy is unlikely to work. jonathan serrie has that story. good morning, jonathan. reporter: good morning to you, ashley. in fact today chinese authorities are reporting the first deaths in shanghai associated with the city's latest outbreak of covid-19 cases. health officials say all the victims involved with elderly. three victims in total. they had preexisting health

problems and were unvax sated. although china reports a vaccination rate of 90%, the figure is only 62% for people over 60 in that country. the authoritarian government is still enforcing strict lockdowns in shanghai, despite growing complaints from residents. the white house new covid-19 response coordinator says, china's zero covid strategy is unlikely to work ends if the highly contagious omicron subvariant ba.2 which is driving the latest surge. >> and that's why our strategy which have advocated, people should get vaccinated, boosted, treatments that are available. that is a much more effective, long-term durable strategy for living with this virus. reporter: today, philadelphia becomes the first major u.s. city to reinstate the indoor mask mandates. several businesses and individuals are suing to block it. they point out the cdc currently lists philadelphia county as a

low risk area when comes to covid activity and hospital capacity. although ba.2 is driving up cases in several other municipalities so far health officials in those cities and counties are holding off holding more stringent requirements. they're optimistic higher vaccination levels, expanded access to treatments will help keep covid activity at manageable levels. ashley? ashley: jonathan, thank you very much. let's bring in now congressman lloyd smucker, republican from pennsylvania. congressman, as we heard from jonathan, philadelphia the first major city to bring back its indoor mask mandate. what do you make of that? >> well, ash, that is unnecessary. there is no logical argument to be made for bringing back masks. it goes against cdc guidelines. even chop, the childrens' hospital of philadelphia, has

said it is not necessary to bring this back. remember, the reason for the mask mandates and shutdowns in first place to insure hospital capacity could contain the cases. we're not close to at that happening here. only thing this i can make sense this is an addiction to power by liberal mayors, liberal governors. it is very tough to wane themselves off that. they believe the government can make better decisions for you than the decisions you can make yourself. no one is telling people not to wear masks. they can do that but it should be their individual choice. ashley: yeah, you know several businesses and individuals, congressman, filed a lawsuit against the state to overturn the renewed rule. obviously you believe they have a case? >> i do. it is the latest in decisions made by the governor of

pennsylvania, governor wolf, and the mayor of philadelphia, that have impacted businesses throughout this pandemic. businesses want to see an nfib study recently talked about the number one concern of businesses is inflation. they want to see policies implemented that address inflation, that address supply chain issues, that insure that workers are available for their businesses. this is just one additional thing they will have to deal with in these difficult times. ashley: you know you mentioned the democrat governor tom wolf, he is pushing a plan that would send 2,000-dollar checks to some pennsylvanians. do we need another round of stimulus, congressman? >> we've seen the impact of the previous stimulus. inflation is a direct result of the stimulus checks. it is why i did not support the american rescue plan when it was first voted on. by the way another reason was because of the surpluses that

states have, which is exactly what we're seeing here. p but why should we continue to incentivize anything other than people returning to work when everybody business owner that i talked to needs workers at their businesses? honestly in pennsylvania the governor's numbers are very much under water. he has a very low approval rating and he knows that democrats are in trouble across the state. so i think actually this is a ploy to buy votes. it won't work because it is not what people want. people again want policies to address the, to address the rising costs. ashley: it seems strange to me that with inflation running out of control you have a governor that wants to spend, spend, spend. it doesn't make sense. >> how about this for an idea? i cosponsored a bill that republicans on the ways and means committee introduced which would incentivize people to return to work. why not a 2,000-dollar incentive

for return to work? ashley: right. >> why not $1500 is that bill. we still have a low workforce participation rate and that's contributing to the supply chain issues that we are seeing. another $2000 payment besides helping to fuel inflation, it is just a short-term fix. it is not what people want. what people need and what they want is connection to great-paying jobs that will help them to provide for their families long term, that will help them to achieve their own american dream. ashley: yeah. why work when the government can pay for to you stay home? it makes no sense. congressman, thanks so much for joining us this morning. >> thanks for having me. ashley: thank you. by the way the governor of new york, kathy hochul says she will not shut down her state as covid cases rise. listen to this. >> i want to protect the health of new yorkers but i'm also protecting the economy.

i am not going to shut it down again, you can count on that. ashley: well that is good news. new york by the way, reported over 4,000 new cases on saturday and is seeing a daily average of 575 cases. now this, automakers including tesla preparing to reopen the shanghai plants after weeks of being shut down but there has already been some speed bumps. grady trimble will have that report coming up. 1000 construction companies are slamming president biden's prounion mandate on federal job. he says this is a lose, lose, for taxpayers and businesses. we'll speak to him next.

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♪. ashley: you are looking at new york city, the great frank sinatra. who doesn't love that, new york, new york. it is partly sunny and i would

say a chilly 49 degrees for mid to eight april. let's take a look at the markets for you. we are in, what, we're coming up to an hour or two into the markets after being closed on friday and we've turned green across the screen. not by much. the dow up a 10th. s&p up a 10th. nasdaq up a third of a percent. a little bit of a turnaround. look at mcdonalds. why? inflation is coming for the big mac, sorry to tell you. food prices up 7.7% over the current year. that is the biggest jump since 1981. you look at the fast-food companies a mixed bag. wendy's down, chipotle up. under a new law new york city employers are required to put pay raises on listing. business groups are working to get the law postponed or changed before the deadline. they don't like it.

meanwhile 1200 construction companies are blasting president biden's prounion mandate on federal construction jobs. our next guest criticized president biden for doubling down on becoming america's most prounion president. bring in associated builders and contractors vice president ben brubek. welcome to you, ben. what is your beef, what is your issue. >> good morning. thanks for having me on the program. ashley: sure. >> president biden signed an executive order that requires something called project labor agreements on federal construction contracts greater than $35 million. project labor agreements results in increased costs, discourage competition for more than 87% of the construction industry. the result of the executive order, it will steer contracts to unionized contractors, union labors at the expense of taxpayers. we know project labor agreements increase the cost of construction 12 to 20%.

we'll get fewer roads, bridges, utilities funded through the infrastructure bill earlier this year. so this is a real lose-lose policy for taxpayers and the construction industry. our members are furious with the administration over this. they hope they will reconsider the policy and and policy will be replaced with something that will support fair around open competition, that will encourage all americans and all construction companies to compete for this taxpayer-funded construction work. ashley: so, ben, give me a sense of how many non-union contractors are being essentially, you know, put out of work by these rules? i mean is it a large percentage? >> well it is hard to know exactly because the final rule hasn't come out yet on this you about we know our members perform 50% of large-scale federal construction contracts in the last decade. so they are going to be severely impacted by this, depending on the size and scope of the contract and that is bad news.

when you have the best firms building roads, schools and bridges they're not allowed to compete on that, that will increase the cost of construction this is another inflationary policy by the biden administration. ashley: does the rule essentially create a closed shop? are there no non-union companies allowed to bid? >> nonunion companies are technically allowed to bid on project labor agreement jobs, however, the terms and conditions of project labor agreements force contractors to hire most or all of their employees from union hiring halls. they have to follow union work rules and pay into union pension, benefit programs. non-union workers will have to join a union or unfortunately pay union dues as a condition of employment. the result of this non-union contractors will not compete and not participate in the competitive bidding process. that hurts taxpayers, that hurts the federal government and hurts states and localities out there trying to build and improve struck drug as well. ashley: it doesn't make sense. we're all doing to make more and

the taxpayer as you pointed out. we wish you luck trying to fight this, ben. thank you for joining this morn. >> thank you so much. ashley: thank you. staying on unions, workers at apple's flagship retail store in new york city's grand central terminal have taken steps to form a union. if this move is successful this will be the first apple store to unionize. according to reports at least three other apple stores are doing the same thing, moving towards a union. meantime as inflation continue as record number of homebuyers are trying to move to more affordable areas. makes sense. since the start of this year 32.3% of redfin users looked to move to a different metro area. as a result, redfin says cities like san francisco, los angeles, seattle, boston, are seeing early signs of a housing market slowdown. we're hearing about this more and more. the hot housing market starting to cool off. automakers are preparing to

resume production at shanghai plants following a three-week shutdown because of covid lockdowns. grady trimble has the story. and, grady, tesla is reopening in shanghai has been delayed again, right? reporter: yeah, ash, there is news related to elon musk that does not involve twitter rather the company he is involved with right now. tesla was supposed to reopen the shanghai gigafactory today and restart production there. that has been delayed at least another day according to reuters because a supplier had a logistical snag. today the electric automaker did start moving employees back into the factory though after a nearly three-week shutdown but the reopening plan, it is pretty extreme. listen to this workers will get a sleeping bag and a mattress according to reports because they will basically have to live at the factory, sleeping and eating there. general motors reportedly used a similar strategy to keep its plants open during the lockdowns. meanwhile sac, china's largest

automaker which has a joint venture with volkswagen, is also looking to reopen its factories this week. of course the backdrop to all of this is the draconian measures put in place in shanghai to control the spread of the coronavirus. the plan includes lockdowns and a new round of daily testing for people who live in the city and new economic data out just today shows some of the costs of china's zero covid policy, retail sales fell by a greater than expected 3 1/2% in march. more lockdowns are expected to be on the way in other regions, ashley. so the economic costs this has on china could be even greater in the coming months. ashley? ashley: it really could. grady, thank you very much for that report. by the way, new poll shows president biden's approval rating sinking to and an all-tie low as the white house loses support among younger voters. hillary vaughn will have that report in our 11:00 hour. the biden administration

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♪. ashley: all right. let's take a look at these markets for you. we're in the green across the board. the dow up 100 points, s&p up a third, the nasdaq up a third of a percent. nice little recovery this morning. nothing too crazy but at least we're on the upside. the white house is announcing it will allow oil and gas leases on federal land to resume. madison alworth has the story. madison, do energy executives think this is going to fix the

current oil production crisis in the u.s.? reporter: no, ashley, they don't. they also warn it will likely continue our current domestic production shortage for years to come. that is because even though the biden administration has or is resuming oil leases on federal lands the acreage available for drilling has significantly decreased while the royalties paid to the government have significantly increased. so the bureau of land management is expected to be offering sale notices today and assessed land in these states. offering up 173 parcells on 144,000-acres. that is 80% less than what had been undervaluation for leasing. only about 20% being offered up. that 20% being offered up will be more expensive too. royalties are now up 18.75%. that is from 12.5% prior. the u.s. oil and gas association president telling fox news, this

will only worsen our current energy problem. >> and so it goes to this fundamental question when we're in a crisis like this is, is this policy, will it do anything to increase production? and the answer is no. it will actually compound the problem. we have a short-term production shortfall right now. secretary's action she announced yesterday will push this problem out three, five, seven, 10 years. reporter: you know it is important to note this is the first announcement around drilling on federal land from the biden administration after president biden ordered a moratorium on new leases the day he took office. here's the thing though, ashley, even when these companies start drilling it will likely take months, if not years to see that oil. not only because of the political hoops they have to jump through but because the supply chain is also making it difficult to get certain equipment. energy companies telling congress it now takes up to six months compared to one month it used to take to get all the permitting and equipment needed.

ashley? ashley: yeah. then you pay all the royalties and fees. it is like is it worth it? madison, thank you very much. the national average for a gallon of regular now stands at $4.09. good time to bring in gas buddy's patrick de haan. patrick, good morning to you. you expect prices to surge, what, another 25 cents in the coming days? why? >> well, ashley i'm a little bit worried. obviously the price of oil has gone up in the last week or so libya continues to be at the forefront of oil fields being shut down. eu continues to consider sanctioning russia's oil and energy that could happen after the election in france. there is just a lot of upward pressure. now you have covid in china kind of pushing the market up and down but we're in the midst of summer driving season. u.s. gasoline consumption last week was up a percentage point. short-term issues are very bullish. the president giving the market

a little bit of uncertainty. we've seen a lot of flipping, flopping back and forth on some agenda items when it comes to oil drilling this is so much a long play down the road, there is not a whole lot of immediate relief for consumers. ashley: did the gas prices, patrick, change peoples travel plans this past easter, passover weekend? were the roads less crowded? i didn't think they were but what say you? >> at least through friday and saturday we did see a little bit of an uptick. we'll have to wait for sunday's data, and monday's data. it doesn't look like there was a big slowdown. say it this way, looks like demand was up but it may have not been up significantly in light of high prices. keep in mind over the weekend, maryland's gas tax holiday was complete. so maryland is dealing with a big jump in prices. ashley: as you look into your crystal ball, patrick what kind of prices could we be paying right in the heart of driving

season in the summer as people go on vacation, decide they don't want to deal with the chaos that can be the airport, you know what? we'll just drive somewhere? what kind of prices do you think we'll be paying? >> i think ashley for the national average we could be up somewhere in the upper 3-dollar, low 4-dollar range. i will put a caveat on that. eu continues to discuss sanctioning russia. that could be a wild card. if they do that, we'll be up over $4 for the majority of summer. if they don't, we see good things come to light, we may slip under four dollars for a good portion of the summer. ashley: that is interesting, isn't it? the strategic petroleum reserve, we dipped into that recently. did that have any major effect or did that last for like three days? >> you know, there was shock and awe of the announcement, keep in mind, i think that is very much a back seat issue right now. we have got more important thing

like what's going on with libya, eu, covid in china. there are a lot of other issues taking the driver's seat and the spr is very much a back seat issue. ashley: we'll have to leave it there. patrick as always, great information. thank you very much. >> thanks, ashley. ashley: consumers looking for pricing relief on the dealership lot will have to wait. oil industry experts predict the car shortage likely lasts through this year and into next. according to j.d. power, the average transaction price in march was a whopping 43,700. that is not cheap. by the way that is 26% higher than before the pandemic. so, it is expensive. now this, ukraine's president zelenskyy warning the rest of the world that they should prepare for putin to unleash nuclear attacks. we'll tell you what a former russian official just revealed about when putin could return to nukes. a ukrainian doctor treating victims of war in an area mostly

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♪. ashley: foreign policy experts are predicting that vladmir putin will only consider nuclear weapons if he feels an existential threat to his country or regime. former russian for -- foreign minister told fox news digital they could be used in very specific situations if russia or one of those countries feel threatened in their hearts, existentially, if nato troops come into moscow and probably will resort to nuclear weapons but there is no existential threat to russia under the present circumstances. kozyrev, insists as long as putin can maintain his regime, he will not do anything to threaten his position of power. let's hope he is right. our next guest is working in the

biggest hospital in the area as a physician. that area mostly occupied by russians. let's bring in ivan. ivan, thanks for talking to us. how are you treating patients in the middle of a war zone? tell me what are you experiencing on the ground? >> hello, before we start i want to express my deepest gratitude to all the american people an american government for helping and supporting us. it is important for our resistance. i work in the hospital on the edge. we have a conflict zone around about 20, 30 kilometers from our hospital. we are got refugees from mariupol. the first main hospital direction of marry -- mariupol. we her explosions, and people, refugees, soldiers, we're trying to do all we can to support our people from occupied territory and also from the ukrainian

controlled territories. ashley: ivan, what kind of support or supplies do you need right now? >> frankly speaking we need everything. we need military and civilian ambulances. we don't have enough of medicine or surgical staff. we try to do all what we can but with no supplies, it is impossible. really hard. we're, we need all kinds of medical equipment. our destroyed hospital as fast as possible. to save as many lives as we can. ashley: next one for you, ivan, ukrainian president zelenskyy says up to 3,000 ukrainian soldiers have died in the war with russia and he says they must prepare for russia to use nuclear weapons. what have you been seeing?

how threatened do you feel yourself and you know, how long can this go on? >> it is, ukraine is target of nuclear weapons, we have no means to treat patients. i think no one in the world, nobody in the world is completely ready to manage such disaster. i hope it is just a threat, not a plan but knowing russians we had better to prepare. ashley: last one for you, ivan, the white house says they are considering sending a high level official to ukraine but the president of ukraine thinks that it should be president biden. listen to this. i will get your comment. >> do you want president biden to come here? >> yes. >> is there, are there any plans for himcome? >> i think he will. >> you think he will? >> i think he will and i think, but, it his decision of course,

about the safety situation, it depends but i think, i think he is a little, united states and that is why he should come here to see. ashley: ivan, what would it mean for president biden to visit ukraine? >> i reckon it's a good idea. always better to know all circumstances from inside to make best decision how to stop this cruel and unnecessary war. i think it could be a great sign of solidarity with ukraine. the west needs to understand the importance of continuing assistance during and after the war. ashley: well, we'll have to leave it there, but ivan, thank you very much for taking the time to talk to us. we wish you the very best and stay safe. >> thank you very much, ashley. ashley: thank you. quick check of the big board if we can. take a look at the dow up 26

points. very muted today, kind of a just getting back into the swing of things on a monday. the dow up as you can see 31 points. take a look at the 10-year very quickly, if we can. this is something we follow, up almost one basis point at 2.83%. that's more than three-year high. checking gold very quickly, $1987, up $12.20. bitcoin has been below 40,000. still is down 490 bucks at $39,335. taking a look at oil, big story of the day, up at $107.69. that has given a lift to the energy sector as you can imagine. nat-gas up 60 cents at $7.75. by the way we're talking about the gas price. the average for a gallon of regular, $4.09. it was 2.87 one year ago. we'll be having more "varney" after this. ♪. when they bundle

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>> the use of nuclear weapons would not achieve any objectives for russia other than destruction. there's no reason to do that other than a punitive measure simply to punish the ukrainians for fighting back. >> i don't think that russia comes out of this winning at all >> i don't think we have hit peak inflation as nasty as those numbers are i think they are going to get worse. >> the fed has really nothing to lose at this point, ash, by talking the talk, because at the end of the day, they could slow the pace of tightening and tone

down some of this hawkishness if we continue to see inflation numbers come off the boil. >> 8.5% inflation that's didi satesser. they have been way behind the curve and i think they should be much more aggressive. >> we're going to hit a recession when we're already in one. i think we'll see consumers pullback and that's the worst thing that could happen. ♪ ashley: fox square in midtown manhattan, "money on my mind" well it's a business program, we all have money on our mind, right it's 11 a.m. on the east coast on this monday, april 18, oh, yeah it's tax day you probably already know that i'm ashley webster in for stuary varney he will be back tomorrow but let's check the markets today and it's green across the screen but all very modest the dow, s&p and nasdaq up about a tenth or thereabouts. take a look at oil.

oil has been surging, up to $ 107.92 almost $108 a barrel up another dollar, that has given the energy sector a boost, as you can imagine. gold meanwhile, hovering around 2,000 at 1,988, up probably $13 or more take a look at the 10 year treasury yield, this also has a way of suppressing equities, the yield at 2.84% it's up another basis point, i think december of 2018 was the last time we saw this kind of level. now this. rachel campos-duffy just traveled down to texas where she sat down with hispanic voters. listen to what they have to say about the crisis at the border. take a listen. >> it's not parents sending their kids over here to give them a better life. it's kids being kidnapped and being used by the cartel to get over here. they are the worst type of

people. >> it's not fair for folks like my family, folks that i know that are doing things the right way. >> biden' message is come on over, we'll help you, you'll get , we're here for you. they are going to need the government to survive so the end result of that is socialism. we don't want socialism. ashley: well i couldn't agree more with all those comments, rachel campos-duffy joins us now , rachel george to you. what else did they tell you? rachel: george. well they are very worried about inflation and the cost of living remember hispanics come from hard-working, often working class families and the democrat parties just lost them on every level, you know, it's not just the economy, which was bad enough. crime impacts hispanic communities more than other communities and the border, these are all people who live in texas, they are feeling it but the border problems are getting

shot at across the country to everybody else as our government flies out so many illegals in the dead of night when no one is watching to all parts of america but then, the one other part of it is that now the democrat party is very openly anti-god and anti-family. this is something they used to kind of hide a little bit more with hispanic voters so on every level these parents, they said their kids are coming home with, you know, pronoun nonsense and getting this transgender stuff in school. they don't recognize this party. none of the values that they care about from hard work to god and family are at all recognizable inside the democrat party. this is a massive opportunity for the gop if they can reach out and remind them of who they are, i think this could be a not just this , actually it's generational. my father voted for a democrat for the first time with ronald regan and he really became a life-long republican and it

impacted all of his children, so once you make that shift from democrat to republican, you vote once you're open to it from thereon. this is a massive shift. by the way let me just point this out. no other demographic is more dissatisfied with the biden administration and their policies than hispanics. they are reporting in these poll s more dissatisfaction than white, asian, or blacks. they are the most dissatisfied demographic. ashley: and very quickly, rachel , do the gop need to do a better job of talking to the hispanic community. those people who, as you say, are now disillusioned. it is an opportunity, but does the gop need to do a better job? rachel: yeah, they need to do a better job and they need to re allocate their resources to this particular demographic which is so clearly moveable, they are persuadable, and oftentimes they are focusing on other demographics that maybe

aren't as as persuadable. african americans, a lot of investment in the trump adminitration and policies that the they like, not saying they shouldn't reach out to african americans but they didn't get a lot of return on their investment, i think they will get a lot more return on investment with hispanics who are already with very little outreach showing they are looking for another answer. ashley: fascinating stuff, great report, rachel thank you so much for joining us today. really good stuff. rachel: of course. thank you. ashley: a new quinnipiac poll shows president biden's approval rating sinking to just 33% the lowest point of his presidency so far. hillary vaughn is on capitol hill. hillary, biden's approval is even worse among young voters. reporter: ashley, that's right, and when you take a look at president biden's approval rating and compare it to inflation rates that are rising, you see that the president's approval rating is dropping almost in tandem as inflation rates continue to rise, rising

prices for everything from gas to groceries particularly hits young people that are working on a fixed income and a smaller income than older people. a gallop poll showing the change in approval by generation of president biden. gen z dropping 21 percentage points, millennials 19%, gen x 15% and that quinnipiac poll showing a more bleak approval number among young people, 58% of people ages 18-34 disapprove of the job the president is doing so republicans are out there talking about inflation and tying it to the president's economic agenda. >> the economic policies of the biden administration continue to exacerbate the country's economic position, whether it's increasing inflation or the potential for a recession, these economic policies are going in the wrong direction. we need to reduce federal spending. reporter: but democrats are not talking about inflation as much.

a public affairs software company tallied up how many times politicians in washington are talking about the top issue on voter's minds, inflation, they found that republicans have talked about inflation six times more than democrats this year, but some progressive democrats are quietly warning those in their party about inflation. politico obtained this e-mail from a top progressive lawmaker who wrote to their colleagues yesterday saying i've become very concerned most of us are not appreciating how terrifying rising prices are for most americans, unlike nearly every other issue, which can be ignor ed by most americans in their daily lives, inflation insists on voter's attention and ashley, of course the big elephant in the room is if that concern about inflation is going to persuade progressives to stop calling for the president to increase federal spending, to follow through on some of his progressive promises, like canceling student loan debt.

ashley? ashley: very interesting stuff, hillary vaughn, thank you very much at the white house. steve forbes, i'm sure he's chomping at the bit, joins us now. steve, it seems to me that the president is losing coming and going. he's upsetting the younger voter s. his approval rating is at an all -time low and i don't think he knows how to get out of this funk. what say you? >> no, he doesn't, the way you get out of it is by changing what he's doing and doing the opposite of what he's doing, whether it's a foreign policy instead of leading from behind instead of the response to opportunities in ukraine, he should be at the forefront here at home. if he wanted to make a real change in energy policy, reverse the xl pipeline thing that he canceled in the first day in office. that would show he's made a turn there, and the recovery from the pandemic problems we've got in supply chains he's making

worse, by attacks on energy and you look at alternative energy, and there was a piece in the journal today pointing out that if we follow through on that that's going to send the price of minerals soaring from their current level so this artificial inflation is being made worse of course by the federal reserve, which print ed a ton of money, which is going to hit us next year. ashley: oh, boy oh, boy the next one for you, steve. goldman sachs sees the risk of a recession in the u.s. at 35% in the next two years. they say the fed's main challenge is to reduce the gap between jobs and workers. what say you? >> well, the only thing the federal reserve can do is stop printing money and have a stable value for the dollar. it can't undo supply chain problems and things like that. unfortunately, the federal reserve is on its way to creating a recession. i love how goldman sachs is sounding like a weather forecast er. 38.2% probability, but the fact

of the matter is, the fed is artificially raising the cost of money. it should let interest rates flow. it's a form of like rent control let the interest rates float, reduce the size of its balance sheet, reduce those bonds, stabilize the dollar, and that's all it can do and the economy, if the biden administration ever behaved itself, you'd see this economy recover splendidly. ashley: well you know, that's not going to happen but quickly, could the fed over do it? i know you probably say no, but could they? >> the answer is yes, they could, because instead of tackling the real cause of a weakening dollar, which is by creating too many of them which they could do by selling some of their bonds, they are going to artificially keep those dollars out there, keep the dollars out there, and then raise the cost of money, already 30 year mortgage has gone from 2.5% to over 5%. most mortgages are floating rate mortgages, when households get hit with those what's going to happen? they have to cut back elsewhere.

so the fed is economic malpractice, they don't know how to fight the disease, which is stabilizing the dollar and get out of the way. ashley: wow you're on fire today , steve forbes, thank you so much for joining us today. really appreciate it. >> thank you, ashley. ashley: really appreciate it. tell it as it is. all right now this. investigations are underway after three mass shootings around the country this weekend. the rise in crime comes as some democrat cities consider refunding the police. what a good idea we've got the report. the president's approval rating among hispanic voters just 26% that's a big problem for democrats, since latinos are the country's largest minority voting block. joe concha will take that on, and at least seven people are dead and nearly a dozen are hurt after russian missiles hit lviv. those numbers could rise as rescuers search through the

rubble griff jenkins is live in ukraine and will have the latest on those deadly attacks. ♪ ♪ we believe there's an innovator in all of us. ♪

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ashley: ukraine's president zelenskyy is warning the rest of the world they should prepare for putin to release nuclear attacks. retired lt. general ben hodges joins me now, good morning lt. general. in his frustration could putin use nukes in ukraine, what do you think? >> i don't think he will, ashley. certainly, they have plenty of them, but i don't see and we should not be dismissive of it. i'm not dismissing the risk, but

i think that we have collective ly exaggerated the risk of this to the point that we're not making some policy decisions that i think be more helpful. there's no battlefield advantage for russia to use a nuclear weapons and there are no positive outcomes for them should they do this. ashley: i thought it was interesting, there was a missile attack on lviv in the far west of ukraine. what do you make of that? it seems like i thought they were concentrating on the east and the south. >> i think the attacks on lviv are intended to number one continue to strike fear in the hearts of ukrainians, to increase pressure on the zelenskyy government, but also, the russians recognize that the re-supply of new equipment and all of the stuff is coming in, the bulk of it comes from the polish side of

the border, so i would assume that some of these attacks are being aimed at logistics, lines of communications, that sort of thing, but what's interesting is that the sanction, one of the positive outcomes of the sanctions is that the russians are no longer getting the parts, some of the important parts they need, components to make the more smart weapons, and so we're going to start seeing increasingly inaccurate bombs and missiles as a result of this as well. ashley: last one for you, lt. general. house minority leader kevin mccarthy says that russia probably would not have invaded ukraine, had the biden administration sent weapons sooner. listen to this and i'll get your comments. >> ukraine is not asking for american men and women to fight. all they are asking for is the weapons to defend themselves if we would have taken those actions earlier, instead of waiting until after russia invaded they probably never would have invaded had we done

that sooner. ashley: interesting point. it seems to me that putin was pretty determined to do what he did. what do you think? >> i have to say, ashley, that was one of the more uninformed comments i've ever heard from a senior congressional leader. of course the russians invaded eight years ago, so mr. mccarthy is off by about eight years on his comment. secondly, what the administration has done correctly in my view is with congressional support is the focus on keeping the alliance together, and i think without even if we had started providing more weapons sooner, without having the alliance together, then i think we be a lot less effective in what we're trying to do now. ashley: it feels like the russians have re-supplied and making another push. i know this is difficult, but how do you see this playing out? does russia make anymore progress or are we

going to have basically another standoff? >> that's a great question. i think that right now, the russians are extremely vulnerable. they are going as fast as they can for the next two or three weeks to rebuild units that were so badly mauled in the last seven weeks of fighting what we call reconstitution in order to build back dupes combat power, so that they could in fact launch a focused attack on the dontesk region but interestingly, they have decided not to mobilize reserves. that tells me there's probably not a phase iii this year, that this is the best they could do for right now, and i think this is the time for us to talk about winning for ukraine to win and we need to break the back of the russians while they are down and so vulnerable. ashley: all right, we'll have to leave it there, but certainly very interesting deferral and thank you so much for your insight, lt. general appreciate you coming on this morning, thank you.

>> thanks. ashley: oh, thank you. let's bring in griff jenkins reporting live from ukraine. what is the latest on those attacks on lviv, griff? griff: well, ashley, since we spoke last, and just to update our viewers, obviously a terrible monday morning strike in lviv, four missiles killing at least seven, 11 injured. the last time a strike by the way hit lviv, president biden was in poland but now we're hearing from the first time directly from lviv's mayor andrew sadavie and he's condemning those attacks, here is what he had to say, listen. >> none of us wanted this war. the enemy attacked and to destroy us as a nation and to destroy ukraine as a sovereign and free state. we have literally one option, to fight, to resist. griff: and, ashley, we're

learning tragically from the governor of the lviv region, that among those injured a three -year-old boy has serious injuries to one of his hands, those numbers by the way, could rise. meanwhile, we are closely watching that dire situation in mariupol after russian forces issued that surrender or die ultimatum with the 2,000 ukrainian fighters dug in, barricaded in a steel plant surrounded by russian forces, ukraine's prime minister saying that those forces will not yield . >> steel has not fallen and there is still our military forces, our soldiers, so they will fight until the end. griff: and, ashley, we're just learning a little bit of breaking news from our ukrainian sources. the security services here released a video in which victor medvechov, the russian friendly ukrainian oligarch who was arrested last week in

ukrainian kudlow and in the video he is appealing to president putin to exchange him from these remaining forces in mariupol, along with the residents that are stuck there, if any developments happen on that front we'll bring it to you as soon as we get it. ashley? ashley: griff, terrific reporting, thank you very much appreciate that. by the way, russian forces also hit a humanitarian kitchen run by chef jose andres. the last hit the world central kitchen wounding four members of the team and the organization which provides meals in disaster and war zones has locations in at least 30 cities in ukraine, giving out nearly 30,000 meals a day. i was recent recently in poland and those kitchens are everywhere doing an amazing job let's check the markets if we can, we've turned it around we've been modestly higher and now we turned it the other way, modestly lower. the dow and the s&p down about a tenth of a percent, nasdaq down

a third of a percent, really struggling for any direction today on the big markets. let's take a look at cryptos if we can. they are all down, analysts, by the way, warning of a price crash after bitcoin fell below its 40,000 price mark, ethererum also dipping below $3,000 for the first time since mid- march so the cryptos down this morning as well. a warning from crypto fund founder arthur chung. he says there could be signer cyberattacks from north korea, he says all prominent crypto companies are probably being targeted and should strengthen their cybersecurity. no kidding. all right, now this. at least 23 known or suspected terrorists were caught at our southern border last year. the shocking report comes as border patrol appeals or prepares for a surge of migrants in the spring and summer. the crisis goes on, we're on it. have you gotten a new iphone update and if you did you can

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♪ baby we were born to run ♪ ashley: if you're born to run take a look at boston at 48 degrees and today is the 126th boston marathon, it is the first full-scale race on patriots day by the way since 2019 what a beautiful day. the 2020 race was canceled for covid, the 2021 race was postponed until october but today they run on patriots day, listening to the boss. let's take a look at the markets , we've been negative, we went positive, we're now back negative, there we go, the dow though it's all very modest down just 40 points, the nasdaq also down one-third of a percent the s&p down about one-tenth but let's look at some of the dow winners, intel, caterpillar, jpmorgan, there they all are, all in the green, intel up 2%,

cat caterpillar up 1.5%, bank of america up today, after their earnings report before the bell, quarterly profits fell 12%, but the good news is, that drop was smaller than analysts expected so the stock is up 3% at 38.75 on b of a. now this , three people have died from covid in shanghai. these are the first recorded covid deaths since the city went into lockdown in march. 25 million people, by the way, are confined to their homes today. some factories are working to reopen though, shanghai, tesla is bringing workers back to their plant, but they won't stop production until tomorrow at the very earliest. all right now take a look at this. it's a new op-ed in the hill. "hispanics are abandoning biden in droves." here's why. well you want to know, right? joe concha wrote that piece and he joins me. good morning, joe, so why are

hispanics abandoning biden? >> well for the usual reasons that other demographics are for starters right because they don't like inflation either and they are feeling that on a daily basis in gas prices and crime, but also, the pandering as well, ashley, right? the use of the term "latinx" which we heard from many democratic politicians, from joe biden to nancy pelosi, to kamala harris, to alexandria ocasio-cortez, you see the poll ing on that and 40% of hispanics say they are insulted by that term while only 2% say they have actually adopted it, so it's a lot of things but the border also, believe it or not, having essentially open border, is not sitting well with hispanics particularly those in texas, and in florida, and now we're seeing numbers, right, we're at 221,000 crossings in march alone, more than 2 million people crossing over last year, and look, those jobs are going to go somewhere and i have a feeling

the hispanic community doesn't like it very much when now they see just a flood of people coming in who didn't wait in line like they did in terms of the legal process, and that's why we're seeing 26%, ashley. ashley: well the gop needs to do a better job though, wouldn't you agree, joe, to target that demographic and say look, just the democrats are taking your vote for granted. >> yeah, you can't just say hey , joe biden's doing a bad job vote for us, you also have to offer solution, the bumper sticker. here is how we'll make your life better but in november, either way i think that the president and the vice president' performance on this particular issue as far as the border and immigration is so poor that we're looking at a red tsunami when it comes to the gop taking back the house and probably the senate. ashley: very well-put. now this story. i know you've been waiting for this apple's newest software update. it includes a pregnant man emoji and several gender-neutral cartoons. what do you make of that, joe? >> well, when they said a man is evolving everyday, boy who knew that we got to this point,

right? i'm going to have to sit down with my pops, ashley, because away back when, when he sat me down to talk about the birds and the bees and said well you can't get pregnant, joe, your hypothetical potential future girlfriend could, that could be problematic at a young age, he didn't mention this at all, so either way the emoji with the pregnant man, that looks like me after my beer pong tournaments, it's monday. ashley: [laughter] oh, my goodness, so you know, listen. i mean, this is pandering at its greatest, right? i have a feeling a lot of people will use the emoji just because it's so ridiculous. >> probably i've used it four times just to mock it really, not to actually use it for any positive purpose. but this is apple again all they are doing is joining other woke corporations like nike and american airlines and coca cola, and the wall street journal editorial board warned about this that when you start taking a political position, you could possibly alienate half or more

of your customers. why not just make a product, do a good job selling it, treat your customers well and get it, there is no upside here let's put it that way. ashley: and i do think they always bend to the minority. that's really the annoying thing the vocal minority while the , you know, the silent majority roll their eyes, right? >> that's correct, and that same editorial board op-ed which was great said look, you're never going to please the left as long as you put profit first, and then once you alienate the right you're friendless at this point, both sides probably not happy but that's apple for you and i still have their phone and it's not going new where because i'm married to it at this point. ashley: don't we all. yes, yes, we all are. you know, the left's point is if you don't agree with us, then you just need to be quiet and don't even say anything, but anyway i have to leave it right there, joe concha. great stuff as always, i'll be expecting a pregnant man man emoji any second. >> it's coming. thanks, ashley.

ashley: thank you very much. an indiana school district is under fire for a video their mascot went viral, the anderson school corporation says they are reviewing their indian chief mascot. there he is, after critics called it hostile and culturally abusive. the school district will consult with native american leaders before making any permanent changes, but that tik tok video, getting a lot of response. all right, now this. parents are suing a massachusetts school after they say teachers encouraged their children to change their pronouns and names, without the parent's consent. we're on that story. the government, by the way, spent millions of dollars on hotel rooms for migrants last year, but get this. most of the rooms were never used, the report is next. ♪ welcome to the hotel california ♪

ashley: all right, welcome back. let's take a look at apple down a half a percent in this morning 's session, workers at apple's grand central terminal store in new york city have begun the process of unionizing, organizers are going to determine the level of support by collecting authorization cards from employees at the store, so that's the story with apple, at least one of them. let me have a look at etsy if we can. etsy down more than 7% at $107, thousands of sellers on the platform are also looking to unionize. this comes after a week-long protest over the company hiking fees by 30%, the stock is down

47% year-to-date and drifting dangerously close to their annual bottom of 109 bucks in fact its gone through there. now let's take a look at meta. it's what'sapp messaging platform rolling out their new communities feature, it allows for up to 32 members to speak to each other all at once, not dog much for the stock, meta essentially flat at 210. now this. homicides in philadelphia are up 9% just this year alone, our very own jeff flock is there and it seems people are just fed up with crime and some cities now wanting to refund the police. what an idea, jeff flock. reporter: yeah, everything old is new again, ashley, in some ways. i'm at the 35th police district here on the north side of philadelphia and the city is now , yes, refunding the police. they're devoting more money in their budget to police as i stand here outside the 35th police district headquarters, if

you see a mural there to the folks that have given their lives in service as police officers in philadelphia. it is one of multiple cities now putting money back into the police department. take a look at this. in d.c., they're hiring almost 350 new officers they say, in los angeles $150 million now more in the police budget being proposed. in new york city a bail reform is being re-reformed and done away with. the mayor of new york, eric adams, said yesterday on abc that he supports the notion that progressive reforms have led to more crime. he said and i quote him now "if black lives matter, then the thousands of people i saw on the street when george floyd was murdered should be on the streets right now saving the lives of these black children that are dying every night matter." we talked to the man who runs

the fraternal order of police in philadelphia and he said yes, the tide is changing. >> people are seeing effects of what they did two years ago and now they are calling for more funding for police, for police to do a good job, they are seeing homicides throughout the country, they are seeing shootings, the gun violence just this past weekend, we've had over 60 people shot in the city of philadelphia. that's not a good number. you don't want to lead the league in homicides or shootings. reporter: john mcnesby there, fraternal order of police, he says they are having trouble, ashley, attracting new officers to the force because of the attitude that had been given , the attitude of the american public is that when it comes to crime, the biden administration, well, their notions about crime, not very popular. i think the numbers are 39% that approve of the way the biden administration is handling crime

, 61% disapprove. the tide seems to be turning though people saying maybe we need to let police perhaps do their job and here is some more money to do it. ashley: yeah what a concept, you know? you defund the police, crime goes up. there's a correlation i believe, jeff flock, one of the most noisy streets in philadelphia thank you very much, jeff, appreciate it. reporter: no kidding. ashley: from crime in our cities to crime at the border we now know there were 23 known or suspected terrorists caught along the southern border last year. that is according to customs and border protection data obtained by fox news. it just shows you some of the individuals coming across the border the report comes as a government watchdog group finds immigration officials wasted $17 million on unused hotel rooms for migrants last year. they say officials hired a

politically-connected contractor who charged government for the rooms whether or not they will use, yes that's your taxpayer money at work or not work. all right, let's take a look at the dow 30 stocks just to get a sense of where we are on this market its been very much stop-and-start at the bottom, home depot, boeing and walt disney trailing on the top line, intel, goldman sachs and caterpillar and american express on the upside. this is interesting story. florida rejecting 41% of math textbooks for public schools, many of them have references to critical race theory but here's the question begging what does c rt hads have to do with math? we'll get into that story, next. ♪ you're just another brick in the wall ♪

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ashley: florida's department of education rejected 54 math textbooks for use in public schools. many of those books reference critical race theory.

what? erica donalds, school choice leader and former school board member joins me now. erica, okay, explain to me how can there be crt in math lessons i don't get it. >> well, we have been seeing this for years, actually. when i was on the school board and we reviewed math textbooks it was full of word problems that talked about climate change and all kinds of other social indoctrination and political indoctrination issues so this has been going on for a long time and good on florida with all of our purchasing power to finally pushback against these publishers not to put this kind of thing in a math textbook but just stick to the basics. ashley: so they are putting crt language into math problems, is that what the issue is here? >> that's exactly the issue. we're talking about word problems that instead of just talking about farm animals or plants or just regular things when you're talking about what's in a word problem, it's talking about race, it's talking about gender, it's talking about

political indoctrination, in a word problem in a math book, and finally, someone is standing up for parents who don't want this stuff in our schools. ashley: interesting. next one for you, parents in massachusetts are suing the lud low public school district. they say school officials encourage children to adopt different names and pronouns without the parent's consent. you know, look. you're a parent, what do you think about that? are the parents right to sue? >> absolutely, and this is one of many lawsuits that we're see ing around the country including one here in florida. we have seen these school districts overstep their boundaries into health and medical and mental health decisions for children without parental consent. in florida we've seen gender support plans that are made in secret with children against parent's wishes and without their knowledge, and parents have every right to stop schools from overstepping their boundaries, especially when it comes to religious conviction,

family values, and certainly the parent's right to choose who is going to give mental health services to their child. ashley: can it affect a child and a child's thinking and, you know, from an emotional point of view from a psychological point of view? >> well we've been telling our children since they were little that teachers are authority figures, to listen to what the school says, and do what your teachers say, so now that teachers and school administrators are telling children, yes you should change your pronouns and no you shouldn't tell your parents about this , it's a huge conflict and a betrayal of parent's trust in the system so we have to stop school administrators and teachers from doing this and someone has been held accountable. ashley: how about this one, erica. a new poll shows support soaring for freedoms in education across the country. i mean, is this about school choice? >> it absolutely is, you know, the silver lining to covid was

that parents looked around and thought there has to be something better than this. there has to be something better than these schools and that the sub-standard curriculum that is being offered to my children, so now parents want options. they want the ability to take their tax dollars and go elsewhere, whether it be to a private school, a charter school , or home schooling, and that's what we school choice advocates have been fighting for for years. we want every single parent to be able to vote with their feet and create an education marketplace that improves academic instruction for everyone. ashley: oh, but the critics all say it gives children who are able to take advantage of that choice of school, it leaves others more vulnerable behind. how would you respond to that? >> well that's actually what's happening nowment what's happening now is the wets it are able to buy a home in the school district of their choice or able to pay for private school leaving students from disadvantaged communities and

families who cannot afford another option, no place to go. what we want is to give those families the ability to make that choice as well, and anyone who is opposed to that and then cries equity on the other side, they are a hypocrite. many of these oppositions went to private schools themselves or send their children to private schools but they want to withhold that right from other families who cannot afford it. we want to give it to everyone. ashley: hypocrisy comes up all the time, erica donalds thank you so much for spending sometime with us today we do appreciate it. thank you. >> thank you. ashley: let's take a quick check of the markets. as you can see modestly down, its been up and down all morning , take a look at ford if we can, penske, the truck leasing company just ordered 750 of ford's electric e-cargo vans good news for ford, only up slightly. now show me johnson & johnson, they just agreed to a $99 million settlement with west

virginia. the state sued j & j claiming they helped fuel opioid addiction. johnson & johnson does not admit liability or wrongdoing. the stock down just 1%. all right, all of that said, it is now time for the monday trivia question. which animal has the strongest sense of smell? elephant, snake, turkey vulchur, thinkbout it, the answer is right after this. to be strong. to overcome anything. ♪ ♪ to be... unstoppable. that's why the world's largest companies and over 30 million people rely on prudential's retirement and workplace benefits. who's your rock? . .

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ashley: all right. before the break we asked this question, which animal has the strongest sense of smell? of course you would say basset hound. guess what? the answer is the african elephant. they can smell water sources, thank you, they can smell water sources up to 12 miles away. you know why? that really long trunk which is a nose. no wonder they have a great sense of smell. our time is up. david: asman in for neil cavuto. david: i heard the elephant call. i'm david asman in for neil cavuto. monday, april 18th, welcome to the coverage of yes, i hated to even say it, tax day, ladies and gentlemen. as the president says the wealthy are not paying quote, their fair share. wait until you hear how little our own president, talks about fair share,