stuart: i'm 7.5 guy. show me please. 5.1. the last devastated an area 230 square miles. workers had to remove 900,000 tons of ash from highways and roads. 57 people died. making it most deadly volcanic eruption in u.s. history. >> good question. good question. >> thanks, man, appreciate it. dave, david asman, in for neil today. david: you can call me dave. we were all 7.5 guys. we were with you. we didn't see that coming. welcome everybody, to "cavuto: coast to coast." i'm david asman in for neil today. the stocks are selling off big time. snap a three-day winning streak. walmart and target crushed on

prices. bellwether stocks what they're forecasting darker days ahead for the economy? we're all over it? plus pennsylvania's gop senate primary locked in a dead-heat. trump-backed dr. oz and david mccormack vying for the same seat. we're live as votes are still being counted. we're following breaking news on the biden administration disinformation board, it is now on pause. that controversial pick to head what some are calling a orwellian truth ministry is stepping down. what we're learning still ahead. first we have full team coverage on america's energy crisis as the administration's war on fossil fuels continues. grady trimble is live in chicago as gas prices hit another record. edward lawrence is live at the white house as the biden administration looks to lift energy sanctions, edward? reporter: david, this slipped in without fanfare.

what this does, it eases restriction on venezuela with maduro still in power. so what this allows them to do, the treasury department is folk to allow chevron and the state department to talk about having a contract with the state-run oil company in venezuela. now a senior administration official tells me this is just a conversation. no action will be taken. when i asked if the u.s. could allow the export of oil with maduro still in power? that official telling me, the u.s. would only act with the blessing of the recognized government venezuela run by juan guaido in talks with maduro. oil north of $110 a barrel. even if the u.s. allows oil exports, we took in 467,000 barrels a day from venezuela back in 2017. the administration looking for a way to make up for loss of russian imported into the u.s. which was 672,000 barrels a day before the ban. so the white house not changing course on energy policies or

signaling support for long-term drilling. senator marco rubio says, this is all just part of the far left agenda coming from within the white house. >> well they can't provide us oil. the oil we need we have. it is in america. they need to allow us to explore it and they're not. they're telling banks not to fund the projects. they're canceling leases. they're waging war on fossil fuels. they're waging war on oil and natural gas. that is one of the reasons why supply is not as high as it needs to be. reporter: instead of negotiating with companies in texas or louisiana, they're talking with venezuela and iran possibly talking about getting back into the iran nuclear deal which woe add more iranian oil to the global market. david. david: edward, thank you very much. as everybody knows these gas prices are killers every time you go to fill up at the pump. happening all over the country, east coast, west coast, smack in the middle. where we find grady trimble in chicago talking to drivers about all of this.

i imagine they don't have many nice things to say what is going on at the pumps? reporter: no, david, they're not very happy, another day, another record. look at this gas station here in chicago. it's up 15 cents since we talked yesterday, up to 5.39. we've been talking to drivers about memorial day plans, summer travel plans. they don't seem to be deterred. they still plan to hit the road. the problem is that could drive up prices even more if there is huge demand for summer travel this year. i want to show you this map. it gives you an idea how high prices are all across the country. every single state now is above $4 a gallon. the national average at 4.56, up four cents overnight, up 16 cents from just last week. six states in the united states out west are above $5 a gallon. california is the only stay right now above $6 a gallon but some analysts are suggesting

that five dollars a gallon for national average is possible even, $6 a gallon for national average could be in our future within the next several months. as we said, david, drivers are not happy. listen. >> be cooler even at 3.50, 4 bucks. we used to think that sucked now it is five. six is coming. >> i'm always driving around. that really hurts us especially when we're trying to live and work at the same time. but it's a battle. reporter: it's a battle. a big part of the problem is refining capacity. a lot of the refineries that are up and running in the united states are making more profitable diesel and jet fuel. and then of the product that they are refining, david, gas buddy estimates that more than a third of it is being exported and not staying in the united states because the oil and gas companies, they can make more off of it in europe where prices are even higher here.

so that is a big problem right now. david: to see our strategic reserves that are supposed to be used inside of the country, go over to your ron even -- europe even though we paid for it here is infuriating. grady, thank you very much. go ahead. reporter: just going to say thats the strategic petroleum reserve now at its lowest level since 1987. the biden administration wants to refill it at least partially but they will probably pay more for it than what they paid to fill it in the first place. big problem. david: $112 a barrel is more than $40 a barrel which is what they filled it up with, it is extraordinary. doesn't make sense. grady, thank you very much. while the biden administration continues to put the brakes on u.s. oil production they are now turning to venezuela's socialist dictatorship for a deal to i am you're a million -- import a million barrels a day, despite the fact venezuela's dirty,

broken state oil company only produces 700,000 bears a day total? that doesn't make any sense. what the heck is going on here? senator rob portman is here. senator, i tried to figure it out. maybe you can help me, maybe you can't, it doesn't make any sense. pedevesa, the terribly run state oil company in venezuela, used to make 2 1/2 million barrels a day. now it makes 700,000 barrels a day. it is so badly-run. it does so in a very dirty fashion, we're going there making a deal for a million barrels a day. they only make 700,000 a day, most of that is used for domestic production. how will we get a million barrels out of that? >> you couldn't make it up, david. here we have an administration that has had a war against fossil fuels, particularly stifling the production of oil and gas production in the united states and yet they seem to be interested in increasing production from countries that

are in the case of venezuela, very aligned with russia right now at a time when we're trying to put sanctions on russia and here we have maduro, one ever russia's great allies, as you said, it is going to be dirtier. by the way russian oil was also dirtier. it never made sense for to us stop u.s. production to bring in russian oil which is produced in a way that is dirtier, but also has to come by ship to the united states which creates more co2. it doesn't make sense. what we should do is produce our own natural resources in this country in the responsible way we can and should be relying on countries like canada. people forget about keystone xl pipeline which was more oil than coming in from russia. that was canceled by the administration after billions of dollars in investments, it has a stifling effect on investment in oil and gas you make that commitment and the rug is pulled out from under you. david: we had the premier of alberta on yesterday. he is desperate. he was in washington to try to find some deal-making ability at

least. there were people i imagine in the senate that were very open to the idea of getting more oil and from canada. it is produced in a cleaner fashion. you don't have to deal with shipping. you have pipelines there. but this administration wants, seems to want to kill any deal either in the united states or even with canada. before i leave venezuela entirely, i just have to ask again though, if we can put up on the screen that 700,000 figure. i think it is 702,000 barrels a day that they come out with. again they used to make about 3 or 4 times as much but it is so badly-run that company, pedevesa is what it is called. this administration either can't do the math or there is something else going on. i don't want to be conspiratorial being sinister about their intentions, but could there be something other than oil involved in this deal? are they just cozying up to the

maduro regime? >> the maduro regime continues to violate peoples human rights. this money would directly support their efforts, with cuban and russian security support in venezuela. it is the reason, david, recall, five or six million venezuelans voted with their feet and left the country. by the way some of whom are coming to the united states. we see bigger and bigger numbers at the southern border from both venezuela and cuba right now. cubans coming in from nicaragua. venezuelans coming up from colombia and central america. why would we be rewarding them. maybe there is something we aren't being told about with negotiations with the maduro regime. everything we see not only do they con to have human rights violations and oy press people but their economy is? shambles the way the government is running the country causing all this hardship and i don't get it either. david: the other thing i don't get, selling all of our

strategic oil reserves to europe. not all of it but a lot of it is going to europe. these reserves were meant for emergencies in the united states. we paid a lot of money for them, taxpayers do. of course the government is making, talk about price gouging, we bought that oil for about $40 a barrel, or at least a lot of it. we're selling it now to the europeans for over $100 a barrel. so the government is doing price gouging here, the biden administration is. why are we selling it overseas? we paid for it. taxpayers paid for it to be used inside of the united states, not in europe? >> "spro" is to be used sparingry in emergency situations like now where we have the highest gas prices at pump we ever had over $4.50. i filled up over the weekend, once again you see that getting to $100. you're like, oh, my gosh how can anybody afford this on fixed income. senior, young person, someone who commutes to work, my gosh, i

don't know how people can afford it on top of higher prices for utilityies, food, clothing everything else. that is what it is supposed to be for to alleviate these kind of emergencies. then you refill it again. then they will have to refill it with very expensive gasoline. david: senator portman, we can't ignore the markets tanking today. a lot has to do what is happening with real bellwether stocks. stocks that really represent the economy like walmart, like target, like lowe's. is that what is weighing most on voters's minds right now? we talk about venezuela, we talk about the war in ukraine, really get down to it it is pocketbook issues which were motivating voters yesterday, no. >> absolutely. this is by far the top issue i hear back home. when you pump gas at the pump you hear from people. inflation on everything, not just gasoline but everything. people are looking at utility

bills, my gosh, what can i do? by far the top issue. you saw big turnouts yesterday as we did in ohio in our primary which was a week ago. we're seeing people interested, particularly on our side of the aisle. we had much bigger turnout on the republican side than on the democratic side, as an example in ohio. people are concerned. they're expressing themselves. i will say with regard to gas prices when the president and the administration blame ukraine we have to realize that the vast majority of these hikes in gasoline, by the way 92% increase of price of gas at the pump since the biden administration took office, the vast majority happened before any invasion of ukraine. part of this inflationary spiral started with so much domestic spending stimulating the economy as democratic, former treasury secretary larry summers warned and many of us warned at the time on top of the supply issues which were somewhat covid related and internationally related but the supply issue was also about energy. david: yeah.

>> if you do more to encourage energy production in this country help on the supply side. that's the issue and i think voters get it. david: i'm way over time, very quickly last question, are we going to have a recession before the election? >> well we had negative growth in the last quarter as you know. if we have another quarter of negative growth that technically is a recession. i don't know. no one does but i would say when you look at the numbers right now, you look what the fed is doing, raising interest rates they have to do to try to calm inflation, the effect that will have on consumer spending. you mentioned stocks being down today consumer oriented, more likely than not we'll have another quarter of economic growth that is negative. david: wow. senator rob portman thanks for being here. we appreciate it. >> thanks, dave. david: what markets gave yesterday they take away today. market watcher kenny polcari is here to break down what is causing this selloff. that's next. ♪.

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♪. david: target getting crushed today along with the rest of the markets. the retailer and lowe's sinking,

way, way down after reporting a miss on earnings. seems like a redo of what happened yesterday with walmart. slatestone wealth chief market strategist kenny polcari joining me now. kenny, great to see you. >> pleasure to be here. david: i think when you look at these companies they represent bellwether for what the economy is doing which means to me we ain't going to have a soft landing. >> no, no. i don't think we'll have a soft landing at all. the question is how deep will it be, how deep will the recession be? a lot of people saying we'll not have one at all, not have one at all -- david: you think it is 100% certain? >> i don't see how they get out of it. i don't see how they create a soft landing at all, when you look at action in some bellwether names. these names are holding up through all of this. now they're getting hammered. david: they are a safety stock. when a safety stock is down 25%, you got to be a little worried. >> these stocks are starting to

get hammered. that will be natural rotation. we see the market push lower, might continue to push lower but i think it portend as coming recession in the second quarter. david: what a lot of people were saying about walmart yesterday, saying about lowe's and target today, inflation is really beginning to have that, that demand destruction effect. a lot of people go in there thinking they will buy something. they see the prices, and walk right out. >> i think that is true. discretionary side what you get in target and lowe's, like outdoor furniture, people see the price. you know what? i don't necessarily need to replace that. but if you go to the staples side of those target, things that you need everyday, that side will hold up. see it in the xlp. consumer staple etf is flat on the year which a huge win while discretionary side is down 26, 27%. when you walk into home depot, maybe i replace the sink in the

bathroom. you look at the price. you know what, maybe i won't. you do start to pull back. david: there are some things that tick me off about this administration's approach towards economics but the worst thing is, oh, corporations, first of all they may be the cause of inflation but more than that they don't worry about inflation because they can pass it on. no. they can't. i mean there is a certain amount to which they can pass on but there reaches a point where the consumer says, i can't afford this. we have reached that point in many of these stores. >> and i think we're going to -- that is the story that is going to play out, right? they will see consumers are getting more and more pricey and more and more concerned where they will spend their dollars. look, if it's a choice do i want the new rug or want to pay my mortgage, rent, food on table, clearly pay your rent and mortgage put food on the table versus -- david: kenny, the forecaster of all this what happened to nasdaq when that began to get killed couple months ago. it has been going down ever

since. the start-up tech companies can't survive at all with higher interest rates. they're not making money right now. now it is going to the safety stocks. so what the heck am i going to do with my money. >> you have to be patient, right? like warren buffett says you want to be greedy when others are fearful. feels like that is where we're getting. don't haphazardly buy everything. you have to remain in megacap, multinational staple names. for me those are the big, johnson & johnson, proctor & gamble, coca-cola. as much as walmart got hurt -- david: i was going to say, want walmart one of those? you're buying walmart? it is down another 5%, down another 7% after yesterday. >> down here you start to buy if you haven't bought it yet. david: are you? >> i'm here with you today. we got off the investment call. it is names we talked about how to start putting money to work. they are names we own. we'll continue to own, buy

strategically on the way down. david: the reason why lowe's, walmart and target are down this much, those reasons are still commit tent. we're not getting rid of inflation anytime soon. >> that's right. david: interest rates are going to go up. you say recession is almost 100% certain right now. >> coming. david: shouldn't you wait until we're in the depths of a recession? >> you can. will you really pick the bottom? you don't know when the bottom comes, when some of these stocks get overdone. walmart i consider a staple name, right? at some point you could try to pick the bottom if you want. try to wait until you get, building a cash position in retirement portfolio that is doing something. you don't have to take your money out put in something. you can afford to be patient. in days like this you should afford to be patient. doesn't mean you don't start lining up names on a sheet you want to put money to work on. david: does politics play any role? we know from what we saw yesterday, we know for a while

that democrats will take a drubbing. that the biden administration will have difficulty spending anymore money based on what is happening with inflation. does that play a part in your decision? >> politics create chaos, short term chaos which creates some opportunity but in the long term it doesn't really price stocks, right? you can't get too caught up what is going on in washington although you should pay close attention to it, it will have an impact but shouldn't make your investment decisions based on what they talk about in d.c. david: kenny polcari, great to see you. we covered a lot in four minutes. thank you very much, kenny. appreciate it. too close to call, candidates locked in a tight race for pennsylvania senate gop primary. we'll take you there live as votes are still being counted. news may break in the next hour. stay with us. ♪

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david: well the senate race for pennsylvania's gop nominee still too close to call. trump-backed mehmet oz holding a razor thin lead over david mccome manage, both of whom surpassed newcomer kathy barnette. bryan llenas is live in new hope, pennsylvania as the votes are still be counted. bryan? reporter: david, look, bottom line we are in bucks county, which was the county that put dr. mehmet oz over the top late last night this is a county just outside of fit philadelphia. dr. oz his margins in this area were better than expected. currently leading former hedge fund ceo dave mccormack, less than 2500 votes statewide. the doctor is winning bucks county by 5000 votes. mccormack vote said they are

confident. mail-in ballots are going their way. thousands remain uncounted. win or lose, though, the oz camp said trump's endorsement was extraordinarily helpful. oz thanked him as both camps expressed confidence they will end up victor. >> president after he continued to endorse me continued to lean into this race in pennsylvania, sir. god bless, you sir, thanks for so much effort into this race. i will make you proud. >> we found it on the ground. we knew it was working. we knew our message to take back this country, we knew our message was resonating with the voters of pennsylvania. reporter: meanwhile conservative commentator kathy barnette, she danced, she prayed, did all but concede her surprise surge as third candidate had undeniable impact stripping boths from both candidates. barn nyet was endorsed by state candidate could you go mastriano

for republican governor. he is anti-establishment pick who believes that the 2020 election was stolen. >> they think they can win this throwing 20, $30 million around but the people of pennsylvania, we're not longer asleep. we do not consent. reporter: if the margin remains half a percentage point or less, an automatic recount will be triggered, candidates will be given a 24 hour notice. recount must start by may 26th. it has to end by june 7th. we're still awaiting results, david, from 31 precincts in allegheny county. there are some 22,000 ballots now need to be hand counted because of misprints in lancaster county. this will take days if not weeks, if this ends up in a recount. david: wow. we knew it would be close but not this razor thin close. it is unbelievable. bryan, thank you very much for exciting race. pennsylvania republican primary still in overtime, democrats overwhelmingly chose far left

candidate lieutenant governor john fetterman for their senate nominee. fetterman celebrated the win from the hospital room foaling a stroke and a medical procedure for his heart just before the election. fox news political analyst giano caldwell joining me for what it means of the direction of the democrat party. thanks for being here. fetterman's story, fetterman's story is incredible itself, the fact he won from his hospital bed and everything but there is a larger thing here, progressive, democrats continue to go for progressives like fetterman as the american public, the overwhelmingly number of independents, everything keeps moving to the middle. so democrats are really isolating themselves here, aren't they? >> yes. democratic socialist he is. i want to right at the top here, there was a lot of conversation around kathy barnette's candidacy, if she would be able to win in a general election.

she couldn't win in the general election many folks said that was a complete and total farce. whoever would have be, won the nomination will be able to trounce john fetterman because he a democratic socialist. it is not a socialist state. that is a state that i think are going largely for republicans, especially after the damage that joe biden has done to the state of pennsylvania and the country. 80% of americans feel that the country is on the wrong track. 33% of americans believe that they approve joe biden's handling of the economy and he has lost african-americans, hispanics, young people to the tune of 20%. 20 points, joe biden has lost. this is going to be a treacherous general election, midterm, for democrats all over. republicans must be ready to govern because it looks more and more like we'll take back the house and the senate, fingers crossed of course. this is a interesting calculation on a democrat side

and a lot of democrats in d.c. did not want john fetterman to actually be the nominee because they knew how much of an uphill battle against a republican in the state of pennsylvania. david: again, it is not just pennsylvania. it is happening all over the countries where these primaries showed us democrats are still addicted to this woke mentality that not only is being rejected by the american public but is causing tremendous inflation, all kinds of problems with energy because of their green policies. >> that's right. david: so i mean it's, it's failing on the face of it and yet democrats still haven't gotten the message. are they going to get a wake-up call in november? >> probably not. the problem is they're ideal list i can. that is what you get with ideal listtic people, they will not govern from a place where american people can respond to. when you look at people like elon musk i never voted for a republican a day in my life, but

i will vote for a republican now. when you think about liberals like bill maher, bashing democratic party every chance he gets, making fun of them, left, right, every turn, who may also vote for a republican who knows, we don't know, but a number of other folks. the woke ideology is destroying their party. they have to figure it out, accept it, try to turn a corner on it or turn a page or they are going end up tarnishing their party forever permanently. -- hispanics and young people. david: i don't want to run out of time because i want to talk about one of the houses of the whole woke movement which is the black lives matter, all of their various foundations, their several different varieties that they have but we have now because of these tax filings we found out that the leaders have used millions of dollars from the movement's funds to pay family members. there was a 73,000-dollar charge

for private jets for cofounder patrice kulles. using mansions for houses. hard to understand that blm will come back from this. >> black lives matter finessed country, especially finessed corporate america taking in $90 million and certainly shelling it out to friends and family and leaving organizations across the country, individual chapters, alone. didn't pass much of that money to those individual chapters. seen people like michael brown's dad speaking out against this. tamir rice's mother, speaking out against blm what they have done. they see it legitimately was a fraud. we understand the issue was legitimate but the organization wasn't. so with that consideration in mind, i think we'll see a turn of events happen fairly quickly when it comes to blm, any

additional support or nations coming from much of anyone. david: four million dollars in consulting payments to its board secretary, cofounder patrisse cullors, founder, spending money like candy because it was coming in like candy too. >> that's right. david: we have to leave it. thanks for being here. >> always great to be with you, david. david: check the market as we head out to a break. it has not improved much. dow jones industrials down 793 points. the nasdaq a huge drop in the nasdaq, down 3 1/2%, 419 points. a lot more to come on what's happening in the markets, what's happening with the economy and what's happening with that disinformation board. that's coming up. stay with us. ♪

david: two of the world's richest people pushing back against biden's proposal to hike the corporate tax and the

inability to change rising inflation numbers. the white house just pushed back on them. fox news correspondent mark meredith has more on the back and forth going on here. mark, what's the latest? reporter: david, never a dull moment around here. good afternoon to you. it is no secret americans are more concerned about the u.s. economy than they were only a few months ago. now the political blame game is underway who bears responsibility. as you mentioned president pointing fingers, here is a tweet last week, quote, you want to bring down inflation? let's make sure the wealthiest corporations pay their fair share. that sparked comments of war of words with amazon founder billionaire jay bezos he accused white house trying to shift the blame. he tweeted out, white house injected more stimulus to overheated inflationary economy. only senator joe manchin saved them from themselves. inflation is a regressive tax hurts the least affluent. misdirection from the

white house. fire coming from tesla, space exxoner, elon musk. he agrees with bezos all the spending coming out of d.c. contributing to the problem. the white house now firing back at both of them. a spokesperson going after bezos telling us, count us as unsurpised a anti-labor billionaire would look for any opportunity to nip at the heels of the most pro-union and pro-worker president in modern history. that is the war of words but americans also telling pollsters that they have some concerns. nbc survey came out over the weekend, 22% of people were concerned about the cost of living, following behind that jobs, economy. issue are with the economy more than any other issue. white house says bringing inflation under a control for top priority from the president. republicans say some of messaging coming from the white house tells a different story. david. david: mark meredith, thank you very much. former trump economic advisor steve moore is here. great to see you, steve. glad these guys woke up.

talk about a woke mindset the fact that inflation is being caused so directly by the administration's actions but you and larry kudlow, who will be on in the next hour by the way you will be happy to know, senator manchin most importantly, because he actually pushed a vote button i think in the right direction against "build back better," have known about this for months. why do you think these guys are finally getting on board? >> well, you know, i'll tell you one thing in a fight between joe biden and people like elon musk and jeff bezos on the economy i will take jeff bezos and elon musk. they actually created jobs. they know how an economy works. david: that's right. >> they know how to meet payroll. not just joe biden, so many people in the white house have no business experience. they don't know how the real world works. it is really true, there is kind of a bubble in the white house. i thought those were cheap shots biden, instead of hey, they have a point here. biden, they just don't want to pay their fair share in taxes

those ad homonym attacks. david: i don't think anybody is buying that. they pushed right back. they can take it. these guys have been in business long enough. jeff bezos wrote back in a tweet, they, referring to the biden administration, did their best to add another 3.5 trillion to federal spending with "build back better." they failed but if they had succeeded inflation would be even higher than it is today. inflation today is at 40-year high. i think what happened to jeff bezos, why he came on late where again you and others have been saying this for months, the real world is finally biting these people. we used to have a old expression, neocons are liberals that have been mugged by reality. reality finally mugged these guys, particularly bezos. you have demand destruction because of inflation. people look at what amazon is offering, see the prices go up and decide not to buy. it's, it must be, we know it is hurting walmart, it is hurting target, it is hurting lowe's, i

think bezos is worried it could really hurt amazon. >> he is certainly feeling it. here is the point about jeff bezos that is interesting. he is not a conservative. he was a biden supporter. he supported a lot of liberal democrats. he is coming on the more liberal side of the political spectrum. for him to say this, as you said he has been mugged by reality here. look, you're seeing a big sell-off again today in the market. this has been a month or two of just, you know, evaporation of wealth. and i'm trying to figure out why that's happening. why all of sudden this sudden, you know, sell-off. this is just a hypothesis. people are looking at what biden is doing. instead of reacting to the reality of this inflation bomb he is basically pointing fingers at others. all of the solutions as "the wall street journal" pointed out the other day, paper that you and i worked for at one point -- they basically said

hey, every proposal he has will make inflation worse. david: absolutely. >> higher government spending, higher taxes, green energy stuff. people are losing confidence there is any plan in the white house to deal with inflation. david: the loss of confidence is being reflected in the financial numbers coming from walmart, coming from target. that is why you see a 25% drop in walmart yesterday. the same thing happened at target and lowe's today. it is really, it is really a dim view of what's to come with this recession. >> david, can i make one other quick point. david: very quickly, 10 second. >> "wall street journal," that is where i saw it, retail sales numbers are up. sure they're up, people have to spend more to buy things. david: that's right. it is money. not good. >> people are not getting more things, same amount of things but have to spend more for it. i'm not sure the higher retail sales number is a real sign that consumers -- david: that number is about money, not about goods and that's why it is so much higher.

steve moore, good to see you, my friend. thank you. >> thank you. david: coming up breaking news on the controversial disinformation board, it could be disbanded. the woman who became the face of the agency may be out. we'll give all the details coming next. ♪. like pulsing, electric shocks, sharp, stabbing pains, or an intense burning sensation. what is this nightmare? it's how some people describe... shingles. a painful, blistering rash that could interrupt your life for weeks. forget social events and weekend getaways. if you've had chickenpox, the virus that causes shingles is already inside of you. if you're 50 years or older ask your doctor or pharmacist about shingles.

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>> welcome back to "cavuto: coast to coast." i'm kelly o'grady. with twitter's board plan to enforce the 44 billion-dollar agreement with elon musk, a legal matter could be brewing that could well rest on how many spam bots make up the platform. all the probability that bots comprised over 5% of users when he made the initial offer. the billionaire calling on sec to investigate the real number of users under the accusation twitter misstated their filings. there is external evidence that may be true. a new report from a software company, that half of president biden's followers are fake or bots because they're no longer active. legal ramification. there subpoena a popular view musk would eat the billion dollar break-up fee if he walks. the has a performance clause to twitter enforcing agreement, suing for damages but the fee would be far steeper than a billion dollars. they would argue the tesla ceo waived his right to due

diligence to close quickly, but if musk is right about the bots he could be protected. >> under sec rule 10-b-5, rule to disclose if the twitter board are not disclosing there is potential fraud. if that were to come up. waiver of due diligence does not waive his rights in relation to what might been misstated publicly. reporter: if musk is able to prove the platform's numbers are wrong, it would give him just cause. the issue with twitter ceo arguing external research musk perform could not accurately represent bots the two could reach impasse. the stock trading 32% below musk's offer. the board are talking a big game but they are in a tough spot and may have to renegotiate. david: a great business story, kelly, appreciate it. meanwhile "the washington post" reporting that dhs's so-called disinformation board is being paused and nina jankowicz, the person tapped to be the leader,

is considering leaving. get reaction from republican attorney general from missouri eric schmidt. this is fascinating stuff. and by the way this "washington post" piece is written in such a fawning way towards the whole idea of what a lot of people called a truth ministry, orwellian truth ministry rather than disinformation. how the biden administration let right-wing attacks derail its disinformation efforts, reads headline of the story. jankowicz is written as some kind of a hero, she has been subject to unrelenting barrage of harrassment and abuse while unchecked misrepresentations of her work continue to go viral. in fact miss jankowicz had been putting out misinformation of her own. that is not right-wing attack. that is a fact. i'm glad to see this thing go or at least pause. are you? >> absolutely, this thing needs to go away forever. this is orwellian, dispopian, it is un-american.

the idea that the government would put together a board with jankowicz at the head of it deciding what is disinformation or misinformation, censoring americans, is something out after third world banana republic, not the united states of america where the very first amendment that is, you know the protection of people to speak their minds is held sacred. it is the beating heart of our constitution. it is unbelievable this was thought of, this was put out there and i think mayorkas in the hearing maybe let the cat out of the bag. a lot of people were not aware of this. you saw tremendous backlash. we have a lawsuit against the government working with big tech, and part of that is this newly established ministry of truth is antithetical to the whole american idea. david: it is on so many front. not only the disinformation agency, if you want to call it that, but you look at these attacks on parents who were speaking their mind at school boards. how ag garland apparently did set groups of people on to

follow these folks a though they were criminals or even worse, terrorists. >> wealthy about that. the government of the united states, the department of justice, weaponized the fbi to go after parents under the patriot act as domestic terrorists, who have the gall to show up to a school board meeting objecting to divisive critical race theory or the forced masking of their kids this is out of some sort of a third world country, not the united states of america. but it is the politicization now of the department of justice, by the biden administration is incredibly divisive. they're willing to turn the arsenal on the american people and it's wrong. david: your pressure, and a lot of folks that had questions about the ministry of truth otherwise it is known had a lot to do with the pause. let's hope it's a pause. missouri ag eric schmidt. thanks for being here. we appreciate it. we have to take a short break. we'll be right

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on what is moving today and what direction it's moving and that's an easy one. lauren: well down, because inflation is up, in a big way. costs go up rates go up you see profits and stocks with it go down and everybody is trying to figure out are we in a recession, when does a recession hit, how bad will it be? let's talk about target because this is a big catalyst for the declines that you're seeing theg their worst day, oh, my goodness , since black monday 1987 scary to just say, the company is losing a quarter of its value today alone, here is why. in the first quarter, its profits were halved. ceo brian cornell says the surge in the price of fuel and freight cost them $1 billion more this year. their customer is also shifting, you know, used to buy things like electronics and appliances. now they are buying groceries and luggage to travel. that's some good news. the historic sell-off is hitting the entire retail sector with very few exceptions. names that operate on thin margins like dollar tree and dollar general look at those

declines 16% for dollar tree. goldman sachs says they are see ing customers tap into their credit and mortgage equity to pay for the rising cost of living. so is the consumer strong enough to prevent a recession or get us out of a recession? jay powell confirmed he's not going to hesitate to about aggressively to raise rates to bring down inflation, and that is being felt in tech huge declines for these popular names as you can see here, higher rates hit their future growth. it's also being seen in the housing market. permits for future homebuilding hit a five-month low in april that means supply stays tight, the 30 year, now at 5.3% look at this translation. we talk about higher costs, the average mortgage payment sits at right side of the screen , a record $2,400. it was $700 less a year ago. david: wow. lauren: that kind of just puts it in perspective for you and

that's spilling over to the rental market too, david, because we're seeing rents hit record levels too. $1,900 a month. david: and by the way all those prices that are down today , you add in walmart, which lost 25%. it's down another 8% today, so that's over 30% down in just two days for walmart. lauren: is it overdone? likely. very likely. they are solid companies but the bottom line is if inflation is unmanageable for them what about the smaller less profitable companies. david: and it ain't getting better, inflation lauren: only getting worse. david: lauren thank you very much well wheat prices surging near record high prices following india's ban on exports madison alworth is on a form in new jersey with how farmers are dealing with all these changes. madison? >> hi, david, yes, so we've seen the price of wheat sky rocket because of that clamp down of international supply. with both ukraine and now india, so we've seen wheat go up in price but part of it, especially

for domestic producers like the one here, part of that increase is because operating costs have shot up. i want to give you a look at this fertilizer that has sky rocketed this past year when you look at that cost, and diesel, more than double and that's needed for all the farm equipment. i want to have you listen to scott, the owner and operator of this farm. >> i was paying $200 a ton for nitrogen, today i'm paying 750 or 845 a ton for that same fertilizer, potash has gone up double, you know,'ferricks us the same, fuel is significant, everybody sees that as that's we're at 2.20 a gallon last year at this time and we're at my last load was 5.95. reporter: you know, another big driver of costs that jumped is the lack of global supply. we're seeing a domino effect from disruptions in ukraine and now the world's second largest producer india is stopping exports to make sure they are

have enough for their population all these are compounding the price per bushel up over 80% the past year while some farmers can cash in and makeup their high production costs with the high prices with sales, it is all about timing the market. klukus has been selling upcoming harvest throughout the year. >> i think it's going to even cost more next year to plant probably. i think we're not seeing end of this anytime soon. we kind of sell-through the season. if i had a crystal ball and knew it was $12 i would have sold at $12 and above. reporter: you know at this point he's sold all of his around 330- acres of wheat that's what the you're looking at behind me, now it'll be harvested in july when it is golden and ready. by that time, you know, other wheaton the market might be even more expensive what this means for us when we go to the grocery store and buy products made from this wheat it'll cost us a lot more. david? david: it is indeed, madison thank you very much.

well kingsview asset management cio scott martin joining me now. scott, you look at all the stock s that are kind of indicators of where the economy is going. that's what walmart is, that's what lowe's is, that's what target is. these were as we were saying in the last hour, these were the safe stocks compared to the nasdaq stocks, the fly-by- nights, and they're down 25%. are you, are we looking square in the face of a recession here? >> yeah, the recession is here, david. i think you're right. and i love what you're talking about with lauren there previous because you're right look at amazon i'd throw that in there as a retail bell weather consumer staple name to some degree for many of us, and i think the recession is here. we had negative gdp growth in q 1 and q 2 is going to be right there with it and that's why the markets david as we parse things out the last couple months why they've been so negatively reactive to so-so data. they started seeing through a lot of the data realizing recession was here or coming so

the good news though is that the sooner we get through this , the sooner we're going to get out of it and i know that's not much consolation for many of us holding stocks today that are down but the sooner we can kind of get through this malaise, the sooner these falls or drops happen, the sooner the markets can recover and go up. it's just hard to get through at times. david: it's a strange recession , and again, so was 2009 so we've had recent history of strange recessions but one thing that's so strange we have such a surplus of jobs, usually recessions and lowering job numbers go hand in hand and in this case, we still have that overhang of 11 million unfilled jobs. are those going to dry up pretty quickly if we're smack in the middle of a recession? >> some will, but it doesn't matter if they do because you've got two jobs for every one person looking for a job so they have room to do that. it's a great call to say it's a strange recession, we should almost write a song with that title and you'll be on vocals of course, because here is the thing. i don't want to sing in front of anybody ever again, but you're

right, david it means that this recession because i believe it's here, will be short and sweet in the sense of we're not going to see that crazy real estate fall out we saw in 2009, the crazy drop we saw in 01, we had terrorist attacks, a big jobs recession back then too so this could be a short and shallow one but the key aspect behind this , the man or woman if you will behind the curtain is treasury secretary janet yellen and fed chairman jerome powell because they are raising interest rates, david, into a recession now pretty precipitous so how does that shake out with respect to negative gdp growth two quarters in a row and we've got what about 200 basis points in hikes coming down the pike from the fed. david: that's not the only thing they are raising. they are also raising the number of regulations we have to deal with particularly in the energy ins and that's causing more inflation. that is to say all of the pressures that are causing inflation are just increasing, the policy pressures, so i don't think we're going to end the inflation thing anytime soon the recession maybe short-lived

because of the economy coming back online after the pandemic but the inflation is going to remain with us, and stubbornly really kind of put a cap on growth, don't you agree? >> i agree to some degree, i guess i could say. i think the inflation picture that was starting to peak out a bit. we're still high. david: i don't think so. >> we're starting to slow the rate of growth. david: look at the wholesale prices, which are precede the retail price increases. we're in double-digits on wholesale prices. >> sure and that's true, david but also a reflection of the fact we have supply chain issues that are starting to get worked out slowly but surely and likely coming as a reflection of slower demand because of the recession that's here, or coming, so that will help hopefully relieve some pressure on prices, but still to that point about wherein population is going forward, how companies are trying to pass along we saw target comment on that as well. it's really impacting that tried and true consumer that's been

holding us up all through say the pandemic. david: yeah, and part of the other craziness of this recession if we're in it already is the fact that you have so few houses, so even though recessions really hurt the housing market and it may hurt this time as well, because we have such a dirth of product, of inventory in housing, that maybe secure, if particularly it's a short-lived recession but it's interesting, you're the second market analyst we've had on who said it's virtually 100% sure we've got a recession coming. so it's not good news, but we're going to have to learn to live with it. good to see you, scott. scott martin, my friend, thank you. well a quick alert as we head out to a break, gas prices hitting new record highs, the national average for a gallon of regular is 4.56 a gallon, we'll have more when we come back. stay with us. ♪

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david: folks i don't want to bum you out but we got to tell you stocks are at the session lows they have recovered a little bit. they were down the dow is down

951 points, it's now down 936 points, but it is tickling that 1,000-point loss on the dow. the nasdaq though is even worse percentage wise. it's down a full 4%, a 4% drop in the nasdaq in one day is big time, so we'll be watching stocks continually throughout the next hour. you don't have to move the channel at all but we do want to talk a little bit about the north carolina primary. it is coming to a very close call with trump gop candidate ted bud winning the senate primary, big upset for congressman madison cawthorn , and fox news correspondent jonathan serrie is live from charlotte, north carolina with the latest. jonathan? reporter: hi, david let's start with the north carolina district 11 congressional race. you have madison cawthorn getting the all -important endorsement of former president donald trump and yet he lost the north

carolina republican primary to state senator chuck edwards who will face democrat jazzmine beach ferrara in november. during a single term in office congressman cawthorn angered many conservatives with a series of political and personal controversies. >> when you get your back pushed up against the wall i found most people in politics, it's not politically ex peaked yet to them they turn their back on you, but no matter what you are facing when donald trump has your back he has your back until the end. >> congressman cawthorn was very polite and offered his support in absolutely anyway. reporter: in north carolina's u.s. senate race, trump endorsed congressman ted budd, defeated former governor pat mcquary in a republican primary. >> governor, i thank you to

your service to our state as governor and for your time as mayor of charlotte. you made charlotte better and you made north carolina better. >> i think my party has got to still reach out to what i call raging conservatives, that care about values and character and accomplishments in order to win the u.s. senate coming up. reporter: going into the november general election, ted budd will face democrat sherry beasley, the former chief justice of the north carolina supreme court who came out on top of an 11-way primary race for her parties nomination and david, with north carolina voter s near evenly split among the political parties, this state-wide race for u.s. senate is expected to be very close in the general election. back to you, david. david: all right, thank you very much, jonathan appreciate it. i just want to mention still no word in pennsylvania and that senate race in pennsylvania and the primary between dr. oz and mccormick they are still absolutely neck-and-neck within

the margin of error. we'll keep you updated on that meanwhile out west, idaho governor brad little held off a challenge from his lt. governor endorsed by former president donald trump. dan springer joining us live from seattle with more on the primaries in the west. dan? reporter: yeah, hey, david. former president trump had a pretty good batting average but he struck out on one race out west as you mentioned. trump's pick for governor of idaho a state he won by 31 points two years ago has lost big in yesterday's gop primary. trump endorsed the far-right lt. governor janice mcge. an last november and he called her true supporter of maga after she called for a 50 state audit of the 2020 presidential election but she had ties to white nationalists and was widely criticized even by republicans when she twice- enacted bans on covid vaccine and mask mandates, while her opponent republican governor brad little was out of the state

well little immediately repealed those executive orders when he returned. little was the first sitting governor to be challenged by his lt. governor in idaho since 193% to 32%. he had a lot of help from republican groups that sprang up after the trump endorsement. >> we are just very happy that the voters looked at a lot of these races and went deep into the candidate's true political leanings and said hey, we want the rule of law, we don't want extremism in the state of idaho. reporter: meantime in oregon it looks like there will be a three -way race between women will square off in the governor 's race in november former speaker of the house and liberal democrat tina kotek defeated tobias read in yesterday's primary. former house republican leader christine drazen appears headed for the victory, and waiting in the wings is betsy johnson, a long-time democratic state senator who was running as an

independent this time. she has a lot of money and could play the spoiler role. david, democrats have held the governor's office in oregon for the last 35 years so it's going to take a lot for republicans to change that, but they may get a break with two democrats really squaring off in a three-way race in november. david: dan springer from seattle dan thank you very much. still ahead the managing editor of the babylon bee on what it would mean if elon musk doesn't close the twitter deal and the bee just had a headline on the demise of the disinformation board. we're going to want to stay here for that. that's coming next. bogey's on your six, limu. they need customized car insurance from liberty mutual so they only pay for what they need. woooooooooooooo... we are not getting you a helicopter. only pay for what you need. ♪liberty, liberty, liberty. liberty.♪ your shipping manager left to “find themself.” leaving you lost. you need to hire.

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david: the dow is down now more than 900 points it's 979 that's pretty close to the low of the session, now 981 it was down 986 again just tickling up or down towards that 1,000 loss

mark. it's down 3% on the dow, nasdaq is down even more percentage wise, it's over 4% down, charlie gasparino joining me now. i think the markets are looking at these numbers the financials coming in from walmart, from target, lowe's, saying if these basic stocks that used to be the safety stocks are getting hit so hard by inflation, demand destruction that's what's going on it's going to happen everywhere. charlie: you know, this is maybe a harsh analogy, but the markets remind me of someone coming off a heroin addiction, and i know people that have. i've had family members. it's a very difficult gut wrench ing process, a lot of people can't come off it, but some people do, and it's gut wrenching and we don't have to go through the gory details. the markets are coming off an addiction to easing money and at certain points, you can't, the markets don't believe that easing money is going to end and that the fed is going to raise rates and there's going to be a

possible recession so you see brief rallies. same thing with heroin addiction they go to methadone, they backtrack, they don't go through with the whole detox, and it's a bumpy ride to getting clean and we're going to have a bumpy ride to getting clean. david: the point is a lot of people were saying that the fed is going to be able to have a soft landing, and that's what powell was saying but the market just doesn't believe it. charlie: well no the markets are going back and forth, up the other day and down today. if the markets were purely rational we would see this everyday for the next six months until inflation is under control but you aren't going to get that. you'll get this and a bounce back. bottom line is the trend is going lower. the trend is, the heroin addict is starting to realize that there's only one way to go, and that's like you've got to go cold turkey, and that's what we have right now. david: the difference though i think about this week is we did see those financial numbers clear evidence that demand destruction because of inflation is kicking in on these basic

companies. charlie: should have known it was coming. david: a lot of the companies didn't know. i think that's one reason jeff bezos is hitting so hard on the president now because he's beginning to see it at amazon. charlie: i think they knew it and when you talk to ceo's they all know it's much worse than the headline numbers. david: one would hope they did know that. charlie: they do. all the financial ceo's know it, they don't go out and criticize biden directly but they do criticize his policies. david: but look at target, 26% down. i mean, how long can that continue? charlie: it's going to continue for a while. david here is the thing. there's only one way to get off, get out of inflation and that's to slow down the economy. david: by the way walmart is down 6.5% but you tack on to that 25% yesterday. charlie: slow down the economy and the economy will slow, markets are starting to reflect that, it'll be up and down because the hair o heroin addict bounces back and forth but the heroin is being removed from the patient and that's easy

money and it might be five rate increases. david: as everybody has been in the business, larry kudlow, the other people who actually had policies that dealt with this , in order to kill inflation you have to have interest rates above inflation. that means interest rates at about 10%. we're nowhere near that right now. charlie: or at least get it up to 5%. david: it has to be above inflation. charlie: or , inflation comes down. that's what you're hoping for and then let's go to twitter , because -- david: lot of news on twitter. charlie: i'm going to listen to that i love -- david: whats happening with twitter? charlie: well here is the interesting thing. musk obviously is negotiating for a lower price. i guarantee if he offered them 35 they probably would have to take it because this is such a crap business when it really comes down to it. you can't sugar coat it. it is a horrible business. there's no cash flow here. doesn't make a lot of money. they pay their executives a lot and they don't make any money and on top of that you have bots

and all this other stuff. bottom line is he has them in the driver seat, however he did sign a merger agreement. they could theoretically, now i don't think it's going to go there and legal experts i talk to don't think it'll go there and we talk to john coffee whose one of the best corporate lawyer s and he's at columbia, want to give a plug to the school, they can file an in junction, saying he's violated their contract with him by not going through with this thing, and a court can order him to go through with it and if he violates that court order, he can go to jail. that is not a theoretical possibility. now, that is not -- he told us this. he told elle tarrot, my producer and the likelihood, this takes time to throw him in jail, the likelihood is they re negotiate a price and it's significantly below 54.80. i still think if he paid 35, he's going to get away with it because whose going to buy this

thing? nobody. the only potential buyer is a crazy rich guy. you know that, right? david: right. charlie: and there's not a lot of crazy billionaires. david: particularly putting something that's not making money. charlie: disney can't buy it they passed, salesforce passed, tech is out, private equity probably doesn't want it because it doesn't draw cash flow. the only person is crazy elon. he's it, and he could, if he says 35, they may have to go for it, but in the meantime, if they want to throw him in jail, there's a path to throwing him in jail. david: never has the phrase crazy like a fox been more appropriate here because yes he may say some things but the bottom line is he's a great negotiator and that's part of what's happening. charlie: and somehow we always slithers out of it, remember 4/ 20 deal confirmed? it was obviously bs, and he got out of it. david: he's a good negotiator, charlie gasparino, great to see

you we'll hit the babylon bee, realtime hbo host bill maher bashing twitter's ironic censorship of it last month. listen. >> they got flagged for , they posted a funny video. this is funny to them. okay, sensitive content, twitter said. in the video they were making fun of twitter for being too sensitive. this is so through the looking glass. david: it is extraordinary that people don't get it. well musk has said his acquisition of the platform would allow him to get rid of the censorship and spam bots, but has since changed his tune saying there maybe too many automated accounts for the deal to move forward. babylon bee managing editor joel berry joins me now. i love how you guys are so up-to-date that even the disinformation board, the news about the disinformation board, you've managed to get in on that i want to put up on the screen for our viewers, you say touching disinformation board realizes

the true disinformation was inside them all along. i mean, and that's not too far from the truth. you're not far from reality when you're doing these parities. >> no, and you know the only thing i'm sad about with the disinformation board being put on hold is the fact that we're not going to get to make fun of it any more. they were giving us so much material so it is kind of sad to see them go, but we had to get one last shot. a parting shot off there as they left. david: well by the way you still have plenty of material out there, and here is some from the recent headlines that you've parity. i love this one of the kid, the starving kid. i don't know if we just have the headline or the picture, there you go the picture and here is the headline. starving american babies disguised as ukrainian soldiers in hopes of getting $40 billion in federal aid. i love that one, did you get any feedback on that one? >> [laughter] yeah, we got a little bit. you know, there's even disagreement even within the kind of conservative circles

about foreign aid and whether or not we should be supporting kind of the war effort in ukraine, but you can't argue with a funny joke. i think that no matter where you stand on that -- david: well they tried to argue with a funny joke and the people in this disinformation board were trying very hard to argue with funny jokes. here is another one on the baby formula story. white house blames formula shortage on that giant baby from honey i blew up the kid. i love that one, and then one more, before i come back to you. the story about the crack pipes being inside some of these safe smoking kits you say biden announces he has hidden five golden crack pipes in safe smoking kits. now, the extraordinary thing when you see these headlines and i think they are hysterical, but is that some people took them seriously and that's what led to twitter kicking off its platform , right? >> yeah, yeah, and to this date we're still in twitter jail. we haven't been able to post for

well over a month and so elon musk is kind of our final hope with this whole thing. i think that the previous guest you were talking to talking about how elon is kind of the only guy who be crazy enough to buy twitter. we've seen what's come out through project veritas, how they are so ideologically driven they aren't driven by money, they aren't making money. only someone who is ideologically driven himself, like elon musk, who has said that for him, finances aren't an issue. he wants a platform for discourse that is maximally trusted. he thinks that's important to the future of mankind, and so he seems to be kind of the only one who be crazy enough to buy a platform that is not making money and we're holding out hope that that sale does go through. david: so joel, what happens to the bee if musk walks away from the deal? >> [laughter] oh, i don't know. yeah, well we're still posting to facebook, we're still posting

to all of the social networks but you know, strangely enough a lot of our readers have kind of decided to go around social media. a lot of our traffic is organic now, people are just finding our site directly and i think that's great. why wait for social media big tech to tell you what you should be looking at when you can just come directly to our site. i think that's fantastic but you know, even if the deal with elon doesn't go through, i think its been good to just see this whole thing play out. if only for the amount of exposure he's brought to the corruption and just the lack of transparencies that exists within big tech so even if a deal doesn't go through it's a net positive. david: by the way i think a lot of the exposure, because of how ridiculous it was to ban you from twitter, that exposure has led to the pushback. that's one reason why the disinformation board or the

truth commission is or orwellian idea is it looks like it's failing is because of the fact that the absurd it of what happened to you got wider exposure from bill maher and others. >> yeah, well i can not over state the importance of satire and just ridicule in our day and age. when the government is over stepping, when powerful people are engaged in corruption , just making fun of them can be a very powerful tool in our arsenal, and i don't know if that's why the disinformation board is being shuttered just because they were being made fun of too much but i like to think it was at least a part of it. david: well a disinformation ped eler, like the woman that was appointed to head the commission because she was ped eling disinformation suggesting that biden laptop was from russia which wasn't true. heading up a disinformation

agency, i mean, it's only you that could manage to find a parity for that and you did, thank god. joel we've got to leave it there joel berry, a modern day jonathan swift. good to see you and best of luck to the babylon bee. >> thank you so much. david: thank you, joel. straight ahead larry kudlow on americans feeling the pressures of soaring inflation, and the white house defense of it all, next. ♪ ♪ ♪ wow, we're crunching tons of polygons here! what's going on? where's regina? hi, i'm ladonna. i invest in invesco qqq, a fund that gives me access to the nasdaq-100 innovations, like real time cgi.

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♪ ♪ we all need a rock we can rely on. 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? >> how does raising taxes on corporations lower the cost of gas, the cost of used car, the cost of food, for everyday americans? >> so look, i think we encourage those who have done very well, right, especially those who care about climate

change, to support a fair tax code that doesn't change, that doesn't charge manufactures workers, cops, builders, a higher percentage of their earnings, that the most fortunate people in our nation and not let that stand in the way of reducing energy costs and fighting this existential problem. david: white house press secretary kareen jon pierre pressed on how raising taxes in corporations will help lower prices. it's a good question. this after jeff bezos slammed the biden administration for miss direction on the issue. kudlow host larry kudlow joining me now. what a pleasure. larry: thank you, david. david: i don't want to pick on a newcomer and she's a newcomer. she was having to read the thing larry: it's not her fault. david: she was getting confused by her talking points for a reason. larry: it's the president who put erin her in it's not her fault. we could talk about her

qualifications some other time, but it's just the dumbest thing imaginable. here is how dumb it is. jeff bezos, who owns the washington post, the washington post now has become a biden critic, bezos is tweeting almost on a daily basis attacking it. i've gotta love that. david: i do, but on the other hand, let me -- larry: the woke ceo's are turning. david: the reason what gets me is you've been saying to kill the bill from the beginning. he's now saying i'm glad we killed the bill. well he didn't give you much credit when you were killing the bill with joe manchin but the point is, right now, i think it's hitting in his pocketbook. the guy runs a company that's based on retail sales. retail sales as we see from walmart today, from target today , from lowe's today, retail sales are going down because of inflation. people walk into stores and they can't afford to buy things, so they walk out and that's hurting the bottom line in these companies. i think that's why bezos is going after this. larry: well that's possible. i don't know.

david: there's nothing wrong with self-interest. larry: no, i like self- interest. i just think that what's happened here is biden' performance and his policies and importantly, his polls dropping into the mid-30s now, so you've got a lot of ceo's. i don't want to say jeff bezos is a woke ceo but hi certainly was not a conservative, just leave it at that. he is a businessman, who sees how ridiculous this is, and so he feels compelled to say something, and then the white house attacked him for being a rich guy, so that infuriated him some more, so you're seeing a whole thing. look there's more here, the roe vs. wade episode, the leak and so forth, all these so-called woke ceo's are staying away from it. see they realize there's no percentage in it, it only gets them into trouble and they don't feel like defending joe biden because joe biden is a loser, so that's what i think jeff bezos is doing also. i don't know how amazon's earnings are. i don't follow it very closely.

retailers have been getting smashed now. almost the whole year, they're down 25% to 30% and you're right you've got real wages are falling, and costs are rising, we're at the producer price index is rising faster than the cpi but it just interests me in general that you've got people like bezos who are smart people, right, the guys a genius in his own way i give him credit , amazon so forth. david: of course he is. larry: it's like they've had enough. i can't take it any more and all these crazy allegations coming from joe biden, i have to weigh in and say something, and i really like that and that is a testimony to the strength of america and that's why the cavalry is coming. david: it couldn't come a moment too soon because look at what's happening with the stocks , the dow is now down over 1,000 points. again, the reality, it's one thing to be against policies that don't seem to be working. it's another thing when you see your bottom line drop as walmart did yesterday, 25% loss yesterday for walmart, about an 8% loss, over 30% in

the stock as a result of the bad numbers that they are getting. they just aren't getting the customers because of inflation. that's really what's going to force a change. larry: i don't want to sound quite so pessimistic. earnings have held up in some sectors, not all sectors. i think the problem generically in the stock market, david, is high inflation and rising interest rates, and fed tightening is a nasty witch's brew for stocks. i don't think it's going to last forever but i don't think the stock market has bottomed yet either. let's give jay powell credit yesterday in his wall street journal interview or whatever that was, conference call, he sounded the alarm bells. he's saying we will get inflation down, we will get inflation down. now exactly what that means, no one knows. they are always behind the curve , but it sounded grim. it sounded like he was really going to, it sounded like he was

going to come out of a phone booth and take his shirt off and it's paul volcker and that also affected the stock market which maybe looking at tighter-than- expected money. okay, i think that -- david: but the problem is you have even if there's the calvary comes for november elections and the house and the senate go to republicans, you'll still have an executive that can make regulations like we saw last week, more green regulations that affected production in a negative way, of energy in this country. we just talked about it with who did we have on, ohio senator rob portman, a good friend of yours, we want to play a little bit from that sound. do we have that sound? take a listen. >> and we're going there making a deal for a million barrels a day. they only make 700,000 a day, and most of that is used for domestic consumption. how are we going to get a million barrels out of that? >> you couldn't make it up, david. here we have an administration

that has had a war against fossil fuels and particularly stifeling the production of oil & gas production in the united states and yet they seem to be interested in increasing production from countries that are in the case of venezuela very aligned with russia right now at a time when we're trying to put sanctions on russia. david: so you have an administration that's going to venezuela which only produces 700,000 barrels a day and the deal is for u.s. getting a million barrels per day, that they aren't going to get from a terrible oil company that can't fit their, can't even get 800,000-barrels a day. i mean, they are doing, this administration can still make mistakes no matter what happens in november. larry: well you know you're right but they aren't immune to public opinion or political opinion. they seem to be so far. i think this venezuelan story is particularly disturbing and oil is only part of it. for one thing it'll take them, i don't know, eight months to a year to crank up their oil

production. it's a socialist communist country. it's a country that's essentially run by the cuban secret service and has been for many years. we were very close to this discussion in the white house during my time with respect to closing down the country and trying to get colombia to help out, but that's a separate subject. it speaks volumes that they would want to flirt with a communist country like that, and i don't know what blinken and the state department, what they could possibly have in mind. in other words, david, this is not about oil. david: that's right. larry: this is about foreign policy in the western hemisphere and the spread of socialist communist influence at a time ironically when a bunch of brave ukrainians have the russians on the run, and actually, the biden s have, they started late but they're actually picking their game up there and they have been quite helpful so i don't know why we would give venezuela the time of day to be

perfectly honest with you and you know something about this , because you've been down there. we've all been down there but here is the other point. they're flirting with havana again now, and again, sometimes in the long run that might make sense, but not now. not now, and the bidens are operating from such a position of weakness in general that they cannot afford whether it's iran or cuba or venezuela, they cannot afford to be viewed as weak and compromising. you know whose heavily into venezuela and the rest of latin america? there's one other country. david: quickly. larry: china, heavily in there david: i wanted to talk to you about the demise of the truth ministry but unfortunately, we have to wait for another time. larry: oh, no truth ministry. david: so sad, poor larry kudlow send him your condolences we'll be right back. stay with us.

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hill with the very latest, hillary? reporter: hi, david. well congress is scrambling to figure out how to fix the baby formula shortage after the new york times reports that two babies have been hospitalized because their mothers could not find the formula to feed them. the house is expected today to vote on a $28 million funding package for the fda that democrats say will help ramp up supply and boost staff. they will also vote on another proposal to make changes to a nutrition program for those in need, and allow people to use those vouchers for formula on whatever brand is on the shelf, but there's a bipartisan push to get to the bottom of how this happened in the first place the white house says they've been tracking this issue since february so i asked speaker nancy pelosi why congress didn't act months ago. if the 28 million in emergency funding and the changes to wic have happened months ago, could congress have helped prevent the catastrophic shortage that we're seeing today >> well when it comes to babies

, it's the here and now and then this moment. i think that when all of this is done, i think there might be a need for indictment. reporter: so criminal charges are on the table but for who? that's what some republicans want to know. >> is she going to go after her own party's fda? is she going to look to the white house for all the miss direction and lies that they have produced? this fda has acted in shameful manner and they need to be held accountable. i look forward to speaker pelosi doing just that. reporter: and david, just this afternoon the senate finance committee chair senator ron widen announced he's launch ing an investigation into the maker of this baby formula, the company abbott, into their company profits and also their taxes. the senator is saying this in a statement. as abbott spent billions buying back its own stock it appears that it failed to make necessary repairs to fix a critical manufacturing plant of infant formula located in michigan, so david, it seems like democrats

are returning to a familiar topic, corporate greed. david? david: when in doubt, use that topic, hillary vaughn, thank you very much appreciate it. well meanwhile, new york and other blue states are edging towards even more covid control measures now that a new wave of cases are climbing but are those officials completely discounting natural immunity? let's ask johns hopkins professor of public health dr. marty makary. great to see you again, doctor. we still are acting as though vaccines are fool proof that is if you have a vaccine you'll never get the virus, and infections are as bad as they were two years ago. i mean, the mindset hasn't seemed to caught up with the science, has it? oops. it looks like we just lost dr. marty makary. do we have him? oh, there he is. if you can hear us, yeah, there you are. you're back. >> yeah so look immunity is

playing a big role and what we're doing is basically ignoring the protective effective immunity. covid and somebody with immunity is entirely different and the cdc reported that 670% of the adults had the infection by december much higher now given the new omicron variant and 75% of kids under 17. it behaves entirely differently. that's why you look at the numbers of deaths and hospitalizations remember about half are incidental, these numbers are not concerning, yet at the same time, schools are canceling graduation isn't allowed to have his parents at school play, canceling picnics. this is the sort of overreaction frustrating a lot of people right now. it is creating a mental health crisis which we're trying to mop up but at the same time the spigot is still on. a lot of people had it don't know they had it. i heard figures like 75, 80% of

the american public actually had, has some kind of natural immunity. are those figures right? >> that's right. if the number was 60% back in november. we've had a lot of omicron circulating with low-grade common cold illnesses since then. 85%, 90, has a some form of natural immunity or 85% has anti-bodies or natural immunity. david: doesn't natural immunity work better than the vaccine does in terms of warding off the illness. >> it does and the reason you're not hearing that is because the newer variants are behaving like different viruses. of course there will be a slight escape of prior immunity, either with vaccine or natural. natural immunity is solid but the viruses are escaping it a little bit likelihood you test positive but the protection against hospitalization is still solid. that is what we're seeing on the ground. david: so bringing back old covid restrictions makes no sense scientifically? >> right.

we need to rehire those who were fired and had natural immunity, chose not to get vaccinated. turns out they had a better form of immunity. david: dr. makary. thanks for being here. >> thank you, david. david: i wish i had better news, it is bitter news about the dow jones industrials. has talk down 4 1/2%. it's a very tough day for the markets. the man to bring you through had past success but you have your work cut out for you, charles. charles: i was going to say is there a doctor in the house. we might need more than a doctor. thank you, david. david: thank you, charles. charles: so much for corporate profiteering. target unable to pass on massive cost increases watch shares plunge and as you can see the bringing the entire market along for the ride. this should be a wake-up call for economic policy and leadership. stocks are in full retreat. where is the bottom? what do you