i think that's appropriate. nobody needs to see my full exposed chest. dagen: todd is a lurker. maria: it was a great party and i saw people bowling too at that party. todd: the best thing is they give you these unlimited cards. maria: there is patrick our executive producer. todd: it's like an arcade so you have unlimited plays on anything you want for four hours it's like your childhood dream. you don't have to beg your mom for a quarter or something. i love bowling it's fun but my invitation got lost in the mail. maria: you were invited i don't understand. you should have come. we appreciate it. dagen? merry christmas. dagen: thank you so much. maria: christmas present for the superstar. dagen: i was fussing about stupid stuff on the break and then i was like merry christmas. maria: have a good day everybody see you tomorrow dagen mcdowell, mark tepper, todd piro, "varney" & company begins right now. stuart: good morning, maria, good morning, everyone. ten days to christmas, christmas

day that is but most of us don't have much cheer for the economy. the vast majority sees the economy as just fair or poor, and, three out of four say inflation has hit them financially, and jay powell says a recession is certainly a possibility. all right this time yesterday, the market was going straight up on the expectation that powell would signal easier times, but he was not to be and the selling continues today. plus, retail sales actually dropped last month, and that is not helping. the dow is looking at a 350 point drop. 50 points down for the s&p, nearly 200 down for the nasdaq. here is the recession indicator, actually it's one of several. the 10-year yield way below the two-year. the 10-year coming in at 3.47 and the two-year at 4.20. gas prices, well that's good news down another $0.02 overnight the average now is 3.19. i've counted 19 states where the average is below $3.10 a gallon. as for diesel, you're looking at

4.83 and that too, down another $0.02 overnight. tesla is down again, after it was revealed that elon musk sold $3.6 billion worth of tesla stock. he may use that money to pay down bank debt that he took on when he bought twitter. there's a development there as well. musk has blocked the twitter account that tracked his private jet. he says people are stalking him. politics. new "wall street journal" poll spells bad news for donald trump in a hypothetical matchup, ron desantis leads him by a wide margin. separately, trump teased a big announcement coming today. america needs a super-hero, he says. new york mayor adams asking for a billion dollars to cover the cost of 17,000 migrants who are now in the city. a billion? for 17,000? if we shelled out that kind of money for the 4 million who have come here since biden took office, we're looking at over 200 billion taxpayer dollars. separately, biden is trying to

stop arizona's shipping containerboarder wall. biden says the containers are trespassing on federal land and must be removed. the latest installment of the harry and meghan saga has dropped. in it, prince harry says william screamed at him for quitting the royal family. and the world cup final is set. france vs. argentina. it's on fox on sunday morning. i'm for argentina, how about you thursday, december 15, 2022 "varney" & company is about to begin. ♪ stuart: all right, let's get going here it's thursday morning, we're going to get started with a new fox poll, look at this 81% of voters think the economy is just fair or poor. professor brian brenberg with us this morning.

look we've got retail sales down in november. the factoring activity down in november. looks like we're headed for recession. brian: prices are still high, debt is going up for families and businesses, and they see more and more of these job los alamitos nounsments coming out. people are feeling it. that number, that poll number is very very bad. if you listen to the president's rhetoric lately, he's talking about things turning around. people are not feeling that. stuart: didn't hurt him in the election though did it? brian: it didn't, but there are a lot of factors going on there including some of the political ones we'll talk about today. stuart: talk to me about retail sales being down. okay, 0.6% in november. that's quite a substantial drop. coming right before christmas? brian: well yeah, that surprised me right before christmas but again, i think if you talk to the average family, they are making tough choices around what they are doing for christmas this year. i mean, i know my wife and i talk about what presents we're getting for the kids and it's like actually she's got a great strategy. you buy them something they can

wear, something they can read, something they want and something that they need and that's how you save a little money on christmas. a lot of people are actually going with the strategy like that this year. what do you think about that? stuart: kids want that? brian: well you get a thing that you want there, but do you buy junk for people? you're not a junk gift giver. stuart: one thing that used to annoy me when i had young children was the pile after pile of presents underneath the tree, bought by relatives. it just got too much and i just don't like it. brian: see? this exactly what i'm talking about. this is the great constricting of the christmas buying this year. stuart: lauren you better get into this. lauren: i can't. the two of you. first of all people probably -- brian: the two of you? lauren: in october because there were better sales going on early so they probably started shopping in october and they are going to shop last minute in december and there are going to be big piles, because we like to spoil our children, even if we cannot afford it. stuart: so you see no significance for the economy over this decline in retail sales last month?

lauren: it is concerning it might bounce back in december or maybe it was just pulled forward in october. i also raised the question where the heck did people shop for these gifts because department store sales were down 3% so there were declines that were concerning. i do think we'll come out in the end. stuart: all right, we'll move on brian: the bull over here. you two, okay. lauren: i just like giving christmas present. brian: i'll remember that. stuart: it's like saying "you people." lauren: you people, i don't want to spend christmas morning with either one of you. stuart: you won't! by the way -- brian: [laughter] stuart: brian, hold on a second. i have to congratulate you. you're going to co-anchor a big new show called "the big money show" going to be here on fox business and it launches januar. you're a spin-off from "varney" & company, don't you? brian: [laughter] lauren: congratulations. brian: thank you so much i'm so excited i get to host with those two wonderful women. they are so smart. i'm going to do my best to keep up but i can't promise anything. stuart: got it we'll see you on

january 23. move on. look at the fed and what they did yesterday. yup, they raised rates 50 basis points. lauren? any sign that they are going to slowdown the rate increases in the future? lauren: step down, can i use that word? 25 point hikes, so this is what they've done this year and now we get to feel the lag effect. i think the message was higher for longer and also maybe higher-than-expected, so the fed sees the tier terminal rate at 5.1% at the end of next year. officials keep moving that up it went from 4.6% to 5.1% and the reason why we had two soft cpi reports in a row but jay powell says i'm not convinced, i'm concerned particularly about services inflation which is labor intensive and that means you have wage inflation at the same time, so the result of this is growth next year, gdp growth of .5%. that's nothing right? unemployment goes up 4.6% next year, according to the fed's forecasts, and you know, i think it's a credibility claim for

powell. they missed inflation. they called it transitory. they doubled down on that and now they want to get ahead of it even if it means sending the economy to a hard landing. stuart: and even as you see retail sales drop in november and manufacturing activity come down in november. lauren: they are going to keep going. stuart: he's going to take a look at that. you don't think it will? lauren: do you think wall street really believes him though? i think that's the debate because look at how the markets moving, okay yes, dow futures are down 350 points in the initial reaction but i'm not so sure wall street believes him stuart: it's time we brought in adam johnson, our market watcher of thursday morning. there's an awful lot of selling today. are you still bullish? >> yes. stuart: explain yourself. lauren: are you ever not? >> yeah, there have been times when i have not been bullish, but i think what's happening now i call it the ghost of covid past, and i think this is important to understand, our mindset. we were so hammered by covid, not only for months but for years. there was always another variant and i think that's haunting the

way we look at the market and the economy now. we're saying oh, are we worried about inflation? we seem to be getting through that as inflation indicators come down and now we're saying oh, my gosh about what recession and then oh, my gosh if recession happens what about earnings so there is this rolling angst that we can't seem to get through. it's about mindset. if you look just today, let's just focus today on the retail sales numbers that we've all been talking about. if you exclude food and energy they were only down two-tenths and by the way spending on entertainment, bars, food, travel, up nine-tenths. people are spending money. they are just spending it differently. we bought all the stuff we needed to buy when we were stuck at home. we don't need anymore. i don't need another pair of shoes. i don't know about you. i don't need another lamp or pot or pan but i'm going to go have some fun. stuart: let me throw this at both of you guys. if you're making $100,000 a year or more, you're not feeling much pain at the moment, but if you are making under $100,000,

you are feeling a lot of pain from inflation. could you divide the economy that way, professor? brian: i would divide it that way by how many people you have in your household as well, if you've got kids, you're trying to cart them around. this is hard because food prices have not come down. every time you go to the grocery store you're saying how can i afford to make the same meal. it's cheaper to eat out now than it is to eat at home, but that's tough for a family of three, four kids. stuart: if you got it you're still spending it, right? >> oh, yeah if you got it you spend it and i think another important message is we can get caught up in what retail sales are this morning. yesterday, united airlines ordered 100 787 dreamliners. that's the largest wide body aircraft order in history so i think we need to think like ceo 's not that they always get it right, but they focus on the long term, and if you look at where we're going, you know, we've been talking about this since covid began, right? it's the wayne gretsky approach to investing in markets.

don't think for where the puck is, play for where the puck is going because where the puck is going is a lot better than where its been. stuart: it's a good one. all right, take a look at tesla. i believe it's down again this morning. this is pre-market of course. lauren: oh, wow. stuart: musk sold off shares. lauren he raised a couple billion dollars didn't he? lauren: another $3.6 billion worth of shares were sold this week so if you're counting this year that's $40 billion. $40 billion so he owns about 13% of tesla shares. he's likely done selling for a little bit because the trading window for the fourth quarter closes tomorrow. look, the share price has been cut in half. investors are furious with him and you see why he's focused on twitter right now, and another elon musk headline. remember the college kid from florida? he tracks where elon musk's private jet is at elonjet? that account was suspended. elon musk says this is why, any account with realtime location info will be suspended, but if

you delay it, if you delay the tracking, that be okay with me. well, the kid calls him a full- on hypocrite but it did get increasingly personal for elon musk. did you know this , last night, a car carrying his son in l.a. was followed by a crazy stalker, he says? thinking it was me. he is mad. it got personal and now he's taking legal action. i'm on team musk on this one. stuart: okay, got it. check futures please, we're about 19 minutes to the opening of the market looking to a down day, 400 loss for the dow at the opening bell. coming up, new documentary details what speaker pelosi told then-president obama after she faced big losses in the 2010 mid-terms. roll that tape. >> it wasn't about that. it was about jobs. the white male thing was just a dominant thing and jobs getting moved. stuart: white males in a mood? we're certainly going to get into that. cases of the flu, rsv, covid

surging. calls for growing for folks to mask up again. you think masks will come back to the free state of florida? i'll ask congressman byron donalds. he's from florida and he's next. ♪ as an independent financial advisor, i stand by these promises: i promise to be a careful steward of the things that matter to you most. i promise to bring you advice that fits your values. i promise our relationship will be one of trust and transparency. as a fiduciary, i promise to put your interests first, always. charles schwab is proud to support the independent financial advisors who are passionately dedicated to helping people achieve their financial goals. visit findyourindependentadvisor.com chevy silverado factory-lifted trucks.

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so i decided to go with golo and it's changed my life. when i first started golo and taking release, my cravings, they went away. and i was so surprised. you feel that your body is working and functioning the way it should be and you feel energized. golo has improved my life in so many ways. i'm able to stand and actually make dinner. i'm able to clean my house. i'm able to do just simple tasks that a lot of people call simple, but when you're extremely heavy they're not so simple. golo is real and when you take release and follow the plan, it works. stuart: a surge in flu, rsv, and covid cases has officials in some cities calling for a return to indoor masking. madison alworth with me. which cities want to mask up? reporter: well, stu, we could be masking up right here, because both new york city and los angeles county are encouraging

people to wear a mask when inside public places, but for some, it's not just a recommendation. the philadelphia public school system is mandating masks for two weeks following winter break. the new york college is doing the same, but businesses in these cities are frustrated to see this slide back. i spoke to patricia rocco. this is a new york city landmark since 1974 and they struggled through the pandemic as a restaurant. their response to a potential mask mandate was firm. >> a mask mandate to be reinstated we would not follow. doing business in new york city is difficult in itself. adding another layer to us and adding another layer to the customer is at this point very ridiculous. reporter: but you know, doctors are also speaking out. many doctors point to mask- wearing and school closures as one of the reasons why rsv cases are now speaking ink across country, and they are warning that the problem could get worse if masks were mandated again. >> these kids were raised in a bubble. they have no immunity to any

common cold. they are getting so sick and sick back to back to back, so what's going to happen? we remask them, they go back in their bubble. reporter: so doctors also warned of the emotional impact of wearing masks especially on young kids. you read faces, social interaction reading lips, that all changes when you wear masks and kids especially, you know, for us, we have those critical years but for kids in school, that's the time when you learn social interaction and just as another layer, another distancing measure if you will. stuart: but in new york city it's just a recommendation? reporter: yes very important. just a recommendation, not mandated. we're good to walk around without masks here. stuart: i'm glad to hear it. congressman byron donalds republican from the great state, the great free state of florida joins me now. congressman, are we going to see masks come back to florida? >> no. [laughter] in florida we don't believe in the little blue deeper across your face. we think people are going to be just fine. stuart: can i just interrupt for a second. are you familiar with the land

and sea or sea-to-land? you know what i'm talking about? the supermarket chain in your district? >> oh, yeah. no, very familiar. stuart: that's the chain where the owner said "you wear a mask, take it off and get out." do you remember that? >> i do remember, very clearly, but i mean, look. florida, we've been through this we're not going back to mask mandates just simply not going to happen. these are the states that think this is going to be helpful. i have not paid attention to the data. they are paying attention to politics frankly which is what got so many cities caught in the disaster that was covid-19 policy and for those business owners in new york, look, they should have voted for lee zeldin , what can i tell you because if you vote for bad politicians who do not care about data and science you'll get bad results, hence people trying to bring back mask mandates in different parts of the country. stuart: we've got a record from redfin, the real estate company, that shows cities in florida take up five of the top 10 places that people want to move to.

it's more than just the weather isn't it, congressman? >> oh, yeah, it's way more than the weather. listen, the way your government operates is critical. the economic environment is critical. enforcing the law is critical. having da's that prosecute crime is critical and more often than not trusting the facts that your governor and your legislature and your representatives aren't going to just decide that they can just takeaway your civil liberties at a moments notice. all of that matters that's why florida continues to be the beacon of hope in the united states of america. stuart: did you mention tax, congressman? >> oh, we don't have an income tax so people love that too. and we're not getting one by the way, so you know, anybody who thinks they want to get frog it in florida trust me we aren't bringing an income tax to our state. stuart: you've forgotten one more, there's no estate tax in florida isn't there? >> no, look for the most part we're a sales tax state, we have some business fees that get charged but that's largely it, and we have a bigger population than new york but we

have half the budget of new york , and our state is doing just fine. stuart: i'm a great salesman for the state of florida. i'm doing pretty good i think. now let's get serious for a second here. dr. fauci attacking governor ron desantis because the governor wants to investigate covid vaccines. watch this , please. roll it. >> i don't have a clue what he's asking for. i mean, we have a vaccine that is highly effective and safe and has saved literally millions of lives, so what's the problem with vaccines? i mean, vaccines are life saving , so quite frankly, kate, i'm not sure what they are trying to do down there. stuart: okay, congressman. what is the governor trying to do? >> oh, i'm not quite sure. i haven't talked to the governor but what i will tell you is on capitol hill we got questions for dr. fauci, so i know you're retired now, but don't go too far because we're probably going to call you in. primarily, what was the public emphasis for a vaccine mandate in the united states military?

was this something that was authorized or promoted by dr. fauci? is he the reason why we've lost anywhere from 20,000 to 40,000 members of our armed forces? simply because they wouldn't take the jab? was this his way of trying to put pressure on the public to go get the vaccine? that's what i would like to know secondarily, with dr. fauci, what were you doing with gain of function research? i know he's jumped and been very clintonian in his responses to senator rand paul but i think us member in the house we have questions too. now third for governor desantis, i think the biggest thing is he wants to understand why all of the pressure from dr. fauci on citizens of florida at the same time, why he's trying to protect citizens and i'm quite sure the governor has a question about the desire to push vaccine s on children, because if you look at the data on covid-19 , children are highly resistant to the virus, so there really is no need to vaccinate

them but dr. fauci just wants to continuously push it. i wonder why. stuart: okay, got it, congressman, thanks very much indeed. merry christmas to you, sir. see you again, sir. >> merry christmas. stuart: yes, sir. check futures quickly. lots of red ink down 370 for the dow, down nearly 200 for the nasdaq. the opening bell is next. ♪ money, money, must be funny in a rich man's world ♪

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stuart: futures showing an awful lot of red ink this morning down 370 on the dow down nearly 200 on the nasdaq and d. r. barton is here. all right, retail sales down in november. manufacturing activity down last month as well. the fed still raising rates. that doesn't sound like it's good for the market. what do you say, d. r.? >> well, stuart, i think that we've got a little bit of scrooge showing up in fed chair powell yesterday and i think you're a bit right. it put a damper on the markets, easy to see in the numbers. we're down yesterday afternoon, down this morning; however, i think adam hit on a really key

point for retail sales earlier. a large chunk of that drop in retail sales was in food and energy and the numbers that were x that we were only down just a little bit and i'm still sanguine, very optimistic, that santa will call and we'll get good numbers at the end of the month for retail sales. stuart: so i'm only a bit right, as you say, and you're talking about being sanguine. we don't use these big words on this program very often, d. r. you want to explain yourself here? >> i like you being more than a bit right, stuart and i think you are, but i think that that pessimism is a very short-term pessimism and i think that the fed is going to hang on a little bit more but that the roll over in inflation increase is good, a good thing. we're not inflating as quickly

as we have before and my grave oops for using a $0.50 word on the show. i know better. stuart: [laughter] should i sell, or wait, wait, important question. should i buy more microsoft now at $250 a share? >> i do like buying more microsoft in particular. the tech sector as a whole, i'm looking, trying to flattish over the next three to six months but there are some big really strong stocks with really strong continued cash flow and growth that i like and microsoft is definitely near the top of that list, stuart. stuart: excellent, excellent. that's a statement i can understand and support. >> [opening bell ringing] stuart: merry christmas to you, ladd. three seconds to go and we open this market. the backdrop is not great, i must say, as we've been saying all morning, retail sales down, manufacturing down, fed still raising rates, jay powell is not done with raising rates and

right from the get-go we are down on wall street. the dow industrials down 350 as we speak. that's just a little over 1%. show me the s&p 500 please what we have there is a loss of 1.1%, a significant loss, 46 points down, and the nasdaq is down nearly 1.5%. i presume that big tech is going to be down. yes, it is, all across-the-board apple is back to 141, microsoft 253, alphabet, amazon is at 89 and meta 117. all down by percentage terms. let's go right to tesla. we know that musk sold off more shares, critics are saying he's using tesla as an atm machine, not good. what do you say, susan? >> wow okay that's interesting terminology so 3.6 billion last night, over the past week, and $40 billion in total being sold in tesla shares and this kind of explains to the market as to why tesla has underperformed the

rest of the market despite the fact that we did have stock markets shoot up and rally after those slower than expected inflation last month, but you know, if you're continuing to sell like this , especially if you need to recheck those margin loans for that $44 billion twitter deal in a rising rate environment, that's going to have some concerns and pressures i think on tesla going forward. two-year lows right now for the stock, demand issues over in china. they are offering incentives here which might indicate some demand issues here as well, so people are thinking i'll tell you this , that tesla investors are begging elon musk to quickly get a twitter ceo in place and please focus on your now half a trillion dollar electric car company. first time its dipped below $500 billion since 2020. i'll tell you whose buying tesla stuart: who? >> cathie wood picked up 11.7 million. that's how she made her name. she called 4,000 for tesla stock in 2026 so she's being brave, first time she's bought tesla stock in just about a months time so she thinks 155, you've

got bargains and discounts. there's a value they say. stuart: all right i believe you have news on the streaming services. what do you got? >> oh, we have lots of news and then you can interject as well because obviously, it's the harry and meghan netflix story. stuart: you want me to interject and harry and meghan? >> endless entertainment and debate so also with warner brothers because wbd is having problems especially after the merger with at&t's discovery this year, so right now, what they are doing is projecting costs for scrapping some of their planned content. it's up to a total of 3.5 billion so they have increased their cost to about $1 billion. okay, so you want to start with harry and meghan and netflix? stuart: it's down 5.5%. why? >> okay so i think most analysts expect netflix to jump to what, i think it's consensus buy, heading into 2023 because you're at the half the levels that you started off this year with. remember netflix with that $700 in january of 2022? but i would say it's probably,

look it's a down market a and we know it's all but interest rates right now and when interest rates go up more of the speculative lower profitability type of stocks get hammered in this type of environment. can we just talk about harry and meghan and content instead of where the stock is going? the warner brothers, costs are going up. also henry cavil is now out as superman in d.c. comics and people are saying why can't warner brothers discovery make d.c. comics as valuable as disney has made marvel? super heros do well at the box office, but they just don't seem to have the right type of movies and content to entice people in. stuart: do you want to talk about the latest drop of harry and meghan? apparently, harry says prince william his older brother screamed at him for leaving and quitting the royal family. >> that's right. stuart: there's no going back for these two. >> i don't think so after this , but do you want to talk about avatar because i wanted to bring up disney. stuart: you might as well. that's serious, what's with

avatar? >> i think we talked enough about harry and meghan so avatar as you know, avatar 1 it was 10 or 12 years ago was the most profitable movie of all-time $2.9 billion this time around they need to make $2 billion in box office receipts just to make their money back to be flat, so just last night, thursday night opening, or wednesday night opening, $150 million. they are projected to be $500 million, pretty good for an opening weekend, but if you need to get to 2 billion just to breakeven, that might be a bit tough but if anybody can do it it's bob iger, disney. stuart: 2 billion? >> including marketing costs and you had to wait 12 years for the sequal. stuart: we have lennar, they are homebuilders way down 3.3% what's the problem? >> yeah, and tell me if this means something for housing as well, since we are in a high rate environment and mortgage rates at the highest in decades as we know. so this is hurting homebuilders, forecasting a slow down in order

s for their new homes because of the higher mortgage rates, and real estate we should point out, accounts for about one-fifth of the u.s. economy and gdp so if there's a slowdown taking place in real estate that has a wider impact ink across u.s.. stuart: and there is a slowdown taking place and that's a fact. all right do you have anything on cryptos this morning, haven't yet mentioned sbf. >> oh, that's surprising. stuart: he's in prison by the way. >> until february 8 where he has an extradition hearing and it's not a nice prison from what i'm told so actually last night, we found out who the whistleblower was which was quite surprising and those un earthed documents released new documents. stuart: who was it? >> one of his top executives of ftx. ftx digital ceo ryan salamay blew the whistle saying there are irregular transfers of funds from the crypto exchange to sbf's personal hedge fund alameda which i found surprising and also, yes, you're going to -- stuart: he went to the authorities, the bahamian authorities? >> bahamian authorities to say something is not right here.

you also had cz of binance this morning trying to sure up confidence. he's saying that he has regulated proof of reserves backed one-to-one for those that have bought bitcoin and ether and other crypto on binance. crypto as you know kind of trades like a nasdaq 100 tech stock these days, so how the rest of the market goes is kind of how crypto goes. stuart: all down. >> coinbase by the way cathie wood bought coinbase last night. stuart: susan thanks a lot. see you shortly. back to the big board we're now down 450 points that is 1.3%. are there any dow stock winners? there's 30 stocks in the dow, any winners? one. verizon is up 2%. the smallest losses are by the rest of them on that list. all right, charles whatever it is? >> river labs. stuart: verizon, cf industries, fidelity. not many big names on that list of s&p 500 winners, not at all, actually. jd.com, t-mobile, those are the

only three winners on the nasdaq? >> china reopening theme. stuart: i guess tesla just turned positive just slightly, dollar tree is down. coming up here is what we have for you. part two, yeah, we got it. the harry and meghan docuseries drops today. oh, i've got a clip for you watch this! >> every single member of the family, senior members of the family have been, including the queen and on the front page of the telegraph, meghan. >> i went oh, my god. stuart: oh, that's just awful isn't it? looks like the series is not helping their approval ratings. we're going to get into that, believe me. the sec just charged eight social media influencers alleging $100 million pump and dump stock scheme. we'll tell you about that too. transportation secretary pete buttigieg under fire while rail unions were on the verge of a strike. where was the transportation secretary? i'll tell you now, he was on vacation, in portugal. more on that coming up.

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stuart: we've been open 12 minutes and we're down 475 points on the dow, that is 1.4%, a bigger percentage loss on the nasdaq, down 1.7%. that's 191 points lower. red ink this morning. president trump's teased a major announcement for today. all right, lauren, any vague clues about what he might have for us? lauren: well you can see for yourself. i watched the teaser and it's like the coming attractions to a hot new movie. watch here. >> america needs a super hero.

lauren: ta-da! so he posted that to truth social, so anchor participation, let's take some guesses what his announcement could be today. could it be he's returning to twitter? yes/no? announcing a vp, runningmate? stuart: yes, it could be. lauren: no. what about running for house speaker? >> i could see that. that's a super hero-type thing. lauren: maybe or stuart? stuart: he could announce he's running as an independent. lauren: uh-huh, okay. the announcement -- stuart: highly unlikely but you never know. lauren: the announapprove of trt mark, in seven years. it's even worse amon w you needu want to win in 2024, just a quarter of independent voters think favorably of the former president. stuart: he's probably not running as an independent, if he got the independent vote. lauren: we have no idea. stuart: all right let's move on. a new poll, another poll, shows among republican primary voters, governor desantis of florida holds a substantial lead over

former president trump. mercedes schlapp is here to bail us all out, aren't you, mercedes lauren: hi, mercedes. >> good morning. stuart: have republicans, it seems to me like republicans are starting to move away from donald trump. what do you say? >> well first of all, i have to say i was trying to guess about what the big announcement was so i kept nodding my head shaking my head yes, no, like maybe that could be it. that could not be it, so this is something that president trump knows how to do which is create suspense so we'll see what the big announcement is. look, i think we have to remember that we are so early on in this process of the presidential primary. i mean ron desantis hasn't even announced and is saying he's looking into that probably later in i would say may or june. i mean there's going to be other candidates that have already talked about jumping into the republican primary including mike pompeo. i mean there's talk about glenn youngkin looking into this race, nikki haley, so this is just the beginning and if there's one thing i've learned in politics

in all my years in this business is that the polls get it wrong all the time. so this is a matter of just see ing where this ends up from now until next year, who knows whose going to be in the lead, and it's a matter of just waiting to see how each of these potential candidates present themselves to the republican base and if they are able to make the convincing argument that they are the winning candidate, who could be? joe biden maybe or kamala harris? or who knows what could happen on the democrat side as well. stuart: here is what i hear, that donald trump will always have the support of about one- third of republicans. 30%, guaranteed, no matter what they will vote for donald trump. >> right. stuart: that's good enough to win a primary or two, but not to win the presidency. any comment? >> well, let me tell you. i think what's going to be interesting with the primary is that if it is a crowded feel, it would benefit a candidate like donald trump. if it's like a desantis against

trump, that be an interesting race to watch, because obviously , that would make it, that gives a chance for desantis to make maybe gain some points there, but look. this is a long process. i want to get to 2023. i want to, you know, have a happy new year but, you know, at this point we're so early in the process and i think the biggest challenge that has happened is that republicans were so hopeful during the mid-term elections that it was going to be the economy, that that was going to take us over the edge here so we can win this senate so republicans can win the senate. we didn't see that happen, so it really has to be about what is the messaging, what is the vision for america and where we are when it comes to election integrity and where we are into making sure that republicans are able to register more voters, bring along independents and make sure they develop a ballot operation and early voting processing in these battleground states. that is actually effective and can win these elections.

stuart: just suppose mr. trump announced he was going to run as an independent. what would you say to that? you've got 20 seconds. >> stuart, i kind of, that was the one where i was like no that's not going to hatch. he's not going to run as an independent. as we know president trump is still the key maker when it comes to one of the leaders when it comes to the republican party , people seek out their endorsements whether they are running for mayor or running for state legislature or federal office so obviously, i think president trump's america first policies are right along the lines of where the republican party is, which is limited government. government getting out of your life, making sure we have economic prosperity, making sure there's education freedom so there's school choice and parent s rights, really basic concepts that just fall in line with the republican party. stuart: you're a wonderful diplomat mercedes and that is a fact. >> i am. stuart: merry christmas. >> i'm the ambassador. stuart: a new documentary about

speaker pelosi's congressional career has been released cover ing her political wins and losses. who did she blame? lauren: oh, gosh okay first of all hbo max documentary made by her daughter and she said democrats lost the house majority in 2010 that was barack obama's first term because of white men who are mad that they don't have jobs. >> i never said they don't regret their healthcare bill across-the-board even if we never had healthcare reform we were still going to lose this election because of 9.5% unemployment because it wasn't about that. it was about jobs. the white male thing is such a dominant thing and when they don't have a job, they get in a mood, so we have to make some decisions about how we go forward. lauren: the tone of her voice. they get mad when they don't

have a job. yeah, they do. stuart: white males. >> white male thing when they don't have a job, they get in a mood. stuart: in a mood. >> but that's totally okay to say. you can say it. you said that about anybody else outrage, but white male mood, no problem. stuart: wicked people. thank you. fentanyl deaths on the rise flooding ink across texas border what's texas doing about it? we have a report on that right after this. research shows people remember commercials with nostalgia. so to help you remember that liberty mutual customizes your home insurance, here's one that'll really take you back. it's customized home insurance from liberty mutual!!! only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪ (vo) the fully electric audi e-tron family is here. with models that fit any lifestyle. and innovative ways to make your e-tron your own.

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stuart: flood ink across the southern border, casey stegall is with me. casey what makes fentanyl so hard to track? >> well, frankly, stuart, because it's everywhere, and it is coming from all points, but it is mainly flowing ink across southern border. dallas has the eighth largest police department here in the whole country, and fentanyl was becoming such a problem here , like in many places ink across country, that dpd created a special investigation division now staffed with two detectives who only deal with fentanyl

poisonings and overdoses. more specifically they work to try and track down and prosecute those responsible for selling the deadly drug. >> wanted for killing someone by dealing them fentanyl is, that's one of the ways that we're going to combat this. >> now the dea tells us its agency is also working closely with the u.s. department of justice, and u.s. attorney's offices ink across country to carry out these similar investigations, and with so much of it readily available on the streets, the problem is becoming a much-larger public health issue to tackle. especially when you consider about 2 milligrams is enough to be a fatal dose. that is an amount so small in quantity you can see enough to kill an adult there fits on the end of a pencil tip. >> the bottom line is it is coming to neighborhoods in the

inner cities just as much as the suburban areas just as much as gated communities as in public housing, and in apartments versus rural farms. >> officials believe making the medication narcan widely available is key to helping lower the nations fatality count but they say it's primarily about education. special agent chavez told me much like the campaign years ago when women and people were advised to watch their drinks while they were out in bars, because of date rape drugs, they say it's a similar education concept here with fentanyl. stuart? stuart: casey, thank you very much indeed. and by the way thank you very much to brian for sticking around for the hour. >> pleasure hanging with you any time. stuart: congratulations on your big show "the big money show" starts on january 23. we'll be watching. >> thank you. stuart: thanks very much. still ahead, bret baier, brian kilmeade, rachel campos-duffy and kentucky congressman james comer. the 10:00 hour of "varney" is next and the dow is down 580.

♪ joy to the world the lorde has come ♪ .. i'm frank siller from the tunnel to towers foundation. i'm here at the patriot awards to honor some very special people. gold star families and families of fallen first responders.

after their loved ones died serving our country, there's a hole in their family. a missing spouse missing father or mother. but many are also left with the struggle of keeping their family home. we can't bring these heroes back, but we can help ease their burdens. here at the patriot awards, we are going to surprise them with a very special gift. we take care of our gold star families and our fallen first responder families. those who die for us and leave young families behind. i'm with 21 of these families tonight. they came as our guests. so, who here things that they deserve a mortgage free home? this morning we paid off their mortgages. they never have to worry about their mortgages again. give them a round of applause. i was not expecting to go out on stage

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