to talk about it in the surveillance state that we're in right now. >>st the tool cool, but it's creepy. [laughter] when you start to think about the behavior change that would have the result of the ring will be camera, i remember years ago when caller id came out, it changed the way we dealt with relationships. it's changing the way we view the world, it's changing the way we view our relationships. we can see who's coming and going all the time. maria: well -- >> great for teenagers. i would not want to be a teenager trying to the sneak kids in your house anymore. maria: it's a good reminder that everything's on tape, joe. >> you always want good data as an economist, but this is too much, for me. [laughter] maria: i'm with you. james freeman, lee carter, joe lavorgna, thank you so much for being here. have a great day, everybody, we'll see you tomorrow. ashley webster in for stuart this morning, take it away. ashley: good morning, maria, and good morning, everyone.

i'm ashley webster in today for stuart varney. elon musk is looking to the appoint a new ceo of twitter by 20 the 23, so get your resumé ready. and you know what? tesla shareholders have on the happy with that news. and we're also learning musk donates nearly $2 million worth of tesla stock to charity last year. and the white house says tesla has agreed to the make at least 7,500 of its publicly-accessible chargers in the u.s. available for use by any compatible ev by the end of 2024. that's all of tesla we know of so far. meantime the, the people in the town of east palestine, ohio, where the train the filled with chemicals derailed, they're filling sick, getting rashes, saddled with migraines while animals are dropping dead. yet we're being told and they're being toldst the safe to return home. we're going to the talk about that with a doctor and ask him whether we're facing real risks in pal student the, ohio. --

palestine, ohio. the president naming new economic advisers, former federal reserve vice chair lael brainard is being tapped to lead the national economic council, the president nominating jared bernstein to the to be chair of council of economic ad visors. to the markets now, retail sales coming in stronger than expected. a remarkable number. we'll be talking about the it. the futures lower, is good news bad news? we'll get into that as well, the dow off 135 points in the premarket. and guess what? it's the middle of winter, but you wouldn't know it. it's going on in the mid 60s in new york city. dare i say shorts weather? i co. "varney & company" is about to begin. ♪ ♪ ♪ something to believe in 'cuz i

don't believe in you anymore ♪ ashley: a little bit of maroon five for you on this wednesday morning as we look towards central park in midtown the manhattan. good morning, everyone. straight to this story, president biden is facing growing call for answers on the recent string of flying objects that were shot down. the white house is dodging questions about when the president will ever give an update to the american people. watch this. >> the president's taking this very seriously, and he's receiving briefings regularly from his national security advisers, and he's going to continue to do that. we are sharing as much information as we can, as possible, but we do want to make sure that the americans, american people understand that there's no need to panic. finish but i just don't have anything to preview as to if the president's going to be speaking on this in the upcoming days. ashley: certainly count sound like it, does it?

todd piro here this morning. good good morning to you, od. senators commanding to have the president address the nation after they received a briefing yesterday. >> good morning to you as well. what kjp just said from the podium is yet another mistruth from her, because when you look at what the senators themselves are saying,st it's not just republican senators. st the republican and chem do contact -- democratic senators. and when they attendedded that briefing, there was a general sense of, hey, everything that we learned in this briefing we kind of learned in the papers, we knew already. you didn't tell us anything that was that ground breaking, and you didn't tell us anything that can't be shared with the american people. and because the president is really the only one who can call a press conference, get all the major networks to show up and basically tell the american people, hey, nothing to worry about, our national security is all bored board -- onboard, we're 900 good -- 100% good, he's the one that needs to do

that. it makes no sense, ash. if. ashley: you're absolutely right, todd. i want to talk about 2024. nikki haley officially dethe claireed her candidacy, and apparently -- declared her candidacy, and apparently the ladies on "the view," particularly whoopi gold berg, lost their minds. watch this. >> so nikki, you know, since you have been asleep all this time and you just woke up -- [laughter] you're just finding out that there are things about our country that are not perfect. and for us to pretend thats and that the nothing happened is ridiculous. you used to the actually have some sanity and knew right from wrong. >> yes. >> and then you lost your mind and went in some new direction. ms. [applause] ashley: you know, todd the, why all the anger and vitriol? >> i don't know. i mean, i watched this clip multiple times. we did it on my show, "fox &

friends" first. i'm trying to get to the bottom of it, and there's three potential reasons. one, it's because the republican minority woman concept really is not what the far left wants because that just sort of destroys all their narratives. that's actually two, woman and minority. another potential is she is worried that by going into the pool she potentially would, you know, do away with your ron desantiss of the world andty the lute the voting pool, but i don't want to give whoopi that much credit. i don't think she's that bright and looks that far ahead playing the checkers game that you need to in electoral poll politics. 9 i think what he's trying to say is that america's not that good, and has it is a notion that you hear from the left over and over again. ashley: right. >> if you don't like it, leave. ashley: yeah. look, we never look to "the view" for keen insight, they just give us a lot of fodder,

which we love. mickey haley is not just criticized by the left, former national security adviser john bolton, surprisingly, is also attacking her. >> he's trying to make himself relevant or keep relevant. he says nikki haley's 2024 the presidential rain is aimed at locking down down the vice presidency. >> i think she's really running for vice president, that's my sense. i think she has a problem because she first said she won't run if president trump ran, and her justification for changing was that a lot of things have changed, which i don't think is very convincing. >> bolton teased he is considering jumping into the 2024 the pray if a strong -- fray. obviously, that's the reason he's saying this, ash. i do agree with his underlying notion that this could be a vice presidency audition, so he's not wrong there. but, obviously, he's saying it because he has designs on getting himself in. let the knives come out, we're going to start punch.

-- punching away. that's our lives for the next two years. ashley: it gives us a job. by the way, staying in washington, senator dianne feinstein has been in her position, we know this, for over 30 years. the question is, is that finally coming to an end? >> best story of the day on so many levels. her office announcing she will not run for re-election in 2024 but, ash, it seems like the senator herself, feinstein, didn't know that. she was the last to know. listen to what happened when a reporter asked her about her retirement to the.. -- retirement. >> you announced you're retiring. >> no, i'm not announcing anything. >> no? >> i will one day. >> you will? thank you, ma'am. thank you, ma'am. >> uh-oh. a staffer quickly correcting the 89-year-old senator saying, quote, we put out your statement. confused, feinstein said, you put out the statement? i should have known they put out the statement. i agree with you, senator pine stein. -- feinstein.

you probably should have known that. setting up a contentious senate primary in the golden state, a handful of congress members already throwing their hats in the race including congressman adam schiff, congressman ro khanna, congresswoman barb are lee and congresswoman katie porter. do those four people know they are in the race for senator? [laughter] if not, we'll let 'em now. -- know. ashley: how embarrassing. oh, my goodness. you don't announce your retirement, but your staff does. great stuff, thank you. we have the latest read on retail sales, by the way. they jumped 3% from a month ago in january, that came in much hotter than expected. we only expected to see an increase of 1.8% for the month. the data very nixed. we -- mixed. we thought the consumer were hurting because of high inflation, but retail sales for january go through the roof. we take a look at the futures and retailers, walmart up, everyone else down. you know who can make sense of all of this? shah gilani is here. shah, let me very quickly,

before we get to elon musk and tesla, just on the retail sales, i thought inflation was hurting house hold income, and yet retail sales after a weak holiday season bounced back. explain it. >> i think's the most surprising metric in a while. we knew inflation was probably a little bit worse than it was based on the numbers yesterday, but 3% in retail sales is a phenomenal figure. speaks to the strength of the consumer. whether or not they pay in cash or they're adding to their credit card remains to be seen. i've got a feeling it's the latter, but certainly a statement about how strong the economy remains. ashley: yeah, it's resilient, that's for sure. now we can get to elon musk and tesla. he says he's sticking around as twitter's ceo for the time being, but he hopes to have a successor in mace by telephone end of the year -- place by the end of the year. i feel like by the end of the year, i would imagine tesla investors want this done as quickly as possible. >> they'd rather see it sooner than later, but i think's the statement he put out yesterday.

the end of the year could come sooner, but i have a feeling it's not because he's said essentially he wants to get twitter's house in order, and who knows how long that's going to take. but the other good news was that they were going to allow their charging stations to be used by other vehicles which would be a positive and could set the stage for some kind of national network headed up by tesla. again, strong positive for the company. and in addition to that, there was one more piece yesterday, ashley. george soros, the billionaire investor, bought another almost 250,000 shares of tesla, so all three bits of news yesterday helped the stock move up nicely. ashley: certainly did. as we look ahead, shah, i'd like to get your insight on this. any recession fears? i mean, what is the fed thinking after -- they obviously look at all the data. i'm not sure what they're thinking today, but do we need a recession to just tame inflation and bring down the hotness, if you like, of the american consumer? >> that is the question, ashley,

that i think every investor, every trader is asking themselves, will the fed continue to the raise rates given the fact that financial conditions are softening and that the economy continues to roll along and, in fact, pick up some steam in some quarters. so that is the question of then, well, we will likely see inflation stubbornly higher than expected which means the fed will have to probably continue to the raise rates. ashley: right. >> keep them elevated maybe into 2024. that is where a recession meets investors' fears. somewhere down there is where we're likely to see a recession. ashley: all right. shah gilani, as always, great insight. thank you for joining us. coming up, let's get into this: residents in east palestine, ohio, living in fear after a massive train derailment release hazardous chem -- chemicals into their town. listen to this. >> how am i supposed to feel safe bathing my children? >> constant the smell of burning

plastics and chemicals in the air, issues with our dog. it's scary stuff here. ashley: very scary. former transportation secretary elaine chao will be here. i'm going to ask her how she would have handled this situation. meantime, senators were left with more questions than answers after a classified briefing on the unidentified flying objects that were shot down. senator marsha blackburn of tennessee says the chinese spy flight was a test, and president biden failed. senator blurbing black burn is here -- senator blackburn is here next. ♪ i've been a bad, bad boy. ♪ no use saying sorry, it's something that i enjoy ♪ ♪ ♪

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ashley: the senate received a briefing on those flying objects that were shot down last weekend and, todd, it sounds is like senators left the hearing scratching their heads rather than with solid answers, right? >> we alluded to this in the a block talking about how they weren't getting any answers from the white house, now they're not getting answers from the intel community. a classified briefing on the three unidentified flying objects that were shot down over north america left senators with more questions than answers yesterday and led both republicans and chem can accurates to call for for transparency. senator marco rubio said 99% of what was discussed could be made public without compromising a single thing. senator richard blumenthal, a democrat, added that the american people need to know more so they'll have more confidence in our national security apparatus. senator roger marshall telling the president he needs to get in front of the american people and tell us what's happening. listen. >> the president needs to find the courage to get in front of

the america public and tell them what he knows. the president can get in the front of america and tell them firsthand that we're safe, that everybody's going to be the okay, that we've got this under control. but america needs a strong leader to step forward. >> i know we're all rooting for the chiefs, that's a pretty loud time. senator john kennedy summed it all up, noting that the biggest takeaway is that those types of flying objects have been flying over us for years with government knowledge. i understand what kennedy's saying there. i don't want to hear it, because it kind of scares me, but there's reality of the situation, and kennedy pinpoints it there. ashley: yeah, he sure does. todd, thank you very much. john kirby did give a brief update on the objects when he said, quote, we don't see anything right now to these being part of the people's republic of china spying program or, in fact, intelligence collection against the united states of any kind. okay. senator marsha blackburn, republican from tennessee, joins us this morning. good morning to you, senator.

you got a briefingen on these flying objects yesterday, so the question is, what did you learn? >> it has been said by others. there was nothing in there that could not be made public to the american people. and we did leave with more questions than we got answers. and i think it's time for the president to do an oval office address to the country and lay out what is going on. we do know that they have been surveilling, they have seen objects, they are tracking these. there is a report that senators warner and rubio released to members yesterday that actually catalogs some of these, the extent of these. what we also know is that the china balloon that was shot done down was a surveillance balloon. they could have taken this out when service the over the a aleutian islands off the coast of alaska. they chose not to. they would not have even

mentioned this had it not been for a citizen, a reporter with a great camera that took a picture, put it on the web site and said what does somebody know about this. and raised the issue. if not for that, we would not have known. but this president is weak, he cannot make decisions in a timely manner. he's been wrong on every foreign policy issue, as robert gates says, for the last 40 years. ashley: right. >> the chinese communist party knows that he is weak, and so they see this as running room to hit their goal of being globally dominant by 2050. ashley: and, senator, before we have to let you go, i want to get into this. you introduced the so-called stop taxpayer funding of traffickers act which in itself is a remarkable statement. >> yes. ashley: you want to deny federal handouts to people smuggling drugs and humans across the border which begs the question,

how are they getting federal benefits in the first place? >> it is unbelievable. as i've worked on the border with the border patrol and with local sheriffs and local law enforcement, what we learned is that many of the people who are working with the cartels are actually living in government subsidized housing, many of them are are getting benefits from the government, aid for families with dependent children. so my legislation would stop those benefits when they are the arrested and would prohibit them from living off the taxpayer while they're waiting to go to court for having broken the law and being there trafficking human beings and drugs. and you've got over 100,000 people that lost their lives last year to drug overdoses.

the majority of those, over 70,000 of those, were to fentanyl, and that fentanyl is coming across the border. ashley: wow. we'll have to leave it right there, but that sounds line common sense to me. senator marsha blackburn, republican from tennessee, thank you so much for joining us. >> thank you. ashley: want to get into this story if we can too -- thank you. chicago is planning to house my grant at a now-vacant kmart. todd the, come in here, has that plan been put on hold? >> yeah, that effort to house migrants all because residents complain that the city is focusing on illegal immigrants over its own residents. it's a phrase we repeat over and over again in city after city in our great land. one citizen adding they have major concerns for the safety of the local community and the people who would actually be housed there. the city also receiving backlash after opening a former elementary school as a temporary migrant shelter with people blasting mayor lori lightfoot saying there's a lack of

resources in the community, and they don't need anyone else to come in and suck those resources up. it should be noted, ash, lori lightfoot in a re-election campaign. could this be because she sees the voters are not happy with her, and she's not going to do this despite her vow to be a sanctuary city at all costs? we'll see. ashley: yeah, we'll see. todd, thank you very much. quick check of the futures ahead of the opening bell in 6 minutes from now, we look like we'll have a slightly lower open. we'll find out because the opening bell coming up. ♪ the dj got us falling in love again. ♪ yeah, baby, tonight the dj got us falling in the love again -- in love again ♪

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ashley: all right, let's ache a look at these futures, pointing to the a lower open in just under about 4 minutes from now. let's bring in the eddie ghabour. good morning to you. we just got much stronger retail sales numbers for january than expected. how do you interpret that, and what because it say about the resilience of the economy and the consumer? >> look, there's no doubt the consumer's been more resilient

at this point in time than i thought they would be, and there is a huge disconnect right now between what the bond market is signaling and what the stock market's been signaling in the last six weeks. bond market's still screaming recession, stock market is ignoring the signals that the bond market's getting. i've learned over the last 25 the years not to to bet against the bond with market. so i think as we've been saying coming into this year, we're going to know by the time we get to the second quarter who was right, whether the bond market was right or the stock market. and i'll tell you something near term that we're watching very closely here is the dollar. the dollar's making a big move this morning on this news. so you see rates continuing to increase and the dollar following up, that's going to be a big headwind, in our opinion, to this market. so it's going to be very interesting. and, look, rates are going to stay higher for longer now. i think this whole pivot narrative needs to get thrown in the trash can, because it's not going to happen, in our opinion. ashley: you say there's no easy way, we know this, to get

inflation down. you say it's going to take demand destruction. you really believe that. >> yeah, look, if the fed is really hell bent on this 2% number, they're not going to come out and commit this, but the only way you're going to come close to 2 the % is to force a version. so if you see an acceleration in inflation again or the economy start to heat up, they're going to the raise rates even higher because the fed's biggest nightmare is another acceleration on inflation. so the only way you're going to get there is command destruction which is -- demand destruction which is going to the put us into a recession, and that's what the bond market is signaling. and there are times that the bond market and stock market won't agree, but fundamentals will matter at the end of the day. ashley: they always do. eddie ghabour, thank you so much, eddie, for your comments this morning as we get ready for the wednesday session, february the 15th, about to get underwayful. and there you go, push the button the, let the trading begin, and let's see where that trading takes us. the dow off nearly 200 points,

down about half a percent. it was down yesterday a little more than 150 op points, so just picking up on that. coca-cola, mcdonald's at the top with apple, jpmorgan chase, chevron down at the bottom. were just getting going. let's take a look at the s&p 500, see where that is. that index finished essentially flat yesterday, down about half a percent in the early going, 4112 the on the s&p. and as for the nasdaq, let's see, it gained 50% yesterday and it's down, what, 59 points this morning in the very early going. let's take a look at the big tech names as well, see how they are performing, and they are all in the red. alphabet, apple, amazon, meta, nothing too drastic although meta down 1.5%. tesla's had a lot of positivity over the last several weeks, andst the up again today. tesla up 1% at $211. they are making charge chargers

available to other evs. good morning to you, susan. of. susan: so many headlines on tesla. elon elon musk making waves as well. tesla is opening up at least 3500 stations to all drivers of electric cars by the end of this year, that's according to the white house. that means tesla will now be eligible for a small share of that $7.5 billion in federal cash that's been earmarked to build out a national network of charging stations for evs. 3500 is just a small fraction of the almost 18,000 chargers that tesla now has across the u.s., so why not give 3,000 of them, make them available and get some cash, federal funding in the process. also some china headlines that just crossed a few minutes ago, and it looks like tesla -- and this might be the reason why tesla is now, i guess, reducing some of the 2% rally we saw in the premarket -- tesla is holding -- halting some of their production at the end of february mostly to upgrade that

model 3 production if line. we know that tesla as a whole has been on a roll in 2023, it's up 70% in the past 8 weeking of -- weeks of this year. barclays says it's worth 275, and by the way, musk is going to find somebody else to run twitter which is why also tesla investors are happy, so he can focus on automaker and gave away about clash 2 -- $2 billion in stock to charity. we know he signed that giving pledge in 2012, so he has signed on to give away half of his wealth by the end of his lifetime. ashley: and that is very impressive. i want to get to airbnb. where are they this morning? they've been on a tear. they're up nearly 10%. i guess what went right? susan: well, so much. awesome earnings as well, and they're saying pretty much what we've heard across the travel space, people have been cooped up during the covid lockdowns and revenge travel is strong. best last three months of the year in airbnb's history.

strong foreign travel means that airbnb is going to guide for higher sales, they're looking at higher sales to start this year, higher than expected. and travelers are returning to major cities, and they're willing to go further, so they're crossing oceans and ralph thing out. average daily -- travel thing out. average dale thely rates went down but bookings remain strong. sales, profit, cash flow, and you heard this from airlines, hotel operators, yes, the traveler's still spending. ashley: revenge ralph the, i love that expression. you're doing it with at iewd. by the way, susan, we had a slew of companies reporting before the bell. let's start with roblox, up 21.5%. susan: yeah. this was a big report card. i guess people were positioned to be so negative on this video, this kids' video game maker that the strong bookings actually surprised them. that means they saw a strong the holiday season which shows that consumers are still spending, and we saw them in the retail

sales number, retail sales this morning, and that's because consumers are still spending despite a higher rate and a slowing economy environment, right? dale thely active users -- daily active users went up by almost 20%. that's really impressive. 58.8 million gamers each and every day, and that remember that roblox, a majority of their gamers are younger than 18. two-thirds, in fact, that's a long pipeline for them in the future. also devon energy reported disappointing results here for the oil major, surprising given that we saw exxon, chevron, all these big oil companies reporting huge profits last year because of the highest oil prices in 14 years. and chris -- krispy kreme came out with better numbers, upbeat guidance. same thing with kraft heinz, they did better to end last year, but it was their guidance that fell short, and that's why the ketchup maker isn't performing well in the premarket. so far about two-thirds of the companies have actually put in better numbers than anticipated,

and that's because, again, people were so bearish heading into the report cards. ashley: yeah, very true. by the way, we got a little look inside what stocks the oracle of omaha is buying. what's in mr. buffett's portfolio? susan: yeah. everybody always wants to know what the best investor on the planet is doing with his portfolio. we call it whale watching when you look at these 13f filings. berkshire hathaway has actually increased his stake in apple. you didn't think that was possible given that he already owns $100 plus. apple makes up 40% of his portfolio, he is the single largest investor in the world's biggest company, but apparently that went up. also increasing his occidental ownership to 28% of the oil company. and here was a surprise because everyone talks about the death of linear television, paramount global which owns cbs got a buffett thumbs up. he increased his stake in paramount global, also added to louisiana pacific cutting -- and this was the surprise cut -- he

cut his tsmc which is that taiwan semiconductor, that chip stock in taiwan that mix all the chips that go into iphones and ipads, he cut that by almost 90% to end last year, but he only bought it in the fall. remember you've heard warren buffett say he is a long-term investor, but if he's cutting in three months' time, what does that say about his confidence in tsmc? ashley: by the way, we got a look at the owner of the carolina pan netter's playbook -- panthers' playbook. susan: there's certain investors that everybody wants to know what heir doing. -- they're doing can. he's buying more disney, very similar to that streaming play, that entertainment play from buffett. also buying caesars, buying the salesforce which we know has been pacing five activist investors. also selling off microsoft and reducing met a. -- meta. so the same thing, he actually sold off more microsoft and amazon there, but stu --

[inaudible] high conviction trader, as i call him. ashley: fascinating stuff. you covered a lot of ground as always, susan, thank you very much. susan: thank you. ashley: you're welcome, thank you. take a look at this op-ed, call biden's ageneral a ca exactly what it is, just plain crazy. liz peek wrote that. she's here to explain how we're in the battle against crazy versus normal. whoopi goldberg can't tell the difference between senator tim scott and rick scott. >> tim scott, black tim scot, because there are two senator scotts, and i don't know how to the deafen differentiate them without a picture. ashley: we're going to bring you the senator's response toss what whoopi had to say. meantime, ohio officials say it's safe for residents to return in and around east palestine, but many fear the train derailment poisoned the area.

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ashley: well well, now this, the governor of ohio, mike dewine, is furious over the cargo the train derailment in the his state and, od the, what is he saying? >> listen to the detail it is here, mike dewine blasting the categorizing of the cargo at the center of the cast -- >> even though some cars did have hazardous the material onboard and while most of them did not, that's why it was not categorized as a high hazardous material train. frankly, if this is true, and i'm told it's true, this is

absurd, and we need to look at this, and congress needs to take a look at how these things are handled. >> here's the explanation, dewine said the train was not considered a high hazardous material train because most of the rail cars did not contain hazardous material but, obviously, some kid and, ash, i understand his point. like, if you have 49 cars but 1 has some horrible chemical that can cause a lot of damage, maybe we categorize it as high hazardous. ashley: that just seems like common sense. todd, thank you very much. by the way, the health issues caused by the train derailment causing plenty of concern as well. one first responder says, quote: a large number of firefighters, police officerses, sheriffs' deputies and state troopers have experienced many somes including a bad cough, makes, sore throat e and diarrhea, the same symptom reported by residents who who did not if evacuate. dr. marc siegel is here. great to have you here this

morning, doctor. the eps says it -- epa says it has not detected any health concerns but, clearly, people are are reporting symptom, residents and first responders. is the air safe? how can it be with? >> we don't know. and we're concerned. and i want to start with the point todd just made. you know, 150 cars on this train, 50 of them containedded very dangerous chemicals. 38 derailed and another 12 got a problem where the chemicals leaked out. so you're talking 50 cars. now, vinyl fluoride, which is stay in the environment for a long time and in the water and could affect animals and affect humans, is a long-term cancer risk in terms of lungs, brain, kidney, i could go on and on. but what i'm more concerned about is what's in the air, what's making people irritated, why are they sick, why do they

have headaches? i'll tell you two possible reasons. actually, vinyl chloride breaks down toes teen which is a poisonous gas, and it's very hard to detect the, and it's the invisible. and then there's another chemical that's leaked out of these cars that also causes a lot of irritation. the governor, who you just showed, said if i lived in this area, i would drink bottled water. i think that says it all. ashley: yeah, it really does. i want to switch subjects because i'm really interested by this. a new report says a pill that is the meant for epilepsy treatment was shown to the switch up autism symptom during testing on mice. very interesting, promising. what do you make of this? >> well, it's preliminary because it's in mice, but i already want to tell you this drug is a drug that i think is terrific. we use it for seizures, and we use it for behavioral issues. it works on the brain by

stabilizing nerves in the brain. it's a really powerful and safe and if effect if we've medication -- effective medication. gsk produces it, by the way. and so i absolutely think not that it's going to end up being a cure for autism, that's not what we're talking about today, but could this be useful in young children who are on the spectrum in terms of behavior, learning ability and socialization, i think it's a very promising idea. ashley: very good. we'll have to leave it right there. doc siegel, as always, thank you so much. great information as always. >> good to be with you, ash. thank you. ashley: yes, thank you. a new report details how bad catching covid can be for someone with diabetes. todd, give us the details on this. >> yeah. at the risk of taking dr. siegel's spot on the medical stuff, i'm going to try my best here. people who have diabetes along with elevated blood sugar levels face greater risk of being

hospitalized. people with diabetes, you don't properly manage their blood glucose levels are at higher risk of experiencing severe symptom. one doctor explaining that people with diabetes have a higher chronic level of inflammation throughout the body, so when an infection to trues -- occurs, then program in story response can be bad. but again, i advise all the varney viewers, i dropped out of being pre-med sophomore year, go to dr. siegel,s not me. [laughter] ashley: thank you very much for that kiss claimer. also -- disclaimer. what's this, todd, about a drug that can help people fight their binge drinking tendencies? >> yeah, listen to this, a cheap drug used to help wean opioid users could discourage binge drinking. it slashed number of days people drank to excess by more than a quarter. total monthly alcohol consumption was cut down by about a third.

it was consumed one hour before drinking but, here we go, ash, it works by limiting the release of endorphins, dulling the euphoria caused by alcohol. so, you know, i think the point is if you have a problem, this might be a good solution for you. but if you like your, you know, beer or two with dinner every night, may not be the path. ashley: maybe not. doctor -- sorry, todd -- [laughter] thank you very much. coming up, don't forget to send in your friday feedback. you can e-mail your questions, comments and critiques, as always, to varneyviewersfox.com. we want to hear from you, good and bad. the irs is facing criticism for going after waiters and waitresses' pay. we're going to hear from the an owner who says the irs is looking to tax the little guy to pay for wasteful washington spending. oh, boy. we're going to have that right after this. ♪ ♪ the irs anticipate gone that

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ashley: president biden claimed that the newly-created 87,000 irs agents would be used to crack down on the rich. well, it sure doesn't look that way. we're learning they might be looking to dip into waiters' and waitresses' tip jars. lydia hu has been covering this story and, lydia, how does the irs plan to implement this? >> reporter: hi there, ashley. well, right now it's a proposal from the if irs for a voluntary program that would track tips from service industry workers, waiters and waitresses. right now there's a public comment period that goes until may, and after that business owners like restaurant owners could choose to be a part of the program. now, last week a spokesperson for the irs said in a statement the, quote, this is not a proposal for the auditing of servers. and they go on to say that the proposal for comment is based on over a decade of feedback from restaurants and other businesses

seeking the increased flexibility for their overall tax compliance on tips. but, ashley, i had the chance to talk to the owner of this restaurant right here in montclair, new jersey. she says there's no way she wants to be a part of this program. watch. >> the irs could be focusing, you know, you hear in one breath it's going to be high net worth individuals, then you hear in the other breath heir going to be the looking into servers and their tips and restauranteurs. and i don't need the help, i didn't ask for the help. i don't need any more government in my business, there already is enough. >> reporter: now, to give us an idea, ashley, of what kind of information the irs would potentially be collecting, you know, we're talking about the a group of people, servers, waiters, waitresses, that make on average less than $30,000 a year. the owner here says most of her waiters and waitresses are about 19 or 20 the years old, so skewing to the younger side. and adding to her belief that

this type of program is just, frankly, not needed is that most tips at her restaurant, she says, are are processed through credit card transactions. 95% of them, in fact. she says that they don't need an extra layer from the irs to help them or oversee them in their handling of tips for tax purposes. ashley. ashley: absolutely right. lydia hu, great report. thank you very much for that. and i also want to thank todd pie todd piro this morning -- pyro for joining us for the whole hour and all of this hard work. thank you, todd the, very much. a little extra in the paycheck this week. still ahead as we look at the markets down at this hour, very early going, but still ahead in the show liz peek, mollie hemingway and deroy murdock, to name just a few. the 10 a.m. hour of "varney & company" is next. ♪ ♪ back into your heart again --

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