big day for the banks, bank of america reported earnings and they beat on first quarter revenue and earnings. goldman saks missed on revenue, and the stock is down about 3.5%. mark, your reaction. >> i want to hit on residential mortgages. you asked about that with regard to the bank of america. first quarter of 2022, 16.4 billion of new originations. nurse quarter of '23, all the way down to 3.9 billion. so from 16 down to 3.9 billion, big drop there. but overall, bank of america coming in very, very strong. maria: yeah. the bar was set so high with jpm. amber, check out nasdaq can, up strongly just like years to candidate, the others are lagging. >> right. americans are seeing great news this morning, and i think all of us who were concerned about our financial futures under the biden administration are breathing a little sigh of relief. maria: well, i don't know, we'll see what he does with taxes. thanks, amber, aptmy and mark end e ther.

"varney & company" picks out i up -- it up here. stuart: good morning, everyone. i'm going to to start with an earnings report. goldman sachs, yeah, they made a lot of money, more than expected. but many response to the banking scare, goldman has sold off some of its long-term investments at a loss. investors not happy with that, and the sock is down this moment about -- stock is down this moment about 3.5%. it is a dow stock, and goldman's decline is taking 80 points off the dow industrials. here's the market pre the opening bell. the dow is up about 17 points. it would have been up about 100 had it not been for goldman. s&p is up 18, nice gain for the nasdaq, about .75% gain, almost 100 points up for the nasdaq. it's a rally. bitcoin rallying well above $30,000, you're at $30,300 as we speak. etherium's to well above $2100 level. a rally there too. interest rates, well, their

holding at higher levels. the 10-year treasury, 3.58. the 2-year way above 4%, you're looking at 4.19. on you can the orer a fascinating -- tucker, a fascinating review interinterview with elon musk. twitter said -- musk says twitter was just an activist organization. mark zuckerberg's facebook is biased. google founder larry page didn't take the risk of avenue i -- a.i. seriously, and can although he voted for biden, next time musk would prefer, quote, a normal person with common sense. more on that that coming up. nix more biden family members -- six more biden family members linked to money from china. nothing the happens. what would happen if trump's family made money from the chinese communist party? all hell breaks loose. we will look at chicago. educational decline, unrest on the streets and a new mayor who promises more of the same. chicago, an example of what not to do.

tuesday, april 18th, 2023. "varney & company" is about to begin. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ stuart: it's tuesday morning, and i see more people actually on street. not so much traffic, but foot traffic looking good. picking up a little bit because it's not raining today. welcome back, lauren. good to see you again. lauren thank you. good to be the back. stuart: all right. let's get started with, what else, goldman sachs. down 3.5%, that's taking about 85 points now off the dow industrials. i want to bring in mike lee, market watcher of the morning. why is goldman down? they made a lot of money, okay? they sold off some of their long-term assets, but why are they down? >> well, stuart, they're not a

depositor institution in the way that jpmorgan and bank of america are, so they can't take large lumps of hair deposit, park it at the fed and expand their net interest rate margin by paying 0% to their fosters and getting 4.75 from the federal reserve. stuart: so does goldman's decline, down 3.5%, having sold off some of their long-term assets, does that mean that the banking crisis is still with us? >> you know, stuart, it's really hard to figure out where this next banking crisis and how it's going to play out. so i would say silicon valley bank is your first are liquidity event. the next thing that comes is a credit event, and i believe this will be somewhere in commercial real estate. so all of this occupancy in new york city, 44% now down from above 90. okay, i don't think that's ever going to get back up there. so think about all the tertiary

markets and all of the blue statements where the lockdowns were draconian and people have never gone back to the office. well, a lot of these commercial real estate loans -- stuart: yeah, they're in trouble. >> yeah. small and mid-sized banks, it's really hard to put your finger on that that as we're looking at a lot of these places have 5, 10, 20-year leases that will be coming due. and if your office is unoccupied, why are you going to renew your lease? stuart: fair point. outside office leasing problems and commercial real estate and bank problem, outside of that that, the rest of the market is up. seems like it still wants to go up. the rest of the market, that is. >> yeah. look, i think this is borderline insanity. i think most market sentiment is with me on that, which is probably why you're going up. i'll be clear, i am not short the market, i am just underweight equities and overweight defensives and the ec by bitieses i still have. if you look at this from the a pure valuation standpoint, we're about a 20 pe ratio over 20

going forward, so if you flip that pe ratio over, you have a 5% earnings yield. in 20199 we were at similar valuations, but in 2019 you had an expanding fed balance sheet, you had rates getting cut and a growing economy. okay, right now short-term interest rates are not zero like they were in 2019, they're at almost 5%. the 10-year treasury is not at 2.5, it's at 3.6. so -- and and i think earnings estimates are way too high going forward. every time we've had a collapse in manufacturing and housing and minor banking crisis like we've seen so far, you've gone into a recession. stuart: okay. >> markets can remain irrational far longer than you can remain solvent. stocks may soldier through, but i am not bullish. stuart: okay. mike lee is not bullish. i'll leave it right there. thanks very much, indeed. let's turn to politics. president biden has sill not declared his re-election campaign for 2024. how far behind schedule compared

to other, previous presidents? lauer lauren so looking at democrats, both obama and clinton had announced their second terms in april, so april 4th of 2011 for obama and april 14th of 1995 for bill clinton. biden keeps hinting that he's going to run again. you know, on friday he said an announcement will come relatively soon. he can wait this out as long as he wants, in my opinion, because there's no clear challenger among the democrats. and i think that he has a hold on the party. other people might disagree. you say you don't even think he's going to run, but look at what republicans are dealing with. they're dealing with president trump and in-fighting within the party. so biden is just sitting this out and watching and waiting. stuart: and, actually, trump is gaining a lot of ground recently. lauren: absolutely. stuart: even "the new york times" is questioning biden's slow walk to announce his campaign. former white house communications director kate bedingfield tells the times, quote, there is no immediate

urgency. the president has the luxury of being able to decide when he wants to to announce, end quote. jason chaffetz with me. why do you think biden is so slow to the announce? >> joe biden's pretty slow on everything. she slow -- he slow walked his campaign to win the first time, he's slow walking his presidency in general. there is no heir apparent. it's not as if kamala harris is ready for prime time. they feed to do some more training -- need to do some more training if they they -- they think it's going to be her. a president wants to be able to pick their own person the if they're going to pass the baton. stuart: i keep saying the democrats will not let joe biden run again. do you want to the respond to that again? because we've been through this before, jason. >> no -- [laughter] look, i think that is right. i think he's -- i think the puppeteers like having somebody who's so malleable right there in office, and joe biden kind of because what the puppeteers want

him to do, so he's willing to sick the it out, and i i think like it. stuart: house republicans have found that six, six additional family members to biden may have benefited from hunter's business dealings in china. watch this, roll out. >> this isn't just about the president's son or the president's brother. we've identified six new biden family members involved in shady foreign transactions that we believe were a direct result of influence peddling. that brings the number of biden family members to nine that were involved in the biden family influence peddling, and we still have more family members that we suspect is were involved. so this is a family affair. this is something that should be troubling to every american. stuart: jason, i'm going to ask you again, we've been through this before, do chinese -- the chinese communist party, have have they got something on our president and his family? >> oh, i think so. some of the estimates are that a

there's some $30 million that is transferred into the biden accounts from various countries, not all china, but countries all across the world. remember what chairman comer is looking at is suspicious activity reports. these are financial institutions flagging accounts saying this is extraordinary. this is outside the scope of a normal transaction. you need to cross-reference those with the irs filings of what not -- and whatnot. again, it's not as if there's one or two transactions. they're looking at a whole host of transactions and millions of dollars and middlemen along the way where money is transferred and then quickly transferred into biden accounts. you combine that9 with the e-mails that we've already seen from his laptop, and clearly there is something going on here. where are the feds? where's the investigation? this should absolutely be out there in the public and be exposed. stuart: and what would be happening if this were trump family members getting money

from the chinese communist party? all hell breaks loose, but there you are. jason chaffetz, thank you, sir. we have senator dianne feinstein, she is a member of the judiciary committee in the senate, but senator schumer wants to temporarily replace her. the republicans are not going to let that happen, are they? lauren: of course not. senator schumer wants to sub in another democratic senator while feinstein recovers. listen to what he wants to do. >> reporter: on senator feinstein, do you have any more clarification about when she might returnsome and if not, walk us through what process would look like to put a temporary replacement. republicans have indicated they don't want to make any -- >> well, look, i spoke to senator feinstein just a few days ago. she believes she will return soon. she's very hopeful of that and so am i. >> reporter: are you confident that you can get republicans to support that? >> we should have a temporary replacement until she does, and we hope republicans are join us on that. [laughter]

lauren: it doesn't sound very convincing. even the republicans traditionally more inclined the partner with a democrat like senators collins and tillis, they say they're not going to vote with schumer to replace her because the judiciary committee is tied 10-10 now. so why would you give democrats one more vote to push through their agenda? stuart: why should you give them the vote so they can push through their democrat-nominated judges? lauren: the democrat cans would say out of respect for the process. stuart: yeah, right. lauren: what if you had a republican senator undergoing something similar? i know. by the way, mcconnell's back after after a 5-week absence. remember thatsome. stuart: yes, he is. coming up, democrats claimed witnesses were mere arely props during yesterday's crime hearings in new york city. one of those witnesses was having none of it. watch in this. >> kate johnson to step one foot in the hood, step one foot in the hood and tell me if those

people in the hood are props as well. stuart: we'll talk to another witness from the hearing. i'll ask her if she felt like a prop. disney just announced its first ever pride night at its california theme park. this is just hours after governor desantis the took another shot at disney in florida. we've got details on that for you. to get a debt deal, speaker mccarthy wants to limit government spending to the 2022 level, but that requires a united republican party, so can they call -- can they get on the same page? wisconsin congressman bryan steil on that next. ♪ ♪ we must stand together, yeah ♪ the chase ink business premier card is made for people like sam who make...? ...everyday products... ...designed smarter. like a smart coffee grinder - that orders fresh beans for you. oh, genius! for more breakthroughs like that...

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♪ big spender -- stuart: that is appropriate. hey, big spender. just as we do stories about going into the debt and spending limits in congress. all right, that's washington, d.c., and it is 58 degrees. kind of cool in the nation's capital. speaker mccarthy does have a plan. limit government spending to 2022 revels -- levels, allow only 1% annual increases in spending from here on out. that's his plan on spending. question, lauren -- [laughter] does he have a unified republican party that can push that plan through? lauren: that's the challenge. that is the challenge, keeping 222 house republicans united to pass a debt ceiling increase with conditions. and only with conditions. they're working through those conditions now to get everybody onboard. they expect a bill by may. here's the speaker.

>> in the coming weeks, the house will vote on a bill to lift the debt ceiling into the next year. save taxpayers trillions of dollars, make us less dependent on china, curb our high inflation all without touching social security and pd medicare. lauren: it's a challenge. guess who's not talking right now? stuart: biden. lauren: with mccarthy. their last meeting was 76 days ago. 76 days. so you have to negotiate to get somewhere, so republicans negotiating are are republicans -- with republicans while the house speaker is not negotiating with president biden because he remains opposed. stuart: biden always said is, hey, show me your plan. well, we've just seen the plan, announced on wall street yesterday by speak everier mccarthy. lauren: he's going to push it to the end and say you always have to come through to the keep the full faith and credit of the united states of america. republicans have been saying for months we're not going to do

that, so talk to us. stuart: a standoff all over again. congressman bryan steil, a member of the house financial services committee republican to boot, joins me now. is that what we're going to get here, congressman? we're going to leave it til the last minute because biden won't negotiate? mccarthy's put forward his plan, but biden won't negotiate, so another showdown coming a couple weeks from now. is that what's going to happen? somewhere have republicans in the house want to deal with this head on and early so we avoid an economic catastrophe that the biden administration is willing to gamble with. it's the reason speaker mccarthy spoke with president biden early on. president biden has his head in the sand. that's a dangerous precipice, that that's why republicans are united can -- stuart: wait, wait, are they united? are they united on a plan which would allow spending increases of just 1% in future years and spending going back to a baseline of 2022 level? are you eling me that the republican party -- telling me that the republican party in the house is united on that? >> i feel confident that we'll

be coming together on the plan that we will put forward on the floor in the coming weeks. i do feel confident that we're united because i think we generally all agree that we need to make significant changes for the stability of the u.s. economy. stuart: yeah. but if you can't come together, the democrats will laugh at you and roll all over you, and we will get much more spending than we want. i mean, i think the onus is on the republican party at this moment, come together and unify. >> i agree with you, and that's the conversations taking place right now on capitol hill, myself and my colleagues speaking with members across the wide ideological spectrum of the republican party to make sure people understand what's at stake, that a united republican conference is in the strongest position to negotiate with president biden. stuart: okay. quick one. you're going to be -- you're on the financial services committee. you're grilling, i think, sec chair gary gensler. he's got a lot of regulatory proposals on the table about climate change and investing. can you roll that back? can you tell our audience you can roll back these rules on

climate and investing? >> i think this is one of the things that we ultimately need to to get disclosure on for the american people. what we have seen is chairman gensler run an aggressive campaign at the securities and exchange commission pretty much unchecked. he hasn't even come before the house financial services committee in far too long. it's a really dangerous the chairman's taking us on, running rules through this regulatory stage which is a real burden on the capital. stuart: thanks for joining us, congressman. i just want to put some fire into this debt ceiling debate, and i think you admit it for us. congressman bryan steil, thanks for being here. see you later. the detained "wall street journal" reporter, evan gershkovich, made an appearance in russian court today. how'd he look? lauren: i thought thin. he was wearing jeans, there you go, with a blue-collared buttondown, and he's standing with his arms crossed in that see-through detention the box. this was his appeal against pretrial detection -- detention,

and it was rejected by the russian court. his trial is may 29th at the earliest, and he will stay in the former kgb prison -- kgb prison where he has been since march 29th. he stays put. stuart: yeah. lauren: not happy about it. stuart: we've got, what, six, seven minutes to go phil the -- til the opening bellment. looking at green especially for the nasdaq. 90 points higher at the opening bell. we'll take you to wall street after this. ♪ -- no, you're shaking like a stone, carry on ♪ i'm your overly competitive brother.

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stuart: three and a half minutes to go, i see some green especially for the nasdaq which is up 88 points. that's premarket. all right, let's bring in mark avalon watching the markets for us today. mark i think the market just wants to go up, but you think the rally is losing its steam. make your case. >> well, i do understand long-term investments in stocks look good, but i think right now in the near term they're ahead

of themselves. we haven't gotten a lot of earnings reports. some were positive, but we haven't yet seen the damage from all the fed hikes and all the monoair the tightening. monetary the tightening x. i think an earnings recession is a real are possibility, and multiples on stocks are above historical averages. i just don't see a mack escrow environment right now that -- macro environment that justifies a premium for stock prices. stuart: okay. explain goldman sachs to me, please. i know they made a lot of money, but i'm told they sold some long-term assets, and that's what's upset the stock which is down 3.3%. have i got -- does this mean that the banking crisis or the banking problem is still with us? >> well, that's a great question, and i think with goldman it is more of a specific company issue, and they're addressing their problem with markets. you know, as you know, they made that big move into retail informing. that's not their forte, and i think they're realizing one --

they want to stay in their lane. i think we're going to see more of that where company-specific news will drive stocks. we saw bank of america have good earnings, deposit growth can, but that count mean all financials and banks will do well. those deposits came from somewhere, so i think we're going to have a case-by-case basis especially in the financials looking at goldman, bank of america and then the smaller regional banks you might have to be a bit cautious on. stuart: okay. one thing i don't understand is 5:00 this morning goldman's stock was up about $11. now, a after the release of that report, it's down 10. all of that because they sold some long-term assets at a loss. that's it? is that that the explanation? >> well, i don't think i can understand a 20-point move in a stock in the premarket. it's just, it's just too much trading speculation perhaps, people betting on a certain number, a news headline that does the or doesn't develop. that that's not sound long-term

investing, and that's not a lane that i swim in. i'm going to believe in them for the long term and actually commend them for getting out of some of these businesses, frankly, they should not have been. stuart: i like that expression, with the getting out of my lane. thank you, sir, see you again with soon. we've got about after half a minute, 30 seconds to go before this market officially opens on a tuesday morning. we are expecting to see quite a lot of green especially in the nasdaq. some big tech stocks are doing pretty well this morning. many 20 seconds i think we'll confirm the view that we're opening higher across the board, but i want to see what happens to goldman sachs by the end of the day. is the markets' judgment still negative on one of best investment banks in the world, most prominent investment banks in the world? why are they taking them down 3.5%? all right. we are open, and the market is moving down for the cow the industrials, you're down -- dow

industrials, you're down about 12 points. that's the impact of goldman. it is a dow stock. goldman has opened lower, and it's taking 80 points off the dow industrials. all right, that's the dow. move on to the s&p, please. what we've got there is a very modest gain, about one-third of 1% to the upside. and the nasdaq up two-thirds of 1%. so the gains are in the s&p and the nasdaq, and some of the losses -- especially goldman -- in the dow. look at big tech. all of them are higher. amazon's up 1.3%, now $104 a share. microsoft moving to $291. meta is at $220 the a share, just about doubled this year. not quite but almost are. -- not quite, but almost. alphabet coming in virtually dead flat. susan's with us, thank goodness, to the explain what's going on with the bank earnings. susan: yeah. you made a great point about goldman sachs because it was up in the premarket, now it's down. i think it's because it is an investment bank and, young, that's their -- you know, that's

their bread and butter, and investment banking revenue actually went down by a quarter to start this year. so they also missed on profit and sales, and, yes, they are blaming some of it on disor the thed accounting -- distorted accounting and its consumer lending business, right? stuart: don't like the sound of that. susan: yeah. so they sold their loan books, a bit of it. some of those assets for a loss of $417 million. but they already told us that they're going to offload some of their books, and we knew it wasn't going to be the at a premium. i don't know -- stuart: it could close with a loss but not as big a loss as 3.8%. susan: exactly. let's talk about the other part of banking. by the way, you know, marcus is the one that provides the apple car which which i'll talk to you in just a bit with, but if you look at what's happening with bank of america, i would say actual traditional lenders beat on sales and profit just like jpmorgan on friday and that's because of higher interest rates and the amount they make doling

out each loan are. deposits, of course, is important given the silicon valley bank collapse, and deposits did go down just by a little bit, but bank of america said they saw pretty good deposit towards the end of march because you have depositors looking to take out their cash from small per regional banks to these large, too big to fail institutions. and then i also want to look at bank of new york mellon as well because it's a custody bank, pretty similar to state street, and they -- higher fees but sales were flat. stuart: this was tea, by the way. the audience caught me slurping on my tea. susan: did they? stuart: yeah, they did. johnson & johnson is down 3.5%. susan: higher sales to start the year, profit was wiped out because they had to account for the $7 billion in cost tied to the legal fees to settle that talc powder case. but j&j said sales of other drugs like tylenol are doing

very well, raising full-year forecasts and profit this year. let's talk about defense -- stuart: a lot of our guests were recommending lockheed martin through most of this year. susan: well, yeah. they beat on sales and profits, supply chain improving and they're maker, obvious, of f-22s, f-35 fighter jets, also heavy supplier to ukraine. and as you know, there have been billions spent there. stuart: yeah. susan: and also turkey, there's a new $200 million defense contract that they're signing as well. stuart: now, netflix reports this afternoon. i presume that subscriber growth is what it's all about. susan: yeah. that's not being provided by them because they stopped subscriber growth -- or guidance for this year now. however, wall street does expect 2.3 million new sign-ups in the first three months of this year, so that's a slowdown from the 7.6 million that they signed up to end last year and you know wall street, you've heard this over and over again, bullish on

netflix because of in this new ad tier. also password-sharing crackdown that should bring in more sales. i do expect revenue to grow about $8 billion or so in the first three months -- stuart: up 8 billion. up 8 billion. stuart: -- susan: it'll be over $8 billion. stuart: the i'm interested in nvidia, always have been, and i think they got an upgrade. susan: nvidia was up big, till up big in the premarket, but some of the gains have been capped because microsoft just came out with a headline in the last few minutes. this is a headline on microsoft reducing its own new a.i. chips. of course, other people are doing the same thing like google, etc. but -- stuart: why didn't i know about this? susan: the headline just flashed a few minutes ago. they're calling it a 355 stock, and and it's a double up grade because they say they have a.i.

chip pricing power which could make up for the fact that their chips are slowing down, really bringing up the rest of the chip sector. nvidia, up 80% so far -- stuart: yeah. can we get microsoft on the screen, please? if this headline just came out, i want to see the impact on the stock. susan:st the up 1 percent if to start or the segment after the market opened. stuart: i'll take it. susan: elon musk said he's starting truth gpt which is the chatgpt/obama a.i. competitor -- open a.i. competitor. one of the richest men on the planet starting his own cat bot in the future. it's interesting because he was one of the original investors in open a.i. of $100 million when service a nonprofit. you heard that last night, tucker had that conversation that he was a little surprised now for-profit, so he might as well develop it himself. yesterday we had alphabet, we talked about google on the "60 minutes" piece. "the new york times" report or

or saying samsung might replace google with microsoft instead. stuart: okay. sorry about our boards there, they're all over the place. stuart: susan: are you watching parking lot if two tonight, tucker, elon? i'm looking forward to that tonight. stuart okay. watch part two tonight. okay, got it. [laughter] what do we have for you coming up? princes, plural, or william and harry, will report reportedly be separated at their father's coronation p. oh, the drama. president biden's pick to lead the council of economic advisers faces a tough senate grilling. in 2021 he said that inflation was transitory. larry kudlow has a few things to say about inflation after this. ♪ ♪

stuart: 11 minutes into this market session, the dow is now down 37, and the nasdaq is skill up 67 points. -- still up. check microsoft for a second, please. the company is readying its own artificial intelligence chips. apparently, investor like that and the stock has reached $290 a share. it's up about a half percent. the national average for a gallon of regular is now $3.67. by the way, prices are expected to to the rise significantly in several states. gasbuddy has issued a warning to drivers in nine states. hey, fill up now, because the price is going up. edward lawrence at the white house. which states, which are the nine states that we're talking about? >> reporter: talking about the northeast and mid-atlantic. basically, every state from the maryland up to maine and everything in between there. now, gasbuddy predicts a jump many gas prices of 15-25 cents

very soon. already the price of gas up 7 cents from a week ago and up 23 cents in the past month according to aaa. you might remember the price of gas was $2. 39 a gallon the day president biden took office. just look at this graph of of the 12 months. at the end of that line, you see it trending back up. aaa says gas prices are inching up because oil's hovering above $80 a barrel. also as we enter the warm warmer month, driving picks up and a change in gas. representative james comer on "kudlow" last night worries the president is not getting the message, and there's no pivot in policy. >> this administration's been hijacked by the left-wing loonies that continue to the rye to enact green new deal legislation that isn't practical, it's not doable, and it's going to cost the american taxpayers a lot of money. and even worse,st it's going to put us at a further competitive disadvantage to china. >> reporter: we will hear from the president early this afternoon, but it's clear from

his speeches in ireland last week, he remains laze arer focused on the transition no -- laser focused no matter the damage it causes to americans' bank accounts. >> we must tackle the climate crisis that has devastating impacts to preserve our planet for generation ares to come. as i said to the parliament ireland's famous 40 shades of green now include green energy, green agriculture and green jobs. [cheers and applause] >> reporter: and now gas experts here in the united states warning that goose price spike for the summer -- gas price spike for the summer, that's coming. back to you. stuart: can't wait. thank you very much is, indeed. president biden wants jared bernstein to replace cecilia rouse to the head the council of economic advisers. he'll pace the senate where they, the senators, will surely ask about this. roll tape. >> transitory doesn't just mean one particular date for everything. what it means is that inflation forecasts are widely expected to

decelerate next year and decelerate further the year after that. i think it's very important to also look at the longer term inflation expectations. i think what's critical about the report this morning is that longer term expectations remain pretty solidly anchored below 3. stuart: well, he kind of got that wrong for the long term. larry kudlow joins us the morning. here's my question, larry: how is jared bernstein going to the explain biden's tax and spend policies when he becomes chair of the advisers? >> well, let me say at the top, stu, jared is an old friend of mine. never have i liked someone so much and disagreed with them -- [laughter] so much, okay? i mean, he's a lovely person, i completely disagree. he was very wrong about spending and inflation. i think, unfortunately, he continues to be wrong. the inflation numbers are still around 5%, and for all two years

real earnings, real weekly earnings, you know, typical families have been falling. i mean, everybody's standard of living has been going down for a couple years because of the inflation problem. jared, you know, is going to be a radical climate guy. jared is going to be a tax the rich and successful guy. look, he's biden's guy. he's a close adviser to vice president biden and president biden. so, you know, i totally disagree with him -- [laughter] and, unfortunately, we're not going to see any change in policy there. stuart: okay. we got speaker mccarthy's plan yesterday. the two main points, to me, seemed to be limit spending, the level of spending back in 2022, and limit increases many spending to just 1% annually in the years to come. that sounds like a good plan to me. does he have the republican party in the house behind him to push that kind of thing through? >> yeah, i think he will.

i think it's a terrific plan. it was a growth plan, you're right. back to 2022 on discretionary spending and a 1% cap thereafter. also he's got work requirements in there, and he's got a covid clawback in there. and he's also got king dollar in there. so i just thought it was an excellent, terrific speech. he talked about milton friedman, he talked about ronald reagan, all of my heroes, dear to my heart. i mean, very, very strong. and most of all, perhaps, he made it very, very clear that a no strings attached debt increase is not going to happen. that there's going to be spending restraint along with the debt ceiling, and he really teed off on president biden for, you know, not getting back to him. i think it said 75 days since they had their first meeting. so they haven't gotten together,

they haven't that had a diet coke, not a cup of coffee, they haven't gone to a drive-in movie yet together. i mean, it's really too bad. the clock is ticking. but, yes, the gop is going to be behind him, i think so. stuart: so are we in for, therefore, a last minute shutdown the government and the debate goes on and on and on and at the very, very, very last second there'll be some kind of agreement? is that what we're looking at? >> yeah, probably. that's how these things go. i mean, almost all of the spending cuts of recent years, you can go back 10, 20 years, have come from these, you know, debt ceiling arguments and is it going to go down to the wire, is it going to go down to the last minute? i reckon so. i think that's the way these things have to work. but again, i think it's interesting, stu, go back a bit. it took kevin information california think 15 concern --

mccarthy 15 ballots to win his speakership. but i don't think i even mentioned h.r. 1, reopening the fossil fuel spigots. all these things, the gop has gotten off to a terrific start. st a unified party and, again, it's a pro-growth party. it's an economic free come party, right? free market capitalism. it's not the socialist party. it's not the party that's going to end the internal combustion engine. it's not the party that's going to the destroy fossil fuels. it's not the party that's going to take over the fifth largest industry; namely, the automobile industry. st the not the big government socialist party. it's in complete contrast to what you're getting from the white house. and i think, you know, again, mccarthy's gotten off to a great start, and and it's the pretty unified. pretty unified. stuart: you got it. harry, all good stuff. thanks for being with us. we'll watch you this afternoon, 4:00 eastern here on fox business. larry kudlow. coming up, elon musk warning

of the dangers of artificial intelligence. gotta watch this, roll it. >> i think we should be cautious with a.i., and we should -- i think there should be some government oversight because it affects -- it's a carriage to the public. stuart: he is highly critical of google's cofounder, larry page. the administration wants more people to go electric, okay, but fewer vehicles will qualify for the tax credit. jeff flock at a charging station talking to drivers about these changes. ♪ -- by your electric love ♪ i bought the team! kevin...? i bought the team! i put it on my chase freedom unlimited card. and i'm gonna cashback on a few other things too. starting with the sound system... curry from deep.

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experiencing the transition from the horse and buggy to the gas-powered vehicle -- [laughter] the transition wasn't perfectly smooth. and so perhaps it ised today. okay, you asked a question, i have the answer. yeah, government-provided tax credits, it turns out very few vehicles actually qualify. put 'em up there. these are all, the all-electrics that qualify that are now on the market. the cadillac lyric, the chevy bolt, the ford f-150 lightning, pickup, and the two tesla models, the model 3 performance version and the's la model y. at the same time the, a number of popular suvs have lost the credit. that would include the nissan leaf which used to be, you know, the poster boy for electric vehicles. rhode island january rubbings which are made in the -- rivian trucks, the bm if w x5 electric. the requirements are, just to go over them for people who don't know, critical minerals. hay must be extract thed or

processed in a free trade country or in the u.s., a country we have a free trade agreement with. battery components must be manufactured or assembled in north america in order to qualify for the credits. that's why some qualify and some don't. and hose percentages, right now it's 40% in terms of critical minerals, it's going up to 80% in 20 the 27. a lot of people don't think that manufacturers will be able to move that quickly and get to that point. and it's true electric vehicles now are more expensive. 58,000 or so for the average electric vehicle, 44,000 for the non-luxury gas-powered vehicles. right now share, 7.2% of new sales are electric vehicles. mr. varney, you better get on the stick. [laughter] stuart: yeah. i'm doing my best. jeff, thank you very much, indeed. see you soon. all right, moving on. still ahead, sheriff mark lamb, he's running for the united states senate. tennessee congressman mark green

will be joining us. douglas murray and indiana senator mark braun. the 10:00 hour of "varney" is next. ♪ ♪ ..

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