answered, catch chip -- ketchup belongs in the fridge. now to the hot dog debate, no, no, no, mustard goes on a hot dog. >> why can't we have it all? i love it. the more vinegar, the better. maria: we hope everybody's going to have a great fourth of july weekend, make it safe and happy, and we send you do our wishes for a happy independence day. it's been a great show today, so happy you joined the show. >> thanks, maria. really fun. maria: see you later in the day on air, brian. happy independence day, everybody. we'll see you here tomorrow, don't miss us. "varney & company" picks it up now. ashley is many for stu, take it away. ashley: thank you very much. i'm ashley webster in for stuart varney today. the white house calls it bidenomics, but you know what? we'll call it costly. a new study reveals biden regulations have cost americans almost $10,000 per household.

we're going to take on the president's claims that he's, quote, turning things around on the economy. not everyone believes him. meanwhile, his son hunter set to be deposed in the defamation lawsuit brought by the owner of the delaware repair shop where he left that infamous laptop from hell. all this as an irs whistleblower alleges he was hindered in his investigation into hunter biden's alleged tax scandal. he says he wasn't allowed to ask any questions about the, quote, big guy. the problems starting to pile up for the biden family. on the other side of the aisle, president trump gaining ground with voters following his second indictment. we're going to dig into those numbers. also let's take a look at the futures as we head toward the near end of the quarter and, yes, the first half of the year. the dow and s&p slightly higher, the nasdaq slightly lower. we'll get into the markets for the second half. by the way, bitcoin holding around the $30,000 mark, up $466 or thereabouts. we've got a huge show for you

with. will cain, taylor riggs, brian kilmeade, congressman wesley hunt and many, many more will be here. it is thursday, june 29th, 2023, "varney & company" about to begin. ♪ ♪ ♪ only in america ♪ ashley: i think i know this. only in america. brooks and dunn. a very patriotic looking sixth avenue in midtown, manhattan. let's get right to the politics going on right now, and there's a lot. the latest fox polls, this survey was taken, by the way, after donald trump's most recent indictment. you'd think until hurt him maybe? no, apparently. lauren, he's expend tending -- extending his lead, right? lauren: he sure has, a 34-point lead over ron desantis. 56% of likely republican primary

voters supporting trump, 22 for governor desantis. vivek ramaswamy many third places with 5%. on the other side of this fox news boll, 64% of likely democratic voters say they'll support president biden again, but that's up just 2 points from may before the indictment. rfk jr. gets 17% and marian williamingson at 10. ashley: will cain, are you surprised that trump's support has grown? it just seems like every time a legal challenge pops up, his numbers go up. are you surprised? >> no, i'm not really surprised, ashley. good morning, thanks for having me on the show. you know, i would refer to twoically i shays, two sayings for why i'm not surprised about the numbs for president trump -- the numbers for president trump. the media and the left seem to take donald trump literally but not seriously while rest of the country takes donald trump seriously but not literally. i understand the allegations of having classified documents at

mar-a-lago, but the question is, what did it matter? did it come pro-- compromise the united states? it's been done by previous poll its thes who -- politicians who didn't have the clearance be it hillary clinton or joe biden. so the american public looks at this and goes, okay, even if guilty, how serious is charge? and with president trump preponderance, they've come to trust him when it comes to the united states of america. but secondarily, the saying or the cliche is as donald trump has said, they're not after me, they're after you, i'm just standing in the way. what i mean by this is we've looked at and experienced this over many, many different can issues, russian collusion hoax to, impeachment one and two and this constant surge to take down donald trump that has manifested in propaganda in the media, lying to the public, a two-tiered justice system, and everyone realizes this is about something more than simply this

man. and so when you see his poll numbers go up, i think this is a fatigue from the public on the powers that be in the united states exposing themselves -- ashley: right. >> -- as advocacy groups when they're looking at this going with, if they'll do it to donald trump -- i mean, by the way, if it's nod donald trump that's ths the republican nominee, get ready, ron desantis'. ashley: you're right. next one, will, president biden was caught carrying a cheat sheet with information about the wagner group and the very latest in russia, but he still managed to make this gaffe. take a listen. >> reporter: has vladimir putin been weakened by recent events? >> it's hard to tell, but he's clearly losing the war in rack, and he's -- in iraq, he's become a pariah around the world. it's not just nato, it's japan -- ashley: clearly losing the war

in iraq are. i mean, he had the information in his hands. it's painful to watch, don't can you think, will? >> yeah. i mean, i would hope after a year of funding a war in ukrain- ashley: right. >> -- that you wouldn't need a cheat sheet to understand the war's not in iraq are. you know, my gut, i think everybody's gut is there's no way, there's no way he makes it to 2024 the, there's no way he survives a debate stage. there's just no way. but then you have to kind of step back from that instinctual response and say but he already did, he did it in 2020, he hid in a basement through covid. he's now governing. i mean, you could look at john fetterman or dianne feinstein or any number of democratic politicians who don't seem up for the job, and yet there's place holders for the powers that be in getting it done. so, you know, whale i'm, while i'm embarrassed that that is the standard for the president of the united states, i think we have predicate here, we have precedent to know it's probably not going to stop him. or better said, it's possibly

not going to stop democrats in attempting to win an election and push forward their agenda regardless of his -- ashley: right. and the question is who's behind him in who's pulling the strings? we'll be talking a lot about that 234 in the coming weeks and months. will cain, thank you, as always. by the way, "the new york times" ran a piece about the migrants that governor desantis the sent to martha's vineyard. lauren, a lot of media has tried to paint desantis as a villain for that, but have we heard from any of the migrants? lauren: a venezuelan who who crossed the border into texas and took that flight north where she and her family found a job and a new life. she writes this: i did not even know where martha's vineyard was, and now i feel welcomed by everybody here. i'm working, making friends, and this is home for me now. this is home now, i don't want to leave are. what's interesting is her migrant flight came to martha's vineyard at the enof the season.

-- the end of the summer. many of the migrants, they just left, went to boston, put up in shelters, etc. the ones that stayed said they found work, they're paying their own way. she rents a home with her family and works as a landscaper. ashley: even surviving the winter up there, so there you go. lauren: yeah. didn't even think of that. ashley: now this, president biden, well, he says his plan for the economy, already working. listen. >> folks, let me say this as clearly as i can, trickle down approach failed the middle class are. it failed america. it blew up the deficit, it increased inequity and it weakened our infrastructure and stripped the dignity, pride and hope out of communities one after another. i'm here to say we have a plan that's turning things around incredibly quickly. we have more work to do. ashley: more work to do. taylor riggs is here now. taylor, great to have you onboard here. voters overwhelmingly, all the polls show it, say that the

economy was better four years ago under donald trump. where is the disconnect between what joe biden tells us and what the people of this country believe? >> i think the hard part about attaching your name to something is you take credit for it, but that as means you -- also means you take blame on the other side. ill say some of the risks that we have seen, certainly, have been real weekly earnings, not hourly. those real weekly earnings, even though we all feel richer and we've all gotten wages, inflation has far outpaced that. so those real weekly earnings are now negative for 26 straight months. that is longest stretch in history, double the stretch since the 2008-2009 crisis which we thought was bad. and so you certainly have to feel like we're getting poorer. that is 993% of this -- 93% of this president's tenure. the good side is, look, gdp wassed good, jobless claims are look relative arely good, but if we're going into a recession early next yearing bank of

america the latest to say that, even if it's a mild one, that's when we're all going to the polls. you need to be careful when you're going to the polls in a recession. ashley: it is a kris key strategy -- risky strategy, for sure. tomorrow we wrap up the quarter, the first half of the year. as we look ahe to the second half of the year, taylor, what headwinds could we be facing? >> we always say the markets are not the economy. so the markets are feeling pretty good even though people at home feel things are a little bit stretched. the nasdaq 100 has a had best start to a year ever. it is over 35%. ashley: incredible. >> if you're looking at a price to earnings ratio, you're looking at this and, like, oh, things may be pretty stretched, could i actually now get in. i think maybe valuations could be a headwind with. certainly, sell in may and go away did not work. and interest rates, we heard from jay powell yesterday looking at two, maybe more interest rate hikes.

markets aren't prepared for rates to go up and they stay there for a lot longer than we expect, that could be something maybe the markets are caught off guard with. ashley: the biggest criticism is, to your point, the big tech companies, narrow number leading everything. it's not broad-based. is that a fair criticism? and do you think we can spread out the wealth a little bit? >> yes. i call it the magnificent seven. nvidia is included in that even with a little bit of a eloff, micron is -- selloff, i micron is crushing it again yesterday. to feel like this is a good,s healthy rally, we need to see it broodenned out -- broadened out. you want to see a little more than that. equal weight, if that starts to catch up a little bit, you think, okay, maybe it's outside the big tech names or a.i. lauren: why does it feel more exciting whenst just in big tech and a. a.i.? >> it's flashy. lauren: i know.

energy, it's just not as fun. ashley: that's true. i've been toll we've got to go but, taylor, thank you for being here this morning. we're going to watch you, too, this afternoon on the big show with jackie deangelis and brian brenberg. great crew. thank you for being here. all right, florida's governor, ron desantis, is slamming biden for his messaging on the economy. roll i. >> well, i can tell you what bidenomics is, martha, it is everybody pays more for basic staples of life. ashley: everybody pays more. well, desantis is not alone. new numbers show only a small percentage of americans actually approve of joe biden's handling on the economy. meantime, president biden snapping back when asked about his involvement in hunter 's chinese shakedown text. let's listen to this. >> reporter: pride, how involved were you in your son's chinese shakedown text message? were you sitting will theresome were you involvedsome. >> no! ashley: sounds just a little defensive even though he is

laughing. we're going to deal with that next. ♪ ♪

ashley: welcome back. we just saw hunter biden and his team arrive for his closed door deposition in delaware, this was literally just about 10 minutes ago. there he is with his backpack on. president joe biden snapped at reporters asking about his involvement with hunter's business dealings. roll the tape. >> reporter: president biden, how involved were you in your son's chinese shakedown text message? were you sitting there?

were you involved? >> no! ashley: well, you know what? gary shapley, the irs whistleblower, says federal investigators just completely ignored these crucial messages. listen to this. >> the importance of that whatsapp message is as an irs criminal investigators, we need to understand all the financial flows of money. we're work on an investigation on hunter biden, we're trying to assess a true and accurate tax assessment for him. sothere is money that's going elsewhere whether it's for president biden or elsewhere, we need to follow the investigative steps to insure that happens, and they were not allowed in this particular investigation. ashley: just not allowed to fully investigate. brett tolman, a former u.s. attorney, joins us this morning. brett, great to see you. you know, look, gary shapley, to me, seems a very credible person and his testimony, and he's clearly upset by what he faced. what happens now though? we know all of this this, but

what happens now? >> well, thanks for having me on. ashley: yeah. >> it truly is a staggering, you know, revelation that the son of the president, then-vice president, was basically shaking down a foreign agent for millions of dollars and demanding it. and, you know, key in that message is he references the bidens, plural. he references, you know, more than just himself. and we all know what that means. when you piece together all the other evidence, what's tragic about this and shocking is this is so inconsistent with doj's historical practice when it comes to these investigations. what this is called is sourcing investigations where you follow the flow of money in and out of accounts, ask you see who's involve ised -- involved in the conspiracy that you're starting to uncover. they were not allowed to do tha- ashley: right. >> -- and to the great detriment

of all of us. who's it going to be left to? well, if doj's not willing to do it, then congress has to step up. and, in fact, you know, this is something that justifies further investigation of what the attorney general knew -- ashley: right. >> -- and what the highest levels of the irs and the fbi and doj did in relation to this evidence. ashley: you know, brett, s&p shapley detail how the investigation into the bidens was hindered. it makes for fascinating testimony. reason to this and i'll get your thoughts -- listen to this and i'll get your thoughts. >> we weren't allowed to ask questions about dad, we weren't allowed to ask about the big guy, we weren't allowed to include certain names in document requests and search warrants. there were definitely hindrances that i've never seen before in my 14 years concerning this investigation that didn't allow us to follow through our investigation of any other individual to to include president biden. ashley: a new fox poll shows voter confidence in our

institutions is tumbling. less than 60% of people now have any confidence in the fbi. when you hear something like this, you shouldn't be surprised. what do you make of it all? >> you know, i've spent 25 the years in the criminal justice system, and, you know, keep in mind that shapley is not just, you know, a new, fresh-eyed agent with criticism for how the doj handled a tough, sensitive the television investigation -- sensitive investigation. he is a supervisory special agent with the irs that has decades of experience, and what has he been doing? he's been doing in every other case what can doj demanded, and that was to expose all those that that participated in some scheme to hide money that may have been illegally obtain thed. and here this is not a stretch that hunter biden was doing things inappropriate with money. we have fake, dummy llcs that are set up, we have whistleblowers within the companies that hunter biden was

working indicating that the big guy was joe biden. this is embarrassing for this country. all of the doubt and criticism of our institution institutional investigative units in this country is justified based on this shocking revelation. and i can't overstate it. this is a bombshell. s it is the largest conspiracy that we've uncovered that we've not been allowed to investigate fully. people should be sitting in jail like all the other cojoe average citizens out there who have been investigated for this type of behavior. ashley: well, we'll find out where this leads us but, my goodness, brett, thank you so much for joining us this morning with your input on this issue. it's not going away anytime soon, that's for sure. brett, thanks. now this, many democrats and members of the media were treating the leaked audio of donald trump discussing classified documents as a smoking gun. lauren are, is that really the case? lauren: this is a document about a military plan to the attack iran. cbs reports that document is not even in the indictment.

so as you know, trump was charged with 31 counts of specifically willfully retaining national security information. so where's the document that many in the media called the smoking gun? they were so giddy about this. so this has been described as an attempt to prove a murder without a body. so you're looking at this tape and you're saying he had this document, so so after your investigation where's the document? ashley: where's the document? lauren: toes the not even -- it's not even in, reported lu, the indictment. ashley: lauren, thank you very much. let's take a look at these futures. the s&p and nasdaq moving slightly lower, the dow jones exactly flat. we'll see where it all goes because the opening bell is coming up next. ♪ ♪ ♪

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request us your prediction, you know, what because history tell us about pre-election years? >> you know, ash, when we look back at a year like we had last year, big down year, then we had the swing up this year in the first six months, double-digit gains. we see that when that happens dating all the way back to 19509 that the next six months or into the end of the year and the next twelve months, into the middle of next year, that we will be seeing up markets on average, counsel-digit gains -- double-digit gains eight out of nine times dating back to 1950. a seasonal tailwind to give us something good here. ashley: that's encouraging. the tech-heavy nasdaq is up more than 30% in the first half of the year. will that index be the leader again, the big tech names given that interest rates are still rising?

>> i believe, ash, that the smart money is starting to look for some non-mega-tech, some of the non-big seven plays because, precisely as you say, they have been so strong. so i'm trying to find some more mid cap and small cap kind of names and indexes instead of just glomming on to the same old big seven. ashley: you know, i was looking at your pick here, and we like exotic picks. but this is one -- [laughter] that's an animal drug company. it's called zotis? the stock similar doll is zts -- symbol. tell me about it. >> they put that e in there, ash, and they're actually a new jersey company. they do both livestock and pet meds, and i think one of the big mega-trends we're going to see going forward is people willing to spend a lot more money on their pets. and this is just one way that you can may that as an

investor -- play that as an investor. and i believe that, it's an $80 billion company, not too small, a dividend just under 1% while you're waiting for them to grow. i think it's a little, like you say goesic, but it's a good place to park some money. ashley: what sector would you avoid going into the second half of the year? >> you know, i do not like the strongest sectors of the first half of the year. i would not avoid tech, but i would avoid consumer discretionary where where people have put a ton of money. i think people might get a little more defensive. ashley: d.r., great to hear from you, a little bit of laryngitis, look after that voice is. we need to hear from you. thank you. as you can see, they're waving, cheer, waving flags, the opening bell is ringing as we are heading closer to the holiday with fourth of july early next week. that take a look at the big board right out of the gate, and as you can see, there's definitely some green on there.

top of the line we have goldman sachs, jpmorgan, the banks after stress test results came out yesterday. but more red than green. the dow off about 17 points. let's take a look at the s&p if we can, down, i say down, it's almost flat, down a couple of points at 4374. the nasdaq too essentially flat, down about 3 points, 13,588 on the nasdaq. and as always, we like to show you big tech. almost all of them in the red. we have apple though bucking trend, apple is up just about a tenth of a percent. all right, let's get into some of the individual stocks. lauren is here. nvidia downplaying how bad u.s. exports restrictions could be for their chip business. what else are they going to do? lauren: yeah. the cfo said and this is a quote, no immediate financial impact. okay, but nvidia and that cfo also conceded that that if the u.s. escalates the chip ban to china, that would result in a

permanent loss of opportunities not just in china, but globally. the stock fell yesterday not even 2 percent, i mean, this is a trillion dollar chipmaker. shares up 180% this year. so a 1.8 # % fall is not much. i did want to also tell you about micron, number four on that list. it's down 1% now. it's the largest u.s. chipmaker. they issued a pretty upbeat forecast. they say a.i. is booming and the supply if excess in the pc and smartphone market is easing. translation, we passed the bottom. demand might be picking up again. maybe the street isn't convinced that the consumer's ready to spend on computers once again, because this stock is down $1. ashley: very good. all right, let's move on. we know that overstock completed its acquisition of bed bath & beyond, so the question is how are they going to handle the branding going forward? are we going to to hear from -- lauren: overstock will be bed bath & beyond. starting in august, this is after all the bed bath & beyond

stores have closed -- ashley: heir going to come back. lauren: overstock says you bo to overstock.com, you will be redirected to bed bath & beyond.com. do you think that's a good move or people have a sullied impression? ashley: they obviously think that the brand has some traction. we'll have to wait and see. abe lauren i think they don't want to be known as the place where you bought your cheep furniture and they want to -- cheap furniture. ashley: getting paid a lot of money -- lauren: -- wedding registry. $21 million for the branding of bed bath and on. i guess investors think it's worth it, the stock is surging 21%. ashley: we'll find out. fascinating. the ftc is reportedly going after amazon. why? lauren: bloomberg is reporting lena khan's ftc thinks they abuse places that use its own logistics. amazon gives those merchants better placement on the page. bloomberg says the suit will be

filed in the coming week, but look at what you have coming out of lena khan and the ftc. last week they accused amazon of enrolling millions of members -- of customers into prime, that membership, $140 a year. and then making it nearly impossible -- ashley: to get out. lauren: exactly. so this is an administration that, my opinion, a, wants to break up amazon but wants to tell you that they're protecting you from big tech. ashley: we're on to it. can't fool us. lauren: no reaction for investors today. ashley: all right. let's talk about netflix. there are those who believe it could rally some more. lauren: citi says it's going to $500. they like that ad tier, it's $7 a month. it's in a dozen markets. did you watch squid game? ashley: i did. lauren: and? ashley: bizarre. lauren: i didn't even try it. anyway, it's the most watched show ever for netflix. season two has been casted, although we don't have a premiere date yet. korean content is gold for

netflix. i've watched several of their korean dramas, and they're good. ashley: yeah. lauren: there's one about an autistic attorney, and there's one -- the queen make per. it's very good -- maker. ashley: would recollect look at you. -- look at you. lauren: binged it. ashley: let's go from squid game to the pfizer, getting a downgrade morning. down 1%. lauren: that's a big move for pfizer. pfizer doesn't move much. it's one of those very stable stocks. credit suisse cut them to neutral, and the price target was 47, they cut it to 40, which is $5 more than where it is the now. the reason is credit suisse sees greater growth opportunities for pfizer's competitors. so i said, well, what about all the obesity drugs, right? ashley: right. lauren: pfizer was working on two bills -- pills, but then they scrapped one of them. remember, it was the news on monday, i believe, issues with potential liver problems. so there's no catalyst for pfizer according to credit swee.

even in this really spicy and exciting obesity drug market. ashley: spicy and exciting, i like that. rite aid, they reported before the bell this morning. what did we find out? lauren: the stock's only $1.55. their turn-around is underway. their loss, narrow. their revenue beat expectations, but it did edge down to $5.6 billion. strong prescription growth, lots of cost cutting, so the stock is up 2 cents right now. ashley: good for a #.5% gain on a $1.55 stock. lauren, thank you very much. let's take a look at big board, why don't we, see where we are five minuteses, six minutes or so into the session. we're up 47 points on the dow. take a look at some of the dow winners if we can. we have jpmorgan chase, goldman, visa, american express and nike. four of the top winners are in the financial sector, nike the fifth. taking a look at the s&p 500 winners, wells fargo, same thing, bank of america, jpmorgan

chase and paychecks, they are among the winners in the early going. and nasdaq, paychex up there again, lucid, adp and tesla. there you go, some of the early winners on thursday morning. president biden carried a cheat sheet on the wagner group as he departed the white house and still flubbed his line on russia. watch this. >> reporter: has vladimir putin been weakened by recent events? >> it's the hard to tell, but he's clearly losing the war this in iraq. ashley: iraq? okay, we'll deal with that one. we make mistakes, but -- a former senior adviser to biden's 2020 the campaign is defending the president's message on the economy. roll that. >> it is the frustrating to see the poll numbers that you just showed around his approval rating. we're seeing a report -- record number of job satisfaction among workers. we are seeing record lows on unemployment. ashley: well, that's the the case, then why is the president's approval so low in

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ashley: welcome back, everybody. take a look at the price of apple, up another quarter of a percent, it's just hit an all-time high and it's just a little more than a dollar away from hitting a $3 trillion market valuation. rah. lauren: wow. ashley: up, up and away. all right, now this: president biden's finally on the campaign trail. he's trying to convince voters that his economic plans are working. mark meredith at the white house this morning. mark, are voters buying what the president is selling?

>> reporter: ashley, not so far at least according to the polls, but still the white house with says it is proud of its economic report. it points to the historic low unemployment rate and also says the u.s. is navigating inflation a little bit better than some of our allies. till though the president's trying to make that case. he was on the road yesterday e in chicago spending a lot of time talking about the economy, making it clear he sees this as an issue he thinks he can win on. but the president also seemed to admit he knows americans are tired of dealing with inflation, especially at the checkout counter. but when it came to the root causes, he suggested it's not washington that's responsible. >> today inflation is less than half, less than half of what it was a year ago. and that inflation caused by russia and by the war many ukraine and by what's going on. but we knew we had to do more. there's more than one way to bring down costs. >> reporter: the "wall street journal" summing up why we're hearing the president talk a lot about this, they say the white

house is going on this pr campaign because with it can read the polls. his approval rating is at 38% in the latest average, people don't hi the economy is all that great. the polls do show president remains vulnerable heading into next year's election, and the republicans already running to challenge him say they have no problem talking about the president's economic records or their thoughts on bidenomics. >> joe biden spent us blind as president, all kinds of money out there for the government that he was just precinct, and it's t caused inflation -- printing, and it's caused inflation to go upper, and the american people feel it every day. >> reporter: still, the president eager to campaign and also raise money, ashley. he's going to be the heading up to new york today for multiple campaign fundraisers. ashley: mark meredith, thank you very much. president biden telling voters his bidenomics are already working. listen. >> when i took office, the pandemic was raging and our economy was reeling. today the u.s. has the highest

economic growth rate, leading the world economies, since the pandemic. the highest in the world. [applause] and, folks, this is no accident. that's bidenomics in action. bidenomics is about building an economy from the middle out and the bottom up, not top down. ashley: okay. but voters don't seem to agree with mr.ed biden. only 34% approve of how he's actually handling the economy. so guess what? we need an economist and, thankfully, ej antony is here. ej, the president has to convince two-thirds, according to the polls, of americans that he knows what he's doing with the economy. is he going to be able to do that? >> i don't think so. frankly, it's a miracle that he even has a third support when you look at the track record. it was so sad seeing that speech, quite frankly, not just because it demonstrate thed the feeble condition of the president, but more so because instead the of actually addressing issues like falling real wages, he chose to say

those problems don't even exist and is instead blaming strawmen like trickle down economics, a theory i've heard no one espouse or implement. ashley: right. but is there any policy that that you can point out that is based on growth? some because everything he does is based on tax and spend. >> and print -- ashley: oh, yes. just get the printing machine out. >> exactly. where has the money come from to finance the trillions upon trillions of extra spending under this administration? it has come from the federal reserve financing those deficits. that is what gave us this inflation. frankly, it's appalling to hear the president talk about how inflation is half of what it was a year ago. it is still a multiple of what it was when he took office. ashley: despite what the fed has been doing. and we heard from the fed saying we could have two more rate hikes before the edge of the year. when you attach -- the end of the year. when you attach yourself to the economy as joe biden is doing, it's very risky, isn't it? we've got a ways to go before the election next year, and is we could have a version.

>> i think it's risky in this case because his policies are doing nothing but hampering the economy. if it was a reagan, for example, that we had in the white house right now that was super-charging growth, that was giving us about 12% annualized growth over a year and a half period, right? i mean, has the kind of record that you would be more than happy to attach your name. to i do think it's a mistake, what the white house is doing right now. ashley: i think people forget that with donald trump, before covid hit, we were humming, all engines were firing. it's hard for joe biden to the compare to that because people do remember the trump days and the economy being so hot. >> exactly. but i think that's part of the gaslighting strategy of this administration. to try to convince the american people don't believe your lying eyes, don't believe your empty wallet, right? you actually just need to listen to us. it's very orwellian, which is scary, but when you compare where we are today to where we were when trump left office, i completely agree with you. there is no case to be made that

we are somehow better off. the economy was growing at a $#.5 trillion annualizedded rate at the end of the trump administration. we had inflation of 1.4%. ashley: right. >> a year and a half later biden managed to achieve monthly inflation if nearly that high. ashley: bidenomics. bankrupting america. [laughter] e.j., thank you very much, appreciate. okay, more on this story, lauren, what did governor desantis have to say about bidenomics? lauren: it's more like biden-flation. reason here. >> well, i can tell you what bidenomics is, martha, it is everybody pays more for basic staples of life. people are paying way more for groceries, paying way more for other necessities like utilities, the cost of buying a new home has gone up dramatically because all the materials have gone up. a. lauren: yeah. so he says the white house is running on these policies where we all pay more and, you know what? we accepted it. i remember the results from the mid midterm elections. we were trying to figure out why republicans did so bad with, and we kind of all collectively

agreed at least on the show it's because americans still have jobs. so they can aboard these higher prices for now -- afford these higher prices for now. but as the economy slows down and prices don't come down meaningfully, you're tapped out. seven in ten americans that live in cities say we live paycheck to paycheck because the cost of everything is just so high. ashley: we're going backwards, basically. lauren: yeah. you have a job, but you're going backwards -- ashley: exactly. your money doesn't go as far. by the way, in case you didn't know it, tomorrow's friday. and you know what that means, don't forget to send in your friday feedback, comments, critiques, good or bad we love them all -- well, kind of. [laughter] lauren: they're funny. thick skin. ashley: varneyviewersfox.com. gas prices in california way higher than the national average, we know that, but those the prices are going to go up even more starting this weekend. we're going to the tell you why. and in just over an hour, virgin galactic will launch its

first ever commercial space flight. lauren is going to have all the details -- lauren: i'm not on it. i'm not one of the paying customers. ashley: we couldn't afford it. we'll have the story next. ♪ flying high again ♪

ashley: virgin galactic is getting set to launch their first commercial space flight in just over an hour from now. lauren, you're following all of this. what should we expect? it's not like a normal launch though, is it? lauren: it's not, and the stock is down 2% leading into this. i would say we pray for a safe journey. virgin galactic and its competitors are truly hoping for that, reliable, repeatable journey to space to open up space tourism eventually to the to the masses. so at 10:30 a.m. eastern time, galactic zero one will take off from spaceport america in new mexico carrying 6 passengers and 13 experiments. unlike typical space travel, this is not a rocket taking off are from a launch pad. virgin galactic uses a twin

fuselage jet that carries a jet rocket and will go 50,000 feet up. then the, at 11 eastern, that rocket will be dropped and ignite, serving the crew into with subor bittal space. they'll experience the weightlessness of space for a few minutes 50 miles above the desert before starting their descent. the mission is a scientific one. there are passengers that are italian scientists. the importance remains the same, people are paying big bucks to go to space. in this case it's $450,000 per seat. that cash will go a long way helping the company build up its space fleet so it can cospace tourism flights -- do space tourism flights once a month hopefully starting in august. put this on the calendar do, right? it comes less than a day after the remains and the goesgate titan submersible -- oceangate titan submersible was pull out

of the ocean which has led ecoto the a debate about how race risky -- risky these can be. extreme tourism is being questioned. so, again, we'll see what what transpires today. it's a huge deal. ashley: it is. and it actually comes back to earth like a normal landing. lauren: yes. ashley: it glides in after being in space or on the edge of space. lauren: yes. but hi of all the science advances you could make -- think of all the science advances. ashley: quick look at the markets as we head to the break, mixed bag. up on the dow and the s&p, down on the nasdaq. still ahead on the show, byron york, brian kilmeade, tom fitton. the 10:00 hour of "varney" is next. ♪ feeling good like i should ♪

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ashley: bad to t