a nebulizer can be easier to use and more effective than an inhaler. plus, medicare part b or your advantage plan may cover the costs. so, call med4home today. we're a pharmacy that specializes in respiratory medications with pharmacists available 24/7. we'll help with things like talking to your doctor and filling out the paperwork. we'll even check in when it's time to refill. and ship to your home. so, why deal with the inconvenience of using an inhaler all day long? enjoy greater freedom by going longer between treatments. it's all possible with a portable nebulizer and long-lasting medication... from med4home. ♪ ♪ here we go, let's get loud, let's get loud ♪

ashley: a bit of j ohio to perk you up -- jlo to perk you up on this friday morning. looking at the empire state building. a little hazy, a little muggy. good morning, everyone. i'm ashley webster in for stuart varneyed today. two two out of the three major exchanges are in the positive, the s&p up slightly, the nasdaq up a third of a percent but the dow ever so slightly lower. it's very much treading water right now. take a look at the 10-year treasury yield. we like to keep an eye on this, that has a big bearing especially on the nasdaq. up 2.8 basis point at 4.06%. meanwhile, the price of oil, where are we with oil in it's on the way up, 88 centss at $72.68 per barrel. and let's finish up with bitcoin. it was down slightly, now it's up slightly, up $164 at $30,382. all right, now this: a new poll shows 62% of americans think that a donald trump's classified

documents trial should be held before the 2024 election. interesting. tammy bruce joins me now. do you agree with that, tammy? >> i do. this entire thing the americans are seeing this as political. this would help maybe dispel that a little bit. but americans want to have a result. no matter what that result is, they want to see. they want the government, i think, to put up and show us what's going on. if they wait until after the election, it seems even more political -- ashley: yeah. >> and so i think that transparency requires it but also for people to have trust in the election, trust in the nature of why this was done, i think until be important. i think -- i don't know president trump in a manner of knowing what he would prefer, but i think that no matter what, this should happen before the election. ashley: or is it some people saying, you know what? if he's found guilty, it takes him out of the gop race -- >> does it? ashley: it doesn't, no, he can run -- >> no, it doesn't.

and i think that the american people also, obviously, with his lead now there is baked into that the fact that he may be found guilty. 9 and the problem is the legitimacy of the government, that even that kind of finding would not necessarily be taken seriously because it has been, there's been so much of a political focus on getting this man, and that's the government's own fault and and shame on them. but, yeah -- ashley: it's why his support has been, you know, bolsteredded. >> well, it is. and this is an underestimation of the american people. they should look at the nature of his support as a statement about what has been going on in this country can. ashley: and the lack of trust the in the government. >> exactly. ashley: all right. i want to go on to this, tammy. governor desantis' wife, casey, just launched a new campaign ad. she's pitching her husband as the candidate for parents. watch this. >> you come after our kids, we fight back. because there's nothing we won't

do to protect our children. they're not yours. ashley: all right, tammy. do you think this mamas for desantis movement is a smart move? does it resonate? >> well, it's not something that you even have to create. normally you want to do something like that to define something. already the parents' movement has been going on now for years, and glenn youngkin's a creation, a product of that. he's made some noise that he might jump into this. so this is an american movement that already exists. if he wants to -- and, look, every candidate, this is what america's about, right? ashley: yeah. >> normally their parents are not going to be politically active necessarily, they've got busy lives. and now they've been forced to get active, and that's fine. they're part of the sovereignty of our nation. and this has been going on though, and it's already affected a number of races. if they want to try to define it, that's fine. but i think that it's not going to, you know, introduce something new. i like the tone of that message -- ashley: yeah. >> she's going to be a tremendous asset to him.

she already has been. she's an impressive young woman. they've got a great family. but the fact is, that is it's almost like he's trying to get in front of a movement that's already begun. ashley: it's interesting, who is it that -- wasn't it sarah palin that came up with mama grizzlies? >> yeah. and the establishment at that time was wondering if she had some kind of focus group to figure that out. no. [laughter] this just was natural. that resonated. and just like soccer moms, you know -- ashley: oh, yeah. >> don't underestimate the women of this country, what matters to us, the democrats it's all about a abortion. the fact of the matter is women want to be able to have an economy where they can actually, if they have a surprise pregnancy as an example, that they can choose to keep it. that this is -- i want every woman to have the freedom of being able to make a choice that is a genuine choice. right now the democrats, of course, have benefited from victimhood and no choices and a bad economy, and now, of course,

it's a reminder that parents matter, our choices matter, women matter and, of course, moms matter. ashley: casey desantis, by the waying used to be this tv news, so she knows how to work the camera, no doubt about it. >> it's a natural approach. i think for those of us in the business you like it or you don't, it's got to be natural. ashley: always great stuff. tammy bruce. >> gate to be here. ashley: florida's republican party is going to require 2024 candidateses to sign a loyalty pledge in order to take part in the state's primary next year. lauren, because that mean that trump and desantis may not be on the ballot? lauren: you see either one of them pledging to support each other? ashley: nope. lauren: they've dodged the question thus far. they would have to support whoever the gop presidential nominee is in order to compete in the florida primary next march. the state just filed this new requirement. it does align with the rnc which is mandating the pledge before the august debate. ashley: and they're sticking to it, aren't they?

lauren: i feel like desantis would do the pledge before trump. ashley: yeah. he needs to get out on stage and have more people see him. we told you yesterday that donald trump has racked up $35 million in donations from april to june. that's a lot of money. what about governor desantis? how much has he raked in? lauren: it's 20 million but it's in 6 weeks. that's pretty sizable. and his campaign says look at these numbers, don't look at the poll numbers. his superpac raised $130 # million. $150 # million is behind desantis recently. and we have donald trump, he will be in council bluffs, iowa, at 2:00 eastern this afternoon. he will go after desantis for opposing his federal mandate to use iowa's ethanol and ethanol in general in fuel. ashley: okay. lauren: and then he heads over to north dakota on saturday to kick start -- to nevada to kick tart the grassroots movement, and nevada is trying to move from a primary state to a caucus state. aaron. ashley: they're on trail, for

sure. lauren, thank you very much. we had a weaker than expected jobs report, 209,000 jobs created in the month of june. right now, as you can see, the dow slightly off, but the s&p and nasdaq just slightly higher. let's bring in luke lloyd. luke, i read your notes -- >> hey, ashley. ashley: good to ceo you this morning -- see you this morning, sir. you are sounding the alarm on a credit crunch. >> yeah. so, you know, my father taught me how to be a good poker player back in the day, ashley. it feels like we've flopped a straight so far, but the problem is we haven't seen turn of the river yet, the consumer, the fed and businesses are still in the game. and the fed is betting heavy in pushing a lot of chips right now the take all of us out of the game by raising interest rates. and looks like consumers and businesses aren't back out yet. we usually talk about credit card debt rising because middle class america is getting squeezed from inflation. but we already forgot what happened in march of this year with the banking system. this is one of the worst years

in terms of major bringses of firms with over $-- bankruptcies with over $50 million in debt. the market is now pricing in the possibility that we go to 6% on the fed funds rate. that's a whole 150 # basis points from when things started breaking in march. and nobody talks about the corporate debt levels. they've actually risen the past couple of quarterses which is fine when rates are low, but all these companies are financing new debt at higher rates. that means lower margins and slower economic growth and, ultimately, i don't think the fed's bluffing. ashley: it's interesting because in your notes you say t getting harder and harder for the average worker to climb the ladder because of socialistic policies like bidenomics which, by the way, the president is touting around the country as the savior of the economy. bit of a disconnect to what you believe. >> yeah. huge disconnect. the cool thing about business in our capitalistic, free market system is when things get out of whack, this is something to reset it. and the best and most product if

i have rise to the top, the least -- productive rise to the top, the least productive get replaced. it is getting harder and harder for the little guy because of policies like bidenomics, redirection of wealth. at the end the most productive and those at the top end up taking care of those at the bottom, and and human nature does not work that way. these are horrible policies for the long term. eventually and, hopefully, you know, the pendulum swings from this side to the other side. ashley: luke, you're nicely wound up now, and i want to get your thought on this story. lauren, we found out that six states in the south have contributed more to the national gdp than states in the northeast which seems kind of opposite what it's always been. lauren: yeah. we don't usually see that. americans move, and as we moved, we took $1000 billion in wealth and companies with us. so these are the states, or florida, texas, georgia, north and south carolina and tennessee producing a combined gdp of 4.6 trillion haas year.

then -- last year. then you take the northeast which is home to the popular d.c., new york, boston corridor, that was up 4.4 trillion last year. so this cements -- two things. it cements the sun belt as the new influence center, perhaps. and speaking of abortion, yes, it's a moral issue for so many americans, but clearly people didn't mind the abortion issue when they decided to move from the northeast -- ashley: that's very true. all right, luke, come back in here. so really the rush has been toward states that have lower taxes, lower regulation, lower government involvement. in other words, free market states. that's what this is all about, right? >> yeah. i mean or, we just got done celebrating the fourth of july. we celebrated freedom and american values, and freedom and american values always wins in the end. i reflected a lot this year about a how far away we are from what america was supposed to be. we are tabsed to death, the government's -- taxed to death can, the government's bigger than ever, and a lot of people

are getting frustrated. we can all kind of reinvent our lives by going to to different states that reflect what we want as americans, economic and social freedom. in the end, economic prosperity leads to freedom. essentially, a lot of people rejecting, like i said, bidenomics. the concern is how do we look in 10 years, 20 years, 30 years? the pendulum always swings from one side to the other. bad policies change people's opinions. it's entirely possible florida and texas turn blue in my lifetime and new york and california turn red because of this. ashley: crazy stuff but very well put. luke, thanks so much for joining us, appreciate it. >> thanks, ashley. ashley: thank you. >> have a good weekend. ashley: yes, you too. you're looking at some of the movers, costco is an expensive stock but it's down more than 1%. lauren lauren it's for stuart today. it's his 75th birthday. unfortunately, the costco shores are down today.

same-store sales declined in june to the tune of 1.4%. ashley: alibaba. lauren: they've got a new toy. you can text a system to create an image for you, a sketch, a 3-d cartoon. it's a beta version, and it's available in china -- ashley: stu would say to that, so what? [laughter] and he'd roll his eyes at the same time. let's i move op on. -- on. lauren: downgraded to neutral, price target of 41 from 50, analysts put them op on negative catalyst watch. people haven't been going for quite some time, visitation numbers are are not good. they report in a couple of weeks. ashley: thank you very much. let's move on. now this, vice president harris, she's at it again with another word salad. watch this. >> culture is, it is a reflexion of our moment and our time, right? and, and present culture is the

way we express how we're feeling about the moment. ashley: that wasn't the full clip, but we will play that later in our show. meantime, russian fighter jets bullying american drones over syria for the second time in two days, so how should the white house sunday to growing russian aggression? michael pillsbury will take that on. and right now treasury secretary janet yellen is in beijing meeting with senior chinese officials to try and smooth things over as tensions rise between the u.s. and china. edward lawrence is there, and he's going to have a full report from beijing next. ♪ ♪ why can't we be friends? ♪ why can't we be friends? ♪ providing for your family is a top priority. but what happens when you need affordable health care?

christian health care ministries could save you up to 40% today. as a member, you can choose your provider without network restrictions. sign up at your convenience with our anytime enrollment. join a christian community that supports each other's medical expenses, offering peace of mind as you prioritize what's most important. enroll now at your chm dot org

back in the day, sneaker drops meant getting online to wait in line. now with xfinity mobile... ...we get the fastest mobile service and can get the freshest kicks asap. i got this. save hundreds a year over t-mobile, at&t and verizon with the best price for two lines of unlimited. nice job, little sis! they grow up so fast... i'm a fan.

from xfinity. we moved out of the city so our little sophie could appreciate nature. but then he got us t-mobile home internet. i was just trying to improve our signal, so some of the trees had to go. i might've taken it a step too far. (chainsaw revs) (tree crashes) (chainsaw continues) (daughter screams) let's pretend for a second that you didn't let down your entire family. what would that reality look like? well i guess i would've gotten us xfinity... and we'd have a better view. do you need mulch? what, we have a ton of mulch.

♪ ♪ ashley: treasury secretary janet is yellen meeting with senior chinese officials again today the in beijing. she's there to try and ease escalating tensions e over national security and technology. edward lawrence is traveling with the secretary in beijing and joins us now. edward, gives us the latest on today's meetings. >> reporter: so, ashley, she's on a mission here of listening and explaining so there are no misunderstandings with the chinese, and that's according to her. this morning in beijing very early friday morning she met with the former vice premier and then her first public appearance was with american business representatives. sitting around this table are representatives from boeing, bank of america, s&p global and others. a senior treasury official says their main concern was just continuing to do business in

china, but all eyes on the early afternoon. that's where she met the second high ranking person in the communist party at the great hall building and said this: >> we see hope in economic competition that is not winner take all, but with a fair set of rules that will benefit both of our countries. >> reporter: so a senior treasury official calling the meeting candid and constructive but saying they only talked about broad strokes without detailing pushback in any one area. they that has yet to change its behavior in any area. republicans saying the u.s. looks weak with the secretary of state antony blinken going to beijing in mid june and only the promise of more meetings out of all of this. >> and so i think it's unfortunate that janet yellen's over there. she's an academic, i think she's naive enough to think if you continue to feed the alligator, that the alligator won't eat you, but china doesn't share our

interests or value, and i'd much rather have the general that you had on the tv before over there negotiating with them instead of secretary yellen. >> reporter: saying, basically, anybody over there negotiating. now, the chinese is are stepped up their restrictions, actually. they now are two rare earth minerals that are used in making semiconductors and other advanced technology in the u.s., that's on a restricted list now, and so businesses in america would have to get licenses to get that material. that's china's latest salvo. ashley? ashley: edward lawrence in beijing, thank you so much for that. i want to bring in michael pillsbury now. good to see you, michael. we heard all sorts of expressions from edward's report there. you field a crocodile, it's still going -- feed a crocodile, it's still going to eat you. do you think secretary yellen is accomplishing anything here? certainly, china, is it a competitor, a partner or just a plain adversary? >> well, as i have said to you

before, ashley, their perceive janet yellen as their friend. they see her as a pro-china voice and the advisers around president biden. so what they're doing here is a larger strategy. the chinese are simply refusing to negotiate. they won't enter into talks at all. they're refusing to restart the military channel to try to prevent accidental war. why? because we have sanctions on their defense minister. so this kind of trip is really a hopeless maneuver, in my view, because there's no actual negotiations going on. what president trump did, i think because of his real estate background in new york, he really forced hawaii jinping to the table -- xi jinping to the table. it began at their dinner decembers 1st, and then the deadline was set that night at the dinner. you have 90 days to negotiate a trade agreement with us. here's the rough draft. it was 90 pages long, by

coincidence. and the deadline wasn't exactly met, but there was a trade agreement. and there was a back and forth, ashley, for three or four months over specific paragraphs and and language and enforcement. nothing like that's happening with china now. the biden team has kind of scared china that they're going to defend taiwan and they've cut off the chips, the smartest chips being sold. so the chinese are confused when janet yellen comes to town and says, you know, we're not trying to contain you, we wanted more investment and more trade. that's not credible to the chinese, nor does it get negotiations going. she has no draft talks. and there's a huge issue for the chinese, ashley. they're afraid that biden is going to do what trump wanted to do, put capital controls, restrictions on investment into the chinese high-tech sector. this would really slow down china's growth rate. they're really afraid of that, and they see janet yellen as against it because people at treasury, economists, they're

always against investment restrictions. so that's what's at stake here. a i'm not optimistic it's going to the make any difference. ashley: i hear you. i want to change subjects if we can, michael. for a second straight day, russian jets bullying american drones over the skies of syria. this time dropping parachute-borne flares into the flight path and, by the way, this is how the pentagon is responding. watch this. >> clearly meant to harass and cheerily unprofessional and unsafe -- clearly unprofessional and unsafe behavior on the part of the russians. we call on the russian forces to cease this type of reckless behavior and to behave like professional airmen. ashley: i don't think that's the word i would probably use when talking about russia's operations in that pa part of the world. what do you make of the pentagon's message in. >> i had many long years in the pentagon, ashley, so i know how they speak. this is pretty extreme. this is a warning to the

russians, to putin, don't do this. and, frankly, the other part of this is we're in back channels telling the chinese, don't help russia. a this' our geopolitical nightmare. these e drones -- china makes really high quality drones. so far they have not gone to russia, or if they have not for use in ukraine. this is the nightmare, that china all of a sudden says, all right, americans are being too tough on us, we're going to provide lethal aid to russia. then the pentagon will really have to start speaking more bluntly and warning both miss cow and beijing. moscow and bay beijing. i'm afraid we're on the verge of that happening, ashley. ashley: gave -- i've got to get this one in, a group of former national security folks held secret talks with russias -- russians, clearly trying the lay the groundwork for peace negotiation. is it this kind of diplomacy, do you think, will end the war in

ukraine? >> back channel diplomacy sometimes works. often it's amateurish and don't know the issues, and they just confuse everybody. when it's professionals who understand some of the issues of how are we going to enforce a ceasefire in the ukraine, then back channel talks can help. so i'm not against back channel, but you need people who know what they're talking about, or you just mislead both sides, ashley. things can get worse. ashley: yeah, we don't want that. we covered a lot of ground, michael, and as always, really appreciate your expertise in these areas. very much appreciate it. >> thanks, ashley. ashley: thank you. all right, now this, twitter sending meta a cease e and desist order over their new threads app. we'll have the latest on the escalating feud between musk and zuckerberg next. also, actor derek cameron is taking a -- actor kirk cam cameron is taking a stand against the library association, saying it's discriminating against him by telling libraries

not to hold his upcoming book event. what? kirk cameron joins me next. ♪ that's me in the spotlight losing my religion. ♪ trying to keep up with you. ♪ and i don't know if i can do it ♪

ashley: all right, let's take a look at these market, rather mixed today as we found out that the jobs market in june cooled off a little more than expected. the nasdaq essentially flat and the s&p slightly down. all right, lauren, come in here. a market that's kind of treading water. you're looking at some movers. let's begin with paramount. lauren: it's down and warner brothers down by 1.25%. both god a downgrade at wolf research, they are blaming an expected drop in television advertising, specifically the up-front deals when you get the money, sign the deal but as a broadcast later, you have fewer this them. ashley: what's biogen doing today? lauren: they have an alzheimer's drug granted full fda approve. medicare say it's going to cover much of the $26,5000 cost.

the stock is down 1. i'm going to go with buy the rumor, sell the news. ashley: that's expensive, mid goodness. but very encouraging as well. endphase energy, what's about? lauren: the solar stocks are doing welled the to, the president announcing a $600 million -- 60 million investment in enphase and creating 1800 new jobs. ashley: lauren, thank you very much. now this, twitter is considering taking legal action against meta's new social media platform threads. kelly o'grady joins us this morning. how is meta responding to that threat? >> reporter: well, ashley, right now meta shared a a no comment to us when we required about their response, but there are reports of some meta employees claiming on the threads platform that no former twitter employees worked on this project at all. hours after launching day one of threads, the twitter legal team sent a cease and desist letter to ceo mark zuckerberg. they accused threads of stealing

twitter's trade secrets and warned them that they plan to strictly enforce their intellectual property rights. so the twitter legal counsel argued, quote, meta has mired dozens of -- hired dozens of former twitter employees assigning them to develop in a mart of months meta's copycat threads act with intent that they use twitter's trade secrets. of course, elon musk jumped in and tweeted, quote, competition is fine, cheating is not. admittedly, there are a number of similarities between the two apps. threads has that look and feel of twitter, and mark zuckerbergs has even admitted that the a app is a direct competitor. i did speak with a number of legal experts, and they say any court battle is likely going to be uphill for twitter because the biggest thing is that that u.s. copyright law doesn't protect ideas. so twitter would have to prove that its own intellectual property -- say, its programming cold, for example -- was actually taken in this case. if you do -- the headline is

this threat of legal evidence shows twitter is worried. they've had small competitors before, but nothing with the strength of meta behind i. just because an app has hype doesn't mean it has staying power, but threads only needs 1 in 4 of existing instagram users to sign up to match the existing twitter user base. it's not impossible, right? ashley: that's exactly right. kelly, thank you very much. very interesting, indeed. by the way, i want to show you this. we've got a new poll that shows that our faith in american institutions is at a record low, so question, lauren, how bad is it? lauren: yeah. confidence in all 16 institutions fell. ashley: all of them. lauren: this year from last year, yep. gallup puts congress at the bottom of list, just 8% of americans have confidence in our lawmakers. television news at 14 percent. looked at this, big tech, public schools and the president of the united states tie at 26% each. churches coming in at 32%.

ashley: tv news is down with congress? that's terrible. [laughter] thank you very much, lauren. lauren: it's not funny, but i laugh. ashley: disappointing. let's bring in actor kirk cameron. great to see you. let me just begin there, why do you think we've lost so much faith especially in organized religion? what's going on? >> well, as you just pointed out, we seem as a country to be losing faith in all of our institutions, and that's because i think we're seeing behind the curtain that there's deception and corruption going on. and it knows no bounds. we see it in church, we see it within people's own marriages, we see it, obviously, in politics. we can see it in the financial sector. and it seems as though there is this evil plot to somehow deconstruct and disorganize our social fabric, our economic fabric for the purpose of reorganizing it toward a different goal. and think that's why people are starting to hunker down and say, man, we need to figure out

what's going on and come up with some alternative channels and methods or this whole hinge's going to implode. ashley: i think you're right. you say the american library association is responsible for religious discrimination. it involves your books, your books of faith that you write, children's books. what exactly is going on? >> yeah. absolutely, they are. the ala, the american library association, is recommending to libraries all across the countrc libraries -- that they find ways of blocking families who want to take their children to the library and read books as part of our see you at the library event on august 5th. so the idea is, hey, your kids are being force fed this trans agenda and so much corruption and immoral any their schools and in their libraries, why don't you let parents bring their kids up for air and talk to them about faith, hope and love and read them some books at the library? and the director of the ala's

office for intellectual freedom says here's how you can block these families from coming to the library. it's religious discrimination, and they're putting local libraries in legal jeopardy by encouraging them to do this. ashley: it's outrageous. and, you know, i was reading on your web site here, it says all of our books teach kids traditional american values. where is the danger there? where is the threat that makes the the ala want to do this? >> there's a great threat to marxists. it's a great threat to communists. it is the hope of lasting liberty in our republic and in any republic. and here's the great news, if i can use some, a metaphor from the lord of the rings, the message has gotten back to the shire, and the hobbits are battling for the battle against the orks. this is exciting chapters in the story, and i'm so glad that i know the author. the ending is fabulous. [laughter] ashley: i love it. well, we wish you the very best of luck with your continued

fight with the ala. i have no idea why they're doing this, but the more we talk about it, the more i hope that they will back down. kirk cameron, thank you so much for joining us. >> thank you. thanks for having me on today. ashley: oh, our pleasure. now this, the governor of wisconsin, tony evans, just made a huge investment into public schools. what's that about a, lauren? lauren: oh, okay. let's give him an an j + for creativity a+. he legally removed some numbers and a hyphen from the state legislature, stay with me, to boost public school funding by $325 per child, per year for 402 years. for 402 years. s this is how he did it. so this increase was slated for 2024-2025. ashley: got it. lauren: he made that the year 2425. it's great for the schools, horrible for property taxes. and that was the governor's way of, i guess, vetoing the republican legislature. ashley: pretty creative, i'll

have to do that. lauren: it's legal. they can do that there. ashley: now this, congresswoman alexandria ocasio-cortez is worried the that president biden is going to derail a bipartisan push to study psychedelic drugs. we'll have that story coming up. and and there's a new twist in the mystery of how cocaine made its way into the white house, this as biden administration dodges all a questions e on the matter. we'll have the latest on cocainegate right after this. ♪ if you want to be down, down on the ground, cocaine ♪

living with metastatic breast cancer means i cherish my memories. but i don't just look back on them, i look forward to the chance to make new ones every day with verzenio. verzenio is proven to help you live significantly longer when taken with fulvestrant. verzenio + fulvestrant is for hr+, her2- metastatic breast cancer that has progressed after hormone therapy. diarrhea is common, may be severe, or cause dehydration or infection. at the first sign, call your doctor, start an antidiarrheal, and drink fluids. before taking verzenio, tell your doctor about any fever, chills, or other signs of infection. verzenio may cause low white blood cell counts, which may cause serious infection that can lead to death. life-threatening lung inflammation can occur. tell your doctor about any new or worsening trouble breathing, cough, or chest pain. serious liver problems can happen. symptoms include fatigue, appetite loss, stomach pain, and bleeding or bruising. blood clots that can lead to death have occurred. tell your doctor if you have pain or swelling in your arms or legs, shortness of breath, chest pain and rapid breathing or heart rate or if you are nursing, pregnant, or plan to be. i'm making future memories every day with verzenio. ask your doctor about everyday verzenio.

ashley: vice president kamala harris gave a rather wordy response when trying to describe what culture means. watch this. >> well, i think culture is, it

is a reflection of our moment in our time, right? and, and present culture is the way we express how we're feeling about the moment. and we should always find times to express how we feel about the moment that is a reflection of joy, because, you know, it comes in the morning -- [laughter] ashley: comes in the morning. i have no idea what that was. it was another confusing statement in a long line of word salads from the vice president, and it didn't take long for twitter to react. our very own liz peek tweeted this: oh, my god, what is wrong with this babbling brook of a woman? doug powers joked, can somebody tell kamala she shouldn't be eating gummy -- every gummy in the package? if oh, well. now this: before heading to the

beach, president biden is going to give a speech on how his administration plans to cut health care costs. he wants to crack down on short-term health insurance plans that were expanded under donald trump. griff jenkins joins me now from the white house. great to see you, griff. give us the details on this. >> reporter: good morning, ashley. you're right, president biden a's got work to do before it's beach time. this is being billed as a major announcement on the administration's plans to lower health care costs and make insurance more reliable for americans with a hard focus on lowering those prescription drug prices especially for seniors. we expect that they are announce granting medicare the authority to negotiate those prices as well as an effort to take on big pharma. we also will hear about new steps the crack down on what they're calling junk insurance which as you referred to, ashley, the short-term limited duration ininsurance they say doesn't provide comprehensive coverage. announcement comes amid pressure and division within the democratic party.

senator bernie sanders has taken a tough stand, threatening to hold up confirmations telling the "the washington post" this saying i will oppose all nominations until we have a very clear strategy on the part of the government as to how we're going to lower the outrageously high cost of prescription drugs. now, today's announcement is part of the president's broader efforts of bidenomics. they say by giving more americans access to affordable health care9, it will help in that effort, but republicans like nikki haley is taking a hard aim at it. listen here. >> he should be clawing back the $500 billion of unspent covid collars. instead of 87,000 irs agents going after middle america, he should be going after the hundreds of billions in covid fraud. groceries and gas are still high. american families feel it. you can call it whatever you want, but it's not the american dream. >> reporter: president biden's remarks come at 3:30 this afternoon in the east room. we will see whether republicans

have anything to say about it or senator bernie sanders, if he's happy with the results of this plan. my guess is though, ashley, if i had to wager, any reporters in the room will is ask about that details of cocainegate as you teased before the break. ashley: it's the burning question of the day, griff. thank you very much, we really appreciate it. and talking of which, let's get back to the cocaine found inside the white house. i never thought i'd be saying that line, but there it is. are there any leads at all? lauren: well, yes. however, we might never know the answer. ashley: why? lauren: to whose cocaine that was in the white house. the secret service says that the dna testing is underway, but they're warning us, they set very low expectations that that data might come back inconclusive. but everybody's wondering, hmm, was it hunter's in and instead of just saying, no, it was not hunter biden, the white house said this -- >> former president trump has made some pretty wild posts recently on social media, one of

them was that the cocaine found in the white house was, had belonged to either the president or his son. are you willing to say that's not the case and they don't belong to them? >> i don't want have -- i don't have a response to that because we have to be careful about hatch about. what i will say is i have noticed there does seem to be some increasing frustration coming from that corner in general. and and i think it is the probably rooted in the contrast between their substantive policy records. ashley: what was that? lauren: i don't know, and it was also a ridiculous invocation of the hatch act which prevents federal employees from commenting on political matters. honestly, just do do what kjp did and say, well, we refer all matters to the secret service or say, no, it was not president's or his son's, just deny it. ashley: all right. let's with go to this, new york congresswoman alexandria ocasio-cortez is worried that

joe biden might derail congress' push to to study psych odellics. psychedelics. why doesn't she think the president's onboard? lauren: because of negative comments he's made about marijuana, and she says i believe the president has displayed a redepressiveness for cannabis policy, and if there is a regressiveness towards cannabis policy, it's likely to be worse on anything else. this was an unlikely pairing, ao to c and texas republican congressman dan crenshaw working to to loosen federal limits on science and research for psychedelics. i know you're scratching your head, but crenshaw is a veteran, and use of micro-dosing has shown to be, you know, successful with lessening ptsd and other symptomses. ashley: yeah, very true. >> lauren: they just want to research it more, and they don't think the president's going to support them. ashley: that concludes our report on drugs -- lauren: are you sure?

ashley: an iphone from 2007 is hitting the auction block, and how much could it go for? $1000,000. mark montero is going to take us through all of the collectibles coming up next. ♪ ♪ i was told my small business wouldn't qualify for an erc tax refund. you should get a second opinion from innovation refunds at no upfront cost. sometimes you need a second opinion. [coughs] good to go. yeah, i think i'll get a second opinion. all these walls gotta go! ah ah ah! i'd love a second opinion. no. i'm going to get a second opinion. with innovation refunds, there's no upfront cost to find out. so why not check like i did for my small business? take the first step to see if your small business qualifies for the erc.

with a majority of my patience with sensitivity, i see irritated gums and weak enamel. sensodyne sensitivity gum & enamel relieves sensitivity, helps restore gum health, and rehardens enamel. i'm a big advocate of recommending things that i know work. - representative! - sorry, i didn't get that. - oh buddy! you need a hug. you also need consumer cellular. get the exact same coverage as the nation's leading carriers and 100% us based customer support. starting at $20. consumer cellular.

is it possible to protect my business from cyber threats? it is, with comcast business. helping every connected device stay protected. yours. your employees'. even... susan? -hers, too. safe. secure. and powered by the next generation 10g network. with comcast business, advanced security isn't just possible.

it's happening. get started with fast speeds and advanced security for $39 a month for 12 months with no annual contract. plus ask how to get up to a $500 prepaid card with a qualifying gig bundle. bridgett is here. she has no clue that i'm here. she has no clue who's in the helmet. are you ready? -i'm ready! alright. xfinity rewards creates experiences big and small, and once-in-a-lifetime.

ashley: all right, now this: mark montero of lcg auctions joins us. mark, great to see you. you've got some iphones up for auction. let's begin with a 2007 factory-sealed iphone. how much do you think you'll get for it? why is it special? >> over 16 years old, the first iphone was released june 29th, 2011. it came in both 4 and 8-gigabyte models. they've become highly collectible, and brand new, factory-sealed condition. in fact, we sold one last october for a record $39,000. we followed that up with another record sale in february for $63,000. ashley: oh, my goodness.

>> both of those, both were 8-gigabyte models. several other 8-gigabyte models have sold since. here we have a 4-gigabyte model. now, apple discontinued the 4-gigabyte model only 2 months in, so they're exceedingly rare. this one comes to us directly from a member of apple's engineering team back in 2007. it's impeccable. we think it's going to break the all-time record, and we think it's going to go up to $100,000. ashley: wow. i should have bought with one and held on to it, but i don't have that patience. let's turn to the toys and collectibles, mark. you also have a is the 84 transformer -- a 1984 transformer. which one? how much are you expecting to get for it? >> this is one of our most highly anticipated items ever. one like this, in factory-sealed condition of this caliber, has not come to the market in years. this is actually a walt they are

p -- walther p-38 that transforms. this toy is banned on domestic flights across the u.s. it's a megatron. there's a taboo nature to this one, and we think i may break the all-time the record for a 1980s toy and could go up to $40,000. ashley: incredible. i've got 30 seconds, mark. you've got a ghostbusters vhs. remember that? how much? >> yes, vhs. this originally came out in 1985. it retailed between $70-80 back then. this is the very first print. it's factory-sealed. it's are very rare. we think this one ooh's going to go between $a 5-10,000. ashley: wow. the key is get it, hang on to it and wait 15, 16 years. mark, fascinating stuff. thanks so much for joining us today. really appreciate it. good luck with the auction. still ahead, california

congressman darrell issa, steve hilton and jonathan hoenig. the 1 11 a.m. hour of "varney & company" is next. ♪ boy you're looking like you like what you see ♪

if you have this... and you get this... you could end up with this... unexpected out-of-pocket costs. which for those on medicare, or soon to be,

is a good reason to take charge of your health care. so consider this. an aarp medicare supplement insurance plan from unitedhealthcare. why? because medicare alone doesn't pay for everything. and what it doesn't pay for, like deductibles and copays, could really add up. even thousands of dollars a year. medicare supplement plans help by paying some of what medicare doesn't... and making your out-of-pocket costs a lot more predictable. call unitedhealthcare today and ask for your free decision guide. learn more about plan options and rates to fit your needs. now if you like this... greater freedom... you'll love that medicare supplement plans have no networks and no referrals needed... see any doctor. any specialist. anywhere in the u.s. as long as they accept medicare patients. these types of plans also give you more flexibility

when traveling in the u.s. your plan goes with you... anywhere you go in the country. even better, these are the only plans of their kind endorsed by aarp. call unitedhealthcare today for your free decision guide. so if you have this and want less out-of-pocket costs... and more peace of mind... consider adding this. an aarp medicare supplement plan. take charge of your health care today. just use this...or this to call unitedhealthcare about an aarp medicare supplement plan. 70% of americans say economy and inflation are the top issue and joe biden says