one true god! maria: sebastian, available right now on foxnation.com, this is a must-see series. mahek. >> i'm so excited to see this. i think we're going to learn history more from a show like that than what we learn from our history books in schools. maria: you're right. take a look at the markets, dow industrials up 103, nasdaq up 125. futures spiking on the cpi number this morning, chris. >> unbelievable. i think there's more to come. >> i certainly do too. i don't think the inflation question is as relevant anymore. i think the growth question due to mr. trump is far more important, and that's what markets are kill on. maria: that's the priority. great panel, adam, chris, mahek, see you soon. "varney & company" picks it up. stuarted good morning, everyone. it is the first of back to back inflation numbers, important politically and important for interest rates. todayst the consumer price index, and here is the news. in november inflation ticked up,

a gain of .if 3%. that is one-tenth of a point hotter than october. in the past year, prices have gone up 2.7%. that means the inflation rate is very slightly hotter than previous months. and here's the market reaction, not what you might expect. slightly hotter inflation, stock prices moving up. the dow up 100, the s&p up 25, and the nasdaq is, shows a gain premarket of 1223 point -- 122 points. interest rates heading down on the 10-year just a little, 4.22 for the 10-year and the 2-year down to 4.12. bitcoin prices just shy of $100,000, 98,8, to be precise. that's the markets in light of the inflation report. now this, politics. the president-elect rolls out an incentive plan. bring at least a billion dollars into this country, and your company gets on the fast track for permits and environmental approvals. he says get ready to rock.

if president says, that will be biden, says he's leaving trump a fairly strong economy. he hopes the administration will build on those gains, but, he says, tariffs are a mistake. on the show today, what's with new york? governor hochul announces a $3 billion vote-buying plan. the mayor cozies up to trump on immigration. there's a switch. the attorney general pursues her ridiculous $486 million fine on trump, and black lives matter threatens violence after daniel penny was found not guilty of manslaughter in the chokehold death of a deranged subway rider. there are signs that the nicer are fed up with all of this -- new yorkers. the rebels ransack assad's palace and his prisons revealing the hour to records of the regime. where are -- horrors of the regime. where are the progressives? if israel had listened, assad would be in his palace are, hezbollah would be attacking and iran would still be nurturing

terrorists. what about those drones that have mysteriously appeared in new jersey and new york? somebody must know where they come from and what they're up to, but that somebody isn't saying. wednesday, december 11th, 2024, 40 days til the inauguration. "varney & company" is about to begin. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ joy to the world -- ♪ stuart: i like it. the supremes. joy to the world. that's fine christmas music, what do you think, todd? >> they were not british. stuart: what's that got to do with it? >> the supremes, not british. stuart: christmas and christianity is not exclusively british. let's move on. we're starting with inflation. prices up 2.7% in the last 12 the months. lauren, what else do we know?

lauren: inflation progress has stalled. prices up in november .if 3% after four -- .3% after four consecutive months of .2%. on the annual basis, that 2.7% is more than october and september. there were increases in the price of shelter, up 4.7%. food up 2.4%. energy prices fell on the year, but they rose on the month. you can see it all right there. if you look at the core level which strips out good and energy, up .3% and 3. 3% respectively as expected, and that's why stocks are up today. 9 7% of investors think that the fed cuts by 25 basis points next week. that explains why the market's up. tiewcht institute got it. lauren: as expected. stuart: i hate the expectations game, but sometimes we plait. -- play it. listen to biden. >> most economists agree the new

administration is going to the tin meter a fairly strong economy, at least at the moment an economy going through a fundamental transformation it's laid out a stronger foundation and a sustainable, broad-based, highly productive growth. and it's my to propound hope that the new administration -- profound hope that the new administration will preserve and build on progress. stuart: todd piro's with us this morning. the president is right in many ways. low unemployment, strong gdp. inflation is not exactly under control, but cooling just a little. but people don't feel that way, do they? >> and that's why, i think, when you look at the economy, it's great for people like joe biden, for people who make a lot of money. everything is coming up great for them. the stock market's through the roof. but if you are the majority of americans, to your point, the reason they don't feel that way is because it's the not. those eggs have not gone down in price, that milk has not gone down in price. and until there's some stabilization of that, you can't claim the economy is good.

now, admittedly, we're going to have some tariffs, and that's going to raise price. but the overall impact on the economy, hopefully, when trump takes over, will make people feel better. and when people feel better, the economy is better with. stuart: got it. thank you, todd. you're here for the hour, please. thank you very much. check out futures, please. there's plenty of green this morning after hose the inflation numbers. dow's to up about 100, but the nasdaq, a gain of .7% concern .73%. carol wool with me in this wering -- kyle wool. inflation, 2.7% in the last year. that's slightly hotter than expected. there's an uptick in inflation, so why is the market up? >> it's slightly hotter, stuart, but i think it's expected exactly. that's why when lauren was saying 97% of the people believe we're going to have a 25 basis point if cut, it's going to happen. again, borrowing costs also comes down like todd was just talking about. your credit card bill comes down a little bit, maybe do a new

mortgage. in the trump economy, maybe taxes come down. we have a lot of things that could actually help this economy. i'm not too worried about inflation being our biggest concern. energy prices could come down substantially. stuart: why do you think that the fed will lower interest rates next week? okay, 95% of the investors think it will, but you sure about that? >> not sure about anything, stuart. of i'm not sure about tomorrow the. the but 97 of the people are saying it, and i think it's baked in 97%. if you lower interest rates, it brings down the cost of the interest which i think the fed would be happy to do. stuart: you better not have another uptick in inflation in december, january, february, because that would be bad news, indeed, wouldn't it? >> it would be, but i think the fed feels comfortable that we have got it mostly under control where they can cut the rates and get back to the more normalized level. stuart: okay. so the rally stays in place despite the slight uptick in inflation, that's your position? >> yes, sir.

stuart: and going higher in 2025? >> i think 2025's going to be a good year in the market -- stuart: not as good as '23 and '24, surely. >> we say that every year. stuart: that's true. >> trump's going to bring the irk finish o market back, you're seeing deregulation with the banks across the board, and i wouldn't be surprised if we release a lot of these a.i. companies. cerebrus has already filed an s1. stuart: everything's looking up, isn't it? >> well, it's christmas time. [laughter] stuart: kyle wool, thanks for joining us this morning, we appreciate. >> thank you. stuart: the new york attorney general, letitia james, her office says they will not drop the $486 million civil fraud judgmenting against trump. trump's team says that decision will interfere with the, with trump's duties as president. todd, i'm sorry, this is outrageous. how will new york's judiciary ever get its reputation back? >> you always hit that point,

and i think it's an important point to hit. i want to look at something else. think about this. if there's any business that the state of new york has with the federal government, this is almost like a $450 million debt hanging over trump's head. so when somebody has a debt over your head, what do they do? they try to twist the screws a little bit more. ostensibly, new york could do that in its relationship with the fed, and that's why it's problematic. you don't want any type of outside influence to ever possibly -- and i'm not saying it would the influence trump, but it's the appearance of i. and that's why i think trump's argument is actually okay here. i don't think they're going to do away with it, i think this will go the appeal and, ultimately, i think it will be overturned on appeal. but until that happens, it's a sword of damocles over trump's head. stuart: and it makes new york look terrible. all right, todd, thank you. i want to know what's the latest on might be's eau -- might be owes' senate -- marco rubio's senate seat.

lauren: the president-elect is reportedly pressing him to hick his daughter-in-law, lara, who just stepped down as the co-chair of the rnc. lara says, yep with, i'm concerning the seat -- i'm considering the seat. if selected, she would be up for two years, and then up for re-election, and trump is and desantis will be at the army-navy game this weekend. stuart: coming up, trump is prompting to put anyone who invests a billion dollars in america on the fast track to permits and approvals. israel has been decimating syria's military assets with over 350 strikes. their trying to keep weapons oup weapons out of the enemies' hands. retired the four-star general jack keane, a favorite guess, he's here and he's -- a favorite guest, he's here and he's next. many ♪ ♪re a ♪

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stuart: we've got some green on the screen 15 minutes before we open the market. dow's up about 80. strong gain for the nasdaq, it's up 168 points. israel targeting syria's navy as well as military the installations and weapons stockpiles all across the country. they want to prevent those weapons from falling into rebel hands. ben hall joins me now. centcom commander, our guys, made a trip to syriaed yesterday. what'd hay do in his visit? >> reporter: stuart, yes. good morning. general corella visited a few bases in northwestern syria. they're in the high hundreds of american troops there who are watching out for isis. he was looking at force protection, making sure u.s. troops were safe considering what's to going on, but also

making sure that isis couldn't rise up. the has hit 74 sites in the last few days, that the being said, all eyes are on what happens next in the country. we've seen scenes of celebration in damascus and other cities because this has been the fall of one of the worst dictators in the world. a man who killed around 100,000 people during the war. but the rebels who have takennen over, nobody know, how they will run the country. the main group is a terror group. their leader was an initial leader of isis. he was aligned with al-qaeda. he has a $10 million bounty on his head. but for the if last few years, he's been saying instead he believes in a unified, peaceful syria, somewhere where all faiths will be free. but many countries, including israel, are taking no chances. israel has created a buffer zone along the golan heights moving too fares and tanks into syria, and they've carried out 350

strikes to the destroy assad's navy, air force, weapons to prevent those from falling into rebel hands. the biggest fighting is in the northeast. turkish forces and turkishish-backed rebel groups are attacking the mesh allies -- american allies who defeated isis. turkey trying to take that land back and push back kurdish control. and i've been speaking to a number of contacts in that part of syria who have worked with the ally forces in u.s., they are saying they need protection from the u.s. because the turk turks are bombing them, and they're hoping somehow the u.s. will peck them. the big picture is that the iran and russia are the only two countries not left in syria with, and that's the big victory. the big question is what comes next on the ground. stuart: ben, thanks for joining us. and joining us now is general jack keane, retired four-star general. israel has now destroyed, we're

told, virtually all of syria's military. what because that -- what does that mean for the region? >> well, first of all, it's absolutely the appropriate action to take. obviously, when a regime collapses, it did so because the military was not willing to to fight any longer for assad and risk their life for a regime that put the country economically in a very hopeless and desperate situation. so they deserted these bases. they can deserted their naval ships. so, you're right, the entire military infrastructure is being destroyed by israel whether it's at sea or their industrial bases that support the navy, air power and the whole structure that surrounds supporting air power. and the same with land power bases, tanks and artillery. it's certainly a preemptive the measure the make certain, obviously, that these don't fall into radical hands and people who are running the country or factions throughout the country

who are opposed to israel and can use them against them. most significantly, they have been systematically destroying democrat -- chemical weapons. and, obviously, that's a weapon of mass destruction, and that is very appropriate. there's risk here certainly because that kind of aggressive behavior if there's civilian casualties here and the israelis are not careful about that, they could unite the different factions against israel, and that's manager the israelis do not want. they just don't want them to be armed with assad's weapons going forward. the right call, i think, it's t not going to last forever. and also critical situation that ben mentioned up in the northeast with the united states. we hit 75 targets to make sure isis doesn't rise again. but erdogan is attacking the forces that we're supporting. we had this problem in the trump administration, and trump dealt directlier ed wan on this -- directlier ed wan on to resolve

that situation, and this may be one of the first things that that's going to be on his december ec if president biden doesn't deal with it -- desk. stuart: general, my question is this, where are the progressives? if israel had been restrained,s assad would still be in his palace, hezbollah would still be attacking, and iran would still be running a terror the organization. where are the progressives here? they were totally wrong. >> yeah. i mean, it's absolutely stunning. the truth is the pact that the netanyahu -- the fact that netanyahu was totally focused on wartime the objectives as a wartime commander, he was not going to let anybody stop him from decimating hezbollah and stop a hamas. that is what he did. and the pact that -- so you are audience understands, when the regime was almost going to be toppled in 2011 and most of us looking at it because the opposition from the people was so significant, this was the

arab spring again that started in 2010, all of us predicted it was just a matter of days or weeks for the regime to fall. iran was all in, tens of thousands of hezbollah fighters with leaders. he put multiple generals in charge of that ground force. assad's ground force relatively ineffective. hezbollah was decisive in stopping that opposition forces and randomly killing thousands and thousands of civilians to try to push them if from not supporting the opposition. they saved the regime. and did it again in 2015 when the regime regained -- the opposition regained momentum. assad's air force was ineffective just as the ground force had been. qassem soleimani goes to see putin in early 2015, two visits, convinced him to put in his air power to save syria with again. he did that. this is how critical syria is to them. they can't dominate and control the middle east without syria.

they host their major strategic platform, and they are on their heels now, and i think it's time to take advantage of it and neutralize iran once and for all. get them to voluntarily take down their nuclear enterprise and use inspectors to ensure that, stop providing support to the proxies, tell them to shut down and if they don't do it, hen take action against them -- then take action against them. do that in coordination with israel and our arab partners. iran is on its heels in a way we haven't seen since 1980. stuart: take advantage. trump's going to be in power in 40 days. general jack keane, thanks for being with us, we do appreciate. >> great talking with you. stuart: just this morning secretary of state antony blinken is going to be testifying on the botched afghan withdrawal. this is in congress. todd, this has been long time coming. >> three years later. secretary blinken will appear before the foreign affairs

committee which voted along party lines to find blinken in content for his failure to testify back in september. you recall $7 billion of u.s. military hardware ended up in the hands of the taliban and p of course, 13 u.s. service members were killed at the kabul airport. the hearing's going to begin in a little less than an hour, back to you. stuart: we'll take the it. todd, thank you very much. check futures, please. i like the the look of the green on the screen. the real gain this morning is in the nasdaq, up 172 points at this point. we'll be back with the opening bell after this. ♪ i still wish you could be here. ♪ wrapped up in my arms spending christmas with me ♪ asking smart questions about opportunities like clean water. and what promising new treatment advances

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with the hcm buyline, we work to empower investors, in navigating market volatility and complex conditions. we provide a diverse portfolio with proprietary mutual funds and etfs aimed at growth and preservation. so you can invest with confidence. visit howard c.m. funds dot com. stuart: futures with about, what, three and a half minutes to go before the bell. the nasdaq is the standout to it's up 174 points. let's bring in super bull mike lee. consumer prices up 2.7% in the last 12 months. that doesn't seem to have hurt the market all the, does it? -- at all, does it? >> no. no. i think the big takeaway here is 40% of the increase came from

shelter, and the way that the shelter component is included in cpi has a tremendous lag to it. and so we're seeing those prices fall nationwide. we're seeing rents fall dramatically. you're starting to -- you know, not necessarily weakness in the housing market, but the ascent in home prices we saw over it's last few years has dramatically slowed. so if you look deeper in these numbers, you can find a lot more comfort than the headline. stuart: tell me about palantir. you've often saidst the best investment at this point. it took a dip yesterday, i believe. are you buying more now? >> yeah. you know, for my clients that don't own it, i would definitely buy more now and then if it were to get down in the 60s, i will buy more, if it got to the 50s, i would buy more. look, when your talking about artificial intelligence, you're seeing companies put together these large language models, so you're getting all these nvidia are gp if us and putting

together these big computers. that's like building this massive v12 engine for a sports car, and without software, it's like having that engine without a vehicle. and without palantir, it's like having no driver and no vehicle. so you have to have it to make these large language molds work, otherwise they're just science experiments. stuart: you say that it's software's turn in this a.i. bull market. okay. so which software stocks do you like? if we've got a bunch on to screen. do you like them all? >> yeah. so, you know, historically when, you know, you see a new technology phase, you have to build the infrastructures which is what we've seen for the last call it two years, and now it's software's turn. palantir, i think, was the first iteration of that. servicenow, ticker now, similar to palantir in some of the things hay do. they're like the air traffic control tower for a company's data and a.i. projects. they're a spectacular company. i'd say that's my number two. and hen you start looking at

crowdstrike, palo alto, salesforce if you think about the capabilities of a.i. in the cybersecurity space, it's just spectacular. so now this is the long-term trend of technology, again, you build the infrastructure, then you move to software. i believe 2025 is going to be the year of software as it goes with the a.i. trade. stuart: mike, i think you have made a lot of people a lot of money because you've been on nvidia for the last year, as i recall, and you've picked up on palantir in the last few months, and it's gone straight the up. so thanks for being on the show. good to have a super bull with us especially when he's right. mike lee, we'll see you again real soon. all right, three seconds to go, the market opens, boom, press that button and here we go. the market is off and running. we're expecting to see a lot of green, and that's what we are seeing right from the get go. the dow is up 100 points, that's the best part of one-quarter of 1%. and the vast majority of the dow 30 stocks are in the green. s&p 500, what's the percentage gain at the open there?

nearly a half percentage point. pretty sound. 30 points higher. the nasdaq, i'm expecting a solid gain there as well. it's up three-quarters of 1%, 150 points. and if you look at the dow 30, again, it's the vast majority in the green. i'm expecting big tech to be mostly higher. that's what's happening. meta, amazon, microsoft, alphabet, apple, they're all on the whereupon side. pull out apple for me, please. they've got a new ios update that the includes chatgpt. taylor, what does that mean for users? >> welcome to the apple intelligence, is what it means, right? in this new sort of update they're releasing, chatgpt is part of the rollout for a.i., apple intelligence is what they're tell calling it. you get e-mail summaries, image creation. and so this is sort of apple's firstest, right, in sort of rolling out what they think a.i. can look like. stuart: the sock the is up just 40¢s. -- cents.

macy's had a bad report before the bell, the stock's down 9%. >> this is a company that continues to struggle with the turn-around. they cut their forecast going forward. it was interesting though that on the call they were talking about how they're seeing some success in first 50 stores that they're testing to revamp and turn the around. but they have to be able to scale and, frankly, turn-arounds like these take time. there's been some activist investors involve involved in the stock. focus on the retail reality footprint, so there's a lot to digest. stuart: there really is, and it's down 8.8%. all right. eli lilly says they're going to the test its obesity drug for alcohol and drug addiction. >> and maybe some nicotine and smoking in there as well. this is fascinating because we have talked the a lot about sort of the boon they haven -- we have seen in these weight loss drugs. now if we're think about large scale testing in 2025 the for

addiction, they're talking about how changes the way that you think about cravings. so certainly trying to find other uses for these drugs. stuart: shareholders voted, i think it was late yesterday, on whether microsoft if should invest in bitcoin. what was the decision? >> surprise, surprise, they shot it down. yeah, there was no way, right? michael saylor had actually come out and along with a think tank and sort of asked them and proposed this, microsoft said, no, they're not ready to do this. it's still a little too volatile. this would have been a big win for bitcoin. clearly, you're not getting that today, but maybe we'll see if they change their mind. stuart: super micro, last time i checked, they were down sharply. what's the story? >> the ceo basically add a -- at a conference yesterday failing to convince investors he promises the stock will not be delisted due to delays many in their filings. he's just not convincing investors. but he reiterated he does think they're going to meet that

deadline to file that annual report that they were supposed to file a few months ago and that he is committed to remaining listed on the exchange. investors just maybe not believing it. stuart: that's the company that was messed up with -- their accountants withdrew. >> yes. there was a big short seller report that led to the a lot of scrutiny. the accountants, ernst & young, stepped down. you have the new accountants, bdo, come in, reassure us there were no -- no misstatements in the financials but, again, this is such a volatile stock. stuart: all right. we have a judge blocking the $24 billion kroger/albertsons deal. now what? >> this is the eight one for lina khan, out the door. the federal judge siding with the ftc. they're blocking it. i don't know how much of this is expected or not. albertsons then suing krogers for breach of contract saying you didn't do enough to listen to the ftc's concerns, to divest

all of the assets they want toed to end sure this deal would go through. so now you have them turning on each other. we'll have to the see how it plays out. stuart: this story, general motors, gm if dumping their robotaxi operations. they've dropped it. maybe that's why tesla's up so much today, $10. >> they spent a billion dollars on cruise and had invested $10 billion in this robotaxi business, and what do you have to show for it? basically nothing at the end of the day. they said they're going to roll it out to the broader tech team but basically banding the robo tax -- banning the robotaxi business. again, leaving it maybe to the companies like a waymo or a tesla who is so far ahead in the space. gm going to try to figure out how to focus on autonomous if driving but just not the actual cruise division. stuart: the i believe biden is going to block the sale of u.s. steel to nippon steel. >> and not unexpected.

we expected this but, again, formally coming out and saying that and, again, trump has said similar. it looks like for now at least the deal is off. stuart: who's going to buy walgreens? i'm talking about buying the whole company. >> a private equity firm, sycamore partners, saying they hi there's real opportunity to take this company private. maybe they can do in private what they are not able to do publicly. remember, just a few months ago walgreens said they've going to be the shuttering around 1200 stores. again, a big retail real estate footprint that they need to reevaluate in terms of the overall business as well. this was a $100 billion company that's now worth less than $8 billion. so maybe sycamore having some ideas. stuart: the i wish somebody would address the impact of shrinkage on companies like walgreens because it's obviously had a negative influence on them. >> no one's talking about it. stuart: taylor, thanks very much, indeed. check that big board, please. in business now for, what, six

and a half minutes, we're up 88 points. .2%. dow winners headed by, on that list we do have, i'll read it, boeing is back up again. amazon up again. salesforce, honeywell,s goldman sachs. the s&p 500, the winners there, broadcom, united airlines, align technology and alphabet as in google, up again. nasdaq winners topped by broadcom, mongo db, marvell technology, alphabet -- that's google -- mondelez international. all of them on the upside by several percentage points. after his acquittal in the death of jordan the neely, daniel penny told judge jeanine that he stands by his decision to protect subway riders. >> i'll take a million court appearances and people calling me names and people hating me just to keep one of those people from getting hurt or kills.

stuart: new york city councilman joe borelli is very much in favor of the penny decision. he is on the show. house speaker mike johnson touting the department of government efficiency as a golden idea. >> i think it's a once in a lifetime opportunity. elon and vivek are pretty smart if guys, and they know a lot about running efficient rain productive companies. -- running efficient and productive companies. stuart: senator mike braun, we'll ask him if some would sacrifice their customers. biden tearing down trump's tariff plan as a major mistake. we'll ask economist e.j. antoni for his take on it. he's next. ♪

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stuart: we're 12 minutes into the trade thing session, the dow's up 50, the nasdaq is up 172. take that. treasury secretary janet yellen finally committed the administration's -- admitted the administration's not done must have to address the deficit. edward lawrence, how convenient. >> reporter: indeed. she's saying the quiet part out loud, stu. we mow that president joe biden has signed more than $7 trillion in spending into law. that is more than the haas administration came n second only to the last administration which needed the money to combat covid spending. so now we hear this, listen to this. >> i am concerned about fiscal sustainability, is and i am sorry that we haven't made more progress. >> reporter: so under the biden administration, total debt by the public increased by almost $8.5 trillion, an

increase of more than 30% while they were in office due in part to runaway spending. some federal reserve members pointed today that spending as pushing inflation. americans saw inflation rise, the biden administration started spending taxpayer money sort of coincided with the two long before the invasion of russia into ukraine. last march the treasury secretary admitted she also got it wrong on inflation. >> so in 2021, though, you did say that inflation was transitory to. do you regret asawing that now? >> -- saying that now? >> i regret saying it was transfour. it has come down, but i think transitory means a few weeks or months to most people. >> reporter: yeah. it's been years. and now we have an acknowledgment that they should have focused more on the debt held by the public, and now that we're just 39 days left in office for the folks behind me. back to you. stuart: thank you, edward. let's get back that consumer price inflation report. prices up 2.7% in the last 12 months. e.j. antoni if joins me now.

e.j., it looks like inflation is ticking up ever so slightly. the stock market doesn't care. what do you say? >> well, stuart, i think the reason for that is because this fed if seems so dead set on cutting interest rates even further. now i don't think at this point they're really data-dependent if when it comes to inflation or when it comes to the unemployment rate. i think what they're probably really looking at are things like unrealized losses in the banking sector which are still measured in the hundreds of billions of dollars. and so the fed is having to consider not only their roles in terms of, you know, monitoring and keeping a lid on inflation which they've done a very poor job at, don't get me wrong, but now they're also having to consider all of the other messes they've created, again, such as those losses in the banking sector. stuart: is inflation going to tick the up some more in 2025? >> i think so. that's what the data seem to be telling us. it's amazing if you overlay what the cpa -- cpi, excuse me, doing

right now versus what the cpi did in the late '1970s and even the first couple of years of the '80s, it's shocking how it's retracing its steps. the fact that the fed is cutting rates even though we're still not trending to that 2% target, that indicates we are going to have another resur resurgence in inflation beginning next year. i think this administration, the incoming trump administration, that is, is being handed an absolute mess. stuart: okay. let's listen to what president biden said about trump's tariffs. watch. >> the incoming administration is determined to return the country to another round of trickle down economics and tax cuts for the very wealthy that will not be paid for. if paid for, it's going to have a real cost. on top of that, he seems determined to put steep universal tariffs on mistaken belief that foreign countries will bear the cost of hose tariffs rather than the american

consumer. who's going to pay for this? the oddly -- i believe this approach is a major mistake. stuart: well, e.j., a major mistake, tariffs, who's going to pay for this, consumers, what do you say? >> if it's such a major mistake, why hasn't he reversed those tariffs in the last four years? he has the power to do so. he has left trump's tariffs in race in -- in place, so if they were so catastrophic in the american -- for the american consumer, why has he done absolutely nothing about them? probably because everything we just heard from the president is completely wrong. the bide -- it was biden's overspending that you were just talking about with the reporter, that's what caused the runaway inflation. and furthermore, this nonsense about the tax cuts being a tax cut for the rich, the only group of people who had an increase in their federal tax liability after trump's tax reform were high income individuals in

high-tax states like new york, new jersey, california, illinois, etc. and that was because of the tax reform that closed various loopholes such as the state and local tax deduction which limited how much of their state and local tax liability those folks could deduct from their federal returns. the entire middle class saw a tax cut under trump's tax reform. and if you allow that to expire, you will not only increase taxes on the middle class, but the only group who will see a tax cut then would, again, be those high income individuals many high tax states. it's the exact opposite of this fiction of trickle down economics that the left keeps talking about. stuart: it's the world turned upside down. e.j. antoni, thank you very much, sir. here's what we have coming up, a series of news events have put new york city in the spotlight, and we are not looking good. new yorkers are ready for a change and for some sanity. that's my take, top of the hour. republicans facing a pressure campaign to support the trump administration's nominees

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stuart: some republicans faced with a choice, either support trump's cabinet picks or risk back a lash from the maga movement. relationship rich edson in west palm beach. are the maga people threatening to primary reluck a about the republicans? >> reporter: they sure are, stuart. any republican who's going to slow down or not quickly work to confirm president-elect trump's nominees through the united states senate. pete hegseth, department of defense nominee, has been meeting with senator joni ernst a couple of times, met again this week. ernst is the first female combat veteran elected to the senate, and hegseth has yesterday the role of women in combat among other issues. that's led to some maga personalitys to float a primary challenge to. the conservative group building america's future is also running

ads urging senators to support hegseth. if a few establishment senators can tank a nominee, as they already have with matt gaetz for attorney general, that could lead to the feeding frenzy, so they're trying to hold the line at hegseth. trump allies are also closely watching senator bill cassidy on robert f. kennedy jr.'s nomination to lead the department of health and human services, that is according to axios. cassidy is the incoming chairman of the senate health, education, labor and pensions committee. longtime adviser corey lewandowski says, quote, we will use every resource to go after those who go after trump's cabinet picks. elon musk posted on x, how else? there's no other way. the trump pings from continue from mar-a-lago, he's chosen andrew ferguson to be at the top role at the federal trade commission. back to you, stuart.

stuart: rich, thank you very much. back in with us, todd. do you see any of trump's nominees not getting confirmed? >> at this point, no, because i think the pressure campaign is too strong. i was telling you off camera, i was at a two-day fundraiser down in the west palm area which at this the point is the heart of the republican area, and the number one thing people said to me, they better get hegseth confirmed and the other nominees as well. the base want wants it. you risk alienating that base if you're a senator that you to publicly said you're on the fence, you're going to be in trouble. rich edson's report laid that out, and i can tell you the anecdotal evidence of that is real. people are fired up, especially for hegseth. stuart: with all that money, elon musk ifing can fund a lot of primaries from reluctant republicans. >> yes. stuart s.t.a.r.t. the todd, thanks for joining us, we do appreciate it. the dow has now turned negative, but the nasdaq has turned thed much more positive. it's now up 250 points, that is

1.3%. big gain. still ahead, tennessee senator marsha blackburn is here with more on the kids' online safety act. it has bipartisan support. senator blackburn wants it to pass and now. trump promises permits and environmental approvals for those investing a billion dollars in america. what does kevin o'leary think about that? israel striking syria's a military assets to keep weapons out of the the hands of rebels. national security expert victoria coates with the latest on that. and california governor newsom if proposing new spending as the state faces another budget deficit. steve hilton all over that one. the 10:00 hour is next. ♪ ♪

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your call is the best gift of all. your gift will be my favorite christmas present this year. please call the number on your screen or go to loveshriners.org to give whatever you can. and when you become a monthly donor your first gift will be tripled! thank you for giving! stuart: the name of the song is espresso. it's about this time o