that looked better than the rigatoni. >> i didn't realize i was a weirdo, if someone orders something you are thinking about getting and you don't like the dish, you are like i should have ordered that. >> order entry. >> somebody orders the same dish as you, i think disappointed. >> no! >> all right. "america reports" now. >> that's great. >> john: thank you. 2024 presidential campaign kicking into high gear as two duelling high profile republican gatherings take place with activists and donors battling over the future of the party. as former president trump headlines the annual cpac conference, several rumored challengers are at the club for gross private retreat, including florida governor ron desantis. >> what will it tell us where the republican base lies? byron york is here to break it down coming up.

>> alec murdaugh is innocent, innocent of these charges. he lied because that's what addicts do, addicts lie. he lied because he had a closet full of skeletons. evidence is crystal clear from that moment he started fabricating evidence against alec. >> john: the alec murdaugh trial, a fiery rebuttal to the closing arguments, before the jury decides whether the disgraced attorney is guilty of murdering his wife and son. i'm john roberts in washington. good to be with you. >> jacqui: murder could get life in prison without the possibility of parole if the jury convicts him of the murder charges. >> john: defense arguing prosecutors failed to prove their case that he committed the

crimes beyond a reasonable doubt. jonathan is live in the southeast bureau with the latest. interesting arguments from jim griffin this morning and now the prosecution with a chance to try to rebutt some of those before the jury gets the charge. >> as we look at the live feed from the courtroom, you are seeing john meters, one of the prosecutors, delivering rebuttal to the defense closing arguments delivered a little bit earlier today. the defense had some choice words for the prosecution's theory of the case, which they described as totally illogical, irrational, and insane. the prosecution theory the defendant killed his wife and son to create a distraction on the day his law firm confronted him about funds stolen from clients. >> even if -- even if the financial day of reckoning was impending, if it was right

there, alec would not have killed the people he loved the most in the world. there's no evidence that he would do that. >> murdaugh initially told investigators he was not with his wife and son at the family kennel the night of their murders, but admitted to the jury he lied after multiple family friends testified that they could recognize his voice in the background of this video that paul recorded just minutes before he was shot. but murdaugh's lawyer says the defendant's lie was caused by his drug addiction and not guilt over any murder, and john and jacqui, dramatic development this morning. the judge had to excuse one of the jurors and replace her with an alternate. the judge determined that juror had discussed the case with at least three individuals outside of the court and although the conversation was apparently not extensive, the judge said the juror did express her opinion about some of the evidence and so she has been excused and an alternate will now be

participating with the other 11 jurors as they go to deliberate, presumably a little later today. back to you guys. >> john: and then the mystery of why she had a dozen eggs in the jury room. jonathan serrie in atlanta, thanks. bring in mark eiglarsh, and mercedes, fox news legal analyst, the question before the jury is cunning con man or grieving father and husband? mercedes, lead us off here. >> well, i mean, certainly the big lie is going to be the biggest challenge to the defense. the fact that when he was asked where he was the night of the murders and he lied to investigators, and by the way, that's a lie that perpetuated for months. that means he did not disclose the truth to his friends, his family, to law enforcement, that continued to speak to him about his whereabouts and when confronted at the trial, by the way, that's your voice on the video and that videotape took

place minutes before paul and maggie were murdered and he had to embrace the lie, take the stand and say yes, i lied, but i lied because i have this -- i'm an addict and the opiates made me lie, it doesn't make any sense. what they say in the latin term, false in one thing, false in everything. and that's really what the prosecutor should have done is embrace that big lie and say only a guilty individual would have lied about the whereabouts of where they were the night the murders took place, and that's it. and not infuse this whole theory about well, wagons were circling and he had to go and that's why he murdered his family. it doesn't make sense. just stick with the lie. much better call. >> john: what do you think, mark, grieving husband and father or cunning con man? >> all right, well first i agree with everything mercedes just said in english and latin.

but let's just make one thing clear. the prosecutors did a phenomenal job of proving this case 100% beyond all doubt that he probably did it. and as we all know from many high profile disappointment cases, that ain't enough. and one of the things the jurors are wrestling with that the defense hammered home brilliantly in closing is the lack of physical evidence. they have proven he's a liar, this he's a thief, that he's a drug addict, but not that he's david copperfield. he can't make all that physical evidence disappear. as we all sit here we don't know what he did. so if he did shower it off, or he did hose himself down, for every action there's a reaction. where is that evidence? why didn't they get into the drain, why didn't they get on the floor and get particles. it's not there. and i'll add to it, too, that video tape which was the most compelling piece of evidence for the prosecution clearly now

turns out to be the best piece of evidence for the defense. one minute you hear them talking about bubba the dog possibly catching a chicken and then minutes later he chooses to execute his wife and his son who he allegedly loves more than life itself? it just doesn't make sense. >> john: i mean you have to think he's a real sociopath to pull that off. as we remember from another high profile case in the 1990s, the defense meticulously tore apart, and o.j. simpson walked free, jim griffin tried to do the same thing saying the south carolina law enforcement division screwed it up. >> we believe we have shown that sled failed miserably.

and had they done a job, alec would have been excluded from the circle a year ago, two years ago. >> john: so mark alluded to this a moment ago, mercedes, did jim griffin effectively cast doubt on the investigation saying that so many things fell through the cracks here or were not investigated we cannot be sure who the murderer was. >> you know, it's so funny. i think exactly right. there is that, obviously this glimmer of reasonable doubt and you feed it through how many experts there were and the fact that they just fell short of the standards that are usually done. apparently there weren't x-rays done of the brain of paul and certain things that were missing in the autopsy and they are just going to hang their hat on it. but that's where the reasonable doubt can flow and you just need one juror to say i don't believe it, i don't buy he killed his family and that would be enough for a hung jury. so, yes, it is definitely a page out of most defense attorneys' playbook, start attacking the gathering of the evidence.

>> john: and what about this thing, mark, jim griffin raised toward the end, paul was known as the little investigator in the house and he discovered where alec murdaugh was keeping his drugs and he confronted him about it. what happens if he confronts alec's drug dealer and said i'm upset at you i'm going to expose you and maybe it was the drug dealer who took he and his mom out. >> brilliant, absolutely, yes. but brilliant, and it was actually objected to by the prosecution because pure speculation and there's no evidence of it. and then the judge overruled -- no, sustained it and the jurors still heard it. the point is that was brilliant lawyering to suggest anything is possible and they didn't prove, i think, that somehow that there's no other possibility that anyone else could have done this. >> john: all right, we'll see which way the jury goes after they get the charge. should be pretty soon.

appreciate it. jacqui. >> jacqui: prominent house republicans demanding to know more about the immigrant in the u.s. illegally now charged with killing 20-year-old kayla hamilton in her own bedroom. 17-year-old suspect is believed to be a member of the ms13 gang. lawmakers are asking two biden cabinet officials to explain why the suspect was released into the u.s. mike emmanuel is live in washington for us. hey, mike. >> yeah, those two cabinet secretaries facing tough questions about the case, jim jordan of ohio and tom mcclintock, argue the border policies have created vulnerabilities that criminals exploit to the detriment of american citizens. mayorkas is on the hot seat, and the health and human services secretary seek the immigration history, detention status, and

tails about the entry not u.s.. kayla hamilton was 20 years old, a young woman living with autism, brutally attacked, murdered and raped in her own bedroom. her mother says she does not want any parent to experience what she's going through. >> it's certainly hard to process. not only that we have to process losing her but we also have to process what happened to her. >> a law enforcement source tells me the suspect was stopped by border patrol in rio grande, texas a year ago and transferred to an aunt living in frederick, maryland. kayla's mother says the suspect is receiving more protection from the justice system than her daughter about noting his name has not been released since he's believed to be a minor. jacqui. >> jacqui: heart goes out to that family. thanks, john. >> john: jacqui, counting down

to 2024. some likely presidential candidates are skipping cpac in favor of another event. what does it say about the future of the gop. >> jacqui: dozens of democrats are backing a republican bill that it could lead to the president's orders and the economy. on your credit cards lately? get ready for a shock. the rate on credit cards is now over 22%. if you want to save hundreds of dollars every month, pay off the balances on your high-rate cards with a lower rate va home loan from newday usa and get the financial peace of mind every veteran deserves. no one takes care of veterans like newday usa.

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>> policing is a big family. people who know at some point they may be asked to make the ultimate sacrifice. but you never wish or hope that it actually happens. >> john: tragedy in chicago after 32-year-old police officer andres vasquez lasso was shot and killed in the line of duty. lasso was chasing a spent during a domestic incident call when the two exchanged gunfire. his colleague seen issuing a somber salute outside the hospital and new jersey, a state trooper was shot in patterson overnight. the trooper was hit in the leg and taken to the hospital. an arrest has been made but they are still searching for three

more suspects. and people continue to lay down their lives on that thin blue line to try to protect us and end up on the wrong side of that. >> jacqui: strikes me how much of a recruiting problem they are having, and the fbi is having good discussions these days. >> john: and paul vallas ran on a platform of increasing police on the streets of chicago, can he recruit the new officers. have to be a big change in chicago in order to attract people to that job. >> jacqui: certainly a test and important job. tough times for them. house democrat, dozens of them, are joining their colleagues to look at the inflationary aspects of president biden's orders before they are issued. the bill which passed in the

house is the latest effort on the gop to pump the brakes on the policies they say are causing the highest inflation levels seen in decades. dagen and sean, co-hosts of "the bottom line" on fox business, thank you for being with us. you can read this news on its face that it looks like democrats want to sort of rein in the spending and want to pump the brakes on the president's ability to increase inflation, but democrats by and large more often than not vote with their party. they very rarely break from the direction the president wants to go. so their votes on this, you know, is this more of a messaging tactic to their constituents that they understand the effects of inflation on their families or is it a full rebuke of the president? i'll hear from dagen first and then sean. >> sean can speak to this, but i do think that some of the

lawmakers are probably upset that the power of the purse has been taken away from them. i do know that cory bush blamed covid and the war in ukraine for the 40-year high inflation, so good luck with that one ringing true with her constituents. but when you by executive order out of the white house, out of the executive branch or by fiat, by decree, do something, it by its very nature is inflationary because what you are doing is you are big footing the free market. you are increasing demand and reducing supply and that is inflationary, period. so you are moving resources from where they should be in the market from where companies deem they need to be and where the market wants to produce supply and you are moving them somewhere else because you are the commander in chaos and you

think they need to be somewhere else and that does create inflation. so, that's the broader economic perspective but sean, you take it away. >> well, yeah, jacqui. to your question, i think what's going on here is i think democrats, they do like these rules, they do like executive orders. they like that joe biden might cancel the keystone pipeline, he might not have as many leases, try to take a stand against fracking, but to dagen's point that's inflationary and you have 59 democrats in the house that voted to curtail joe biden. you are right, democrats rarely break ranks. they all stick together really, really well, better than republicans, but you have their constituents back at home who are getting pummelled by inflation, and when that happens, they come to the members of congress and go you have to stop this, whether it stops spending, rules and regulations that drive up the costs, and when the members of congress hear the messages from

their constituent they might like executive orders but like their jobs and want to keep them so they listen and say i'm going to vote for this act. however, they might also think it might pass the house but probably not the senate and so therefore it may never become law, to your point. >> sean always makes fun of me because i talk about this almost every day. but one of the things that is the most offensive to me and to us that is the most agregious handout by joe biden that is incredibly inflationary, and the case that was in front of the supreme court about student loan forgiveness, the bailout, there's already been a student loan bailout going on for the last three years. joe biden, every month, nobody in this country with a student loan has had to make a payment. there's been no interest accruing.

every month for three years. it is $5 billion a month that is not coming into the treasury. that is a bailout because when you don't have interest accruing on a loan you -- the loan declines in real value by the inflation rate. that is a bailout. that is a wealth transfer from people who didn't go to college, who paid their own way, to people -- no, no, i'm saying they have already gotten a bailout of about $180 billion that's inflationary. >> jacqui: i certainly hear you there. going back to the vote, though, what strikes me is that democrats are at their retreat right now, they are touting the investments made over the first half of this president's term as historic investments. they are not backing down, not saying that was inflationary, and then they are going and, you know, voting for this bill that really in effect, i mean -- the gop even, you know, in pulling this forward only highlighted really two examples where

executive orders were the cause of what they said was inflationary measures, the keystone pipeline as sean highlighted and the move to have the shift to electric vehicles. so the spending is happening through bills, not often through executive orders. so, does this actually matter? each of you quickly, we are out of time. >> so just real quick. when democrats can't run away from the big spending bills, they cannot come to the constituents and say i'm sorry, i caused inflation, they defend that at the retreat and saying i'm going something on the flip side with joe biden and regulation. you make a good point, jacqui. >> moratorium on making student loan payments is wildly inflationary and crushes working people who didn't go to college and pay their own way, it's a wealth transfer to elites with graduate degrees. highly inflationary and the same people get crushed by the rising interest rates by the federal reserve as the central bank

tries to fight it. straight on joe biden. >> jacqui: happy to have you with us. see you on "the bottom line." >> john: still has not answered the question. fbi says a man tried to sneak explosives on to a flight. how close did the bomb get to making its way on to a packed airplane. >> jacqui: will the director of national intelligence block lawmakers from having access to critical documents? tennessee senator marsha black burn is hear to weigh in next. >> we have compelling evidence that the wuhan lab, not nature, is the reason why covid happened. the more china lies, the more americans die. they deserve the truth.

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you see him entering the airport with two bags right here, one of those bags set off an alarm, triggered a tsa inspection. what officers found inside. confirmed explosive device with multiple fuses, a can of butane, a lighter, a wireless drill and two electrical outlets taped together. the fbi criminal complaint mentions the kind of powders found inside the three inch compound. black powder and flash powder can ignite from heat and friction and posed a significant risk to the aircraft and passengers. thankfully officers found it before anything happened. >> it makes me feel comfortable that the process worked. i have not traveled in a long time but i used to post 9/11 and you know, just everything that the tsa does, i mean, makes us all feel safer in the skies. >> right now, not a whole lot known about muffley, but he left

the airport five minutes after he was paged after they found the explosive. he was arrested in lansford, pennsylvania later that night. he never showed indications of doing something so stupid. he is in fbi custody and appearing via video conference in federal court, started a few minutes ago, we are listening in and will report back on everything that happy new year. >> jacqui: doing something so stupid could have been really terrible if they did not catch it before it happened. john. >> john: jacqui, congress finding an issue of bipartisan agreement. senate unanimously approving a bill that would require the director of national intelligence to declassify all documents that could shed light on the origins of the covid pandemic. the bill comes after fbi director christopher wray told fox the bureau believes covid likely started from a lab leak in wuhan, a finding the energy

department has also reached. tennessee senator marsha blackburn. good to have you with us on this thursday. bret baier asked christopher wray where the fbi is in the investigation in the origins of covid. here is what he said. >> i should add that our work re re relateed continues and not a lot of details i can share that aren't classified. >> john: the goal of the senate to bring that out into the light. why do you believe it's important at this stage for the american people to know everything the fbi does? >> yeah, you know, john, the american people, there are so many that lost friends and family. they lost their lives, over a million americans. you had tens of millions adversely impacted with this loss of life, with loss of livelihood, with children that

have experienced emotional trauma and mental health issues because of covid. now, there was a common sense consensus early on that if this lab was doing coronavirus research, it was working on gain of function research, you had people at the lab who worked there who were highlighting that this was going to be a very bad virus, you have some that lost their lives, then it made sense. it just made sense that you would go investigate the lab. well, the chinese communist party got the world health organization to participate in a cover-up with them. they even negotiated the language with the w.h.o. and the chinese communist party and then big media and some u.s. officials, such as dr. fauci, who said don't blame the chinese

for this. so the american people want answers. it's why we have said let's make this information public. it's why we have also said if china doesn't step up on this we should be imposing sanctions. >> john: all right. in terms of where china stands on all of this, director wray said this, i found interesting. listen here. >> the chinese government seems to me has been doing its best to try to thwart the work here, the work we are doing, the work our u.s. government and close foreign partners are doing, and that's unfortunate for everybody. >> john: so sounds like there's no question in the fbi director's mind china is actively impeding this investigation. so, what should the biden administration be doing to get china to open the doors? >> well, the biden administration, unfortunately, has shown that they will not challenge the chinese communist

party. that is a disservice to the american people. not only on this issue, but on fentanyl and tiktok and other issues. but john, they should be very forthright in saying if you do not come forward with this, sanctions are going to be taking place. and they should be forceful in this. just as joe biden should call xi jinping and say you stop shipping this fentanyl into our country or there will be sanctions. challenge them. last year we had a $1 trillion trade deficit with china. a trillion dollars. they had the best year they have ever had. let 'em know you are gonna cut that out, that that is no longer going to take place. get active with reshoring these jobs. pick up our defense with taiwan and helping taiwan to prepare. help these other island nations

to prepare and push back on china's bullying. >> john: a lot of people, senator, who believe for national security purposes continuing to have the bulk of our supply chain coming out of china is just insanity. we look forward to having you on the next time. we have lots more to talk about. appreciate you joining us. >> jacqui: u.s. intelligence officials are saying it's unlikely -- havana symptoms. they spoke with patient 0 who says he's gas lighted by his own government. >> john: and exploiting americans and protecting our children. next hour, why democrats objected to a republican bill that gives the president the power to ban tiktok. >> woman: why did we choose safelite? >> vo: for us, driving around is the only way we can get our baby to sleep, so when our windshield cracked,

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♪♪ >> jacqui: times have changed. a new disney live action "peter pan" is getting slammed by fans for a controversial casting change. >> are you -- >> lost boys. >> you are not all boys. >> so? >> the newlily released trailer for peter pan and wendy appears to follow similar story beats from the original play, but features one crucial casting change, female lost boy characters. the change to the animated film, sequels, disney is accused of updating classic films with woke themes. they might have lost some

viewers with that, john. not everyone likes it. >> john: the lost boys or the woke thing? >> jacqui: changing the boys to lost girls now. >> john: why can't you have both? i'm sure not every child that is lost is a boy. >> jacqui: that's true. there you go. the u.s. intelligence committee ruling out foreign involvement as a cause of havana syndrome as victims continue to deal with medical issues ranging from traumatic brain injuries to vertigo. fox news spoke with a former cia official, first to be diagnosed with havana syndrome in 2016. jennifer, we thought that hostile governments were directing energy beams at the diplomats, now appears not to be the case, the victims closer to an answer? >> not based on the findings of the two-year intelligence community report released yesterday, which concluded there is no evidence of a foreign actor behind what the havana

syndrome victims say left them debilitated, suffering from vertigo, dizziness, and some cases brain injuries. 1500 u.s. government officials have come forward, many from the cia and state department to say they think that they have been the target of an attack. of those, it is believed 2 to 3 dozen make up a subgroup whose injuries and descriptions resemble what experts say could be the result of a microwave or pulsed energy weapon. we tracked down patient 0, who goes by adam to protect his identity. he was a u.s. government worker in havana, cuba in 2016 when he experienced a terrifying sensation that resulted in blood coming out of his ears, a wave of energy pulses causing him to black out. >> frankly, i find the report embarrassing and laughable. in reading the report, a myriad of error, mistruths, twisting of

the truths and flat out as far as i'm concerned lies in there. >> adam received an award for his service from mike pompeo who served as both the former cia director and secretary of state. adam is now medically retired. >> to say they don't have the same equipment is laughable. it was just two years ago china was bragging they were using microwave weapons on the indian border against india. nsa released a report of an officer hit abroad to cause neurological deficits. russia sold a system to china in the early 2000s, and china called it torch 1. >> the patent for a beamed radio frequency energy weapon that can cause some of the side effects that dozens of u.s. intelligence officers and military personnel have described. american physicists have said they worked with the russians on

microwave weapons in the 1990s. the pentagon has a budget to research strategies to counter these kinds of weapons, even though the latest intelligence assessment says russia and china don't have them. john. >> john: is this report the final word or no? >> well it's -- it's final in the sense the task force set up. whether congress and the intelligence oversight committees will take it up and press for hearings or classified briefings. >> john: jennifer griffin at the pentagon. thank you. >> jacqui: more questions now about the alleged weaponization of the doj and fbi after new report claims the two apparently didn't see eye-to-eye on the mar-a-lago raid. we are going to talk to former special agent nicole parker whose got some spoken out ideas of the political bias in the bureau. >> john: but first, former president trump and ron desantis have appearances at duelling gop

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>> john: some rough moments for a pet owner who had to hoof it after her english bulldog, armed to the teeth with a large knife in her mouth. the dog named fendi, what else would you name the bulldog, rejected the idea of trading the knife for a yummy treat and raced about the house barking "i'm going to cut you," no, i added that. the owner secured the knife back in her possession. as you can imagine, that video is going viral online. >> jacqui: if you want to go viral online, put a knife in your mouth and run around on all fours. your take away from that. >> john: i've done it many times. >> a house republican -- excuse me, 2024 republican hopefuls are gathering for two separate events happening at the same time. the cpac gathering south of washington, d.c. will feature former president trump.

florida governor ron desantis at the main draw tr club for broth private donor retreat in palm beach, trump was reportedly not invited. byron york is a chief political correspondent and fox news contributor. thank you for being with us today. >> thank you, good to be here. >> jacqui: what do you make of desantis skipping out on cpac, does this pretty much confirm what we all suspect that he's going to run? >> well, i think what you see here is the basic divide, the fundamental divide in the republican party now just in a handy one story. cpac is very oriented toward president trump and his followers and the other event, the club for growth event -- club for growth has had a troubled relationship with president trump. in 2015 and 2016 it opposed him,

didn't want him to be the president, and when he did win they accommodated him. they accommodated the fact that he was president, got used to it. but now they oppose him and they want to move on and want another candidate. so basically what you have is in the washington area with cpac, you have people who want trump to be president again and in palm beach you have the donor class of the republican party who do not want trump to be president again. easy divide here. >> jacqui: you know, this divide that we are watching play out is certainly interesting to watch. i guess not all that surprising. these, you know, divisions have existed for a long time and now coming to the surface and watching it on camera in realtime. watching the field of potential 2024 hopefuls grow, i wonder, watching this, the choices some of the potential candidates are making and where they attend and where they don't, desantis, for

instance, does he risk alienating potential support, fox news first primary poll last week showed trump leading desantis by 15 points. is that factoring into any of his thinking or what do you think is guiding the decision here? >> well, they are both taking a risk, because to be elected president they have to unify the groups, republicans need all the votes they can get to be elected president in 2024. they are both taking a risk. i think the people who want to move on from president trump cannot get ahead of themselves. you pointed out that fox poll, 43-28 trump leading desantis, and that's a significant lead and trump still has a very, very strong following in the republican party. there's a certain number of his followers who could vote for somebody else, another republican in the future, but there might be some who just

want to vote for him or nobody at all. and the thing -- the next republican nominee needs to know is he has to unite these groups to get elected or if he doesn't, he's going to lose. >> jacqui: what do you make about the other potential candidates skipping out at cpac, mike pence, scott, and others except for sinunu have spoken at prior cpac events. what do you make of their absence this year? >> a couple things going on with cpac. it's not all the trump-desantis divide, also a lot of controversy about the head of the american conservative union which puts on cpac, allegations, there's allegations against him of sexual harassment and so perhaps some figures are avoiding that whole situation. but basically the bigger picture here is the divide inside the

republican party. we should mention that there are a couple of candidates, nikki haley and vivek are trying to unite by appearing at both. both at cpac and the club for growth in palm beach. >> and pompeo and youngkin were both invited but not attending, appreciate it. >> john: new at 2:00, the alec murdaugh trial in a lunch break. the charge to the jury expected soon. which side had the stronger case. and tiktok says it will limit screen time for some youngest users but is it lip service to appease critics. the fcc commissioner will join us on that. congressman mike waltz on the china threat, retired fbi nicole parker, and talk to the attorney of the sons of alec murdaugh's

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