jail time for some bigwigs at volkswagen, i understand. javier: that's right.saw it coming definitely, and now apparently it is becoming a reality. vw manager oliver schmidt has been detained in the u.s. for almost a year now and we are waiting for his sentence that is due to be announced any minute. schmidt was in charge of the company's environmental division and engineering division in the u.s. and pled guilty to felony. prosecutors are demanding seven years in prison and a fine of up to $400,000. schmidt says he was following orders. let's dig in a little bit deeper with our financial correspondent in new york, jens korte. jens, what can we expect of this sentence? some say that he could face up to 169 years in prison. or that, that was at least planned. jens: that was originally this ridiculous threat from u.s. prosecutors, but that was clearly a technical move to force oliver schmidt to plead guilty to what he eventually did and also give some more information and more names probably to u.s. prosecutors. the attorney for oliver schmidt is arguing that he

of the 37 bigwigs who report directly to jeff bezos, only two of them, two are women.re of asian descent and zero are african-americans at that level. which is absolutely contrary to bezos' own words last year when he told employees that diversity and inclusion are not just good for business, they are, quote, simply right. and i speak for the person who manages the amazon prime account in my house. more than 50% of households in america, it is women who do the shopping. how about having women, how about having amazon's management committee reflect their consumer. >> you and i have talked many times about a lot of companies that do a lot of business with women who do not have representation on their management boards or their actual board. so that is work that remains to be done. we're out of time. >> jeff bezos wants to get on a rocket ship. let's make women part of the future. >> that does it for "velshi & ruhle." you can watch me at 3:00 p.m. eastern. >> and see me at 9:00 a.m. have a great weekend. we will see you monday. your brain is an amazing thing. but as you g

but what proof do we have that this money doesn't just so right back into the pocket of whatever bigwigot the tax break. >> when we have a high tax structure companies leave. look at pharmaceutical companies that have left his country because of our corporate tax rate. they will be coming back. how many? who knows. but we know we are now competitive with the rest of the world and we're hearing from other taxpayer groups around the world saying uh-oh, our country has to do this now because you took the lead in cutting your corporate rate. this is tax competition and this is what drivers the economy. >> david williams we appreciate and i know a lot of people like the idea of hearing they're going to get more money right before christmas but i guess most people the polls show people aren't particularly thrilled or happy. >> they'll get more money trust me. >> it will can you remember down the node. >> next year, gentleman and and february. >> david we'll bring you back in 2027 again to talk ab these cuts. >> awesome. >> thanks for joining us. developing tonight the united nations general a

. >> some bigwigs are publicly high fiving the tax cuts but they may have some ulterior motives. there's so much to unpack about this tax package. after a months-long public campaign to get tax cuts through congress, president trump signed the new tax law with very little fanfare on friday. this law slashes corporate taxes way down from a statutory or official rate of 35% to 20% now, and it makes those tax cuts permanent. 21%, i'm sorry. it was 20 for a long time and settled up at 21. to pay for the trillion dollar or more hole that that's going to blow into the u.s. budget, the middle class tax relief that president trump promised is going to be smaller and temporary. so we end up with a big deficit financed tax cut that benefits businesses and the wealthy at the expense of the middle class. now, there's a whole lot of analysis on this. independent analysis for instance from the tax policy center estimates that the top 1%, the wealthiest americans, will ultimately get 83% of the benefits of this tax bill. >> one thing that stood out to me, we have been focused on the composition

demanding that bigwigs share the wealth.kes a look. >> it began on september 17, 2011 in new york city, just a few blocks from the financial capital of the world. inspired in part by arab spring protests overseas. i could by wall street was a social movement against income inequality, corporate greed, and the influence of big business and politics. almost overnight, demonstrators grew to tens of thousands. spreading to the heart of the cities across america. more than 80 countries worldwide. but, patients among city leaders and law enforcement authorities began arresting protesters. roughly two months after launch, the occupy movement faded. >> i called a constructive failure. >> michael white helped launch it with a single tweet from the office of a canadian magazine. envisioning it as a leader of this movement, a revolution for the people, by the people. >> i think it's a good things. it trained in a generation of activists, but do we give new power to the 99%? but we do not change how america democracy works. >> eventuall

the findings showed corporate bigwigs inflated earnings by several hundred million dollars.hed their own stock before crash. by december of that year, enron filed for bankruptcy. some 20,000 employees eventually lost everything. >> it was like a sledgehammer to the face. >> what followed was years of legal proceedings. in 2006, kenneth leah, the company's chairman and ceo, was convicted on ten counts of conspiracy, fraud, and making false statements. he never spent a single day in jail. he died of a heart attack two months after his trial and before he was ever sentenced. jeffrey skilling had also served as enron's ceo. he was convicted on nearly 20 criminal counts. >> i feel horrible. but that's not to say that i think i did something illegal. >> in 2013, federal prosecutors announced they struck a deal, shaving ten years off his sentence, making him eligible for release in 2018. enron's chief financial officer also served time. he was incarcerated for six years because of his involvement with the scandal. he got out in 2011 and now makes his rounds on the speaking circuit.

. >>> despite new releases from music bigwigs, it was a spanish language ditty that took over americanacito became the first famous track to hit number 1 in the u.s. since the macarena. over 4.5 billion views. ♪ >>> breaking royal news, prince harry officially engaged to american actress meghan markle. they announce their engagement in november. the pair met on a blind date and harry told reporters he knew the star was the one from the start. >> let you finish proposing. can i say yes now? >> let me finish. and then i had the ring in my finger. >> can i give you the ring? oh, yes the ring. >> all eyes will be on what she wears down the aisle when the couple marries. >>> la la land. >> a mix-up leads to the most awkward finallily -- but the celebration hit a pause when one of the la la land winners pointed out that moon light had in fact won the apart. >> there's a mistake. moon light, you guys won best picture. >> the uncomfortable moment continued as it was explained it was the wrong envelope. >> details just coming in. this is very much breaking right now. >> a terror attack outside

it's minus 20 and who wouldn't want to be on out a bigwig right now? >> according to mastercard spipding pulse retail sales growing at its best pace since 2011 and without it a record amount of deliveries kate rogers watching the trend and morgan brennan the shippers. kate, you're up first, merry christmas. >> reporter: hey, brimpt merry christmas to you it's looking like a big win for big rell tailers this holiday season you mentioned the data out showing overall retail sales from november 1st through christmas eve up 5%, the best pace since 2011 and e-commerce growing a whopping 18% during the same time period electronics are up 7.5% and jewelry purchases up 6%. home improvements and furnishings, items for your home grew by 5% shoppers were shopping late into the season this past saturday. super saturday it was dubbed set to be the second biggest day in terms of foot traffic after black friday today the day after christmas set to be the fourth busiest of the retail season and this week between christmas and new years, shoppers are set to spend $69 bi

. >>> another hollywood bigwig is facing sexual misconduct allegations. los angeles police investigating oscar winning director roman pulaski. he's accused of molesting a 10-year-old girl in 19735. although the allegations are so cold criminal charges can't be brought, detectives say they might be able to use evidence they collected to prosecute other cases. the latest allegations were reported to police in october. that victim claims she was molested during a photo shoot after polanski had her pose naked. >>> just released death certificate for charles manson is shedding some new light on his cause of death and failing health. manson died of cardiac arrest accompanied by respiratory failure triggered by colon cancer. the certificate notes that the cancer had spread to other areas of his body. manson died november 19th at a bakersfield hospital in the central valley. the 83-year-old had been serving a life sentence for orb straighting the 1969 killings of pregnant actress sharon tate and eight other people. >>> the man accused of trying to attack new york

a curious conversation he had with the number of ceos and bigwigs including the owner of the patriots>> a friend of mine said this tax bill was incredible. he owns the new guns patriots but is in the paper business too and he said based on this tax bill he just wanted to let me know that he is going to buy a big plant in the great state of north carolina and he is going to build a tremendous paper mill or paper products plant. neil: charlie gasparino watching that to do that sort of thing, share the wealth and all that. their fiduciary responsibility, the better this gets. >> trump has heard from ceos the don't like the plan and he doesn't brag about that but i spoke with him, he spoke with randy levine, the president, business leader of the new york yankees, longtime republican friend of donald trump who basically told him point blank what was wrong with the plan, the fact that private equity is getting a huge sweetheart deal, private equity managers. neil: amazing how that stayed in. >> it is called campaign contributions. a lot of money targeted to specific lawmakers including mitc

gave us cut which could expire at some point and you gave businesses incorporation and fat cats and bigwigst how do you plan on something if you're a regular person when you have a tax cut that might go away. does the that put you in a particular position of got really knowing the tax cut it's perm and won't be there per put actually down the line. >> that is true the tax cuts expires have to expire and one thick i have to say republicans in the senate did not make the individual tax cuts expire because they don't like people or like corporations more sne made individual tax cuts expire because reconciliation rules that governed processing of this bill in the senate say you cannot increase the deficit after ten years after the budget window. they had a choice make corporat individual rate temporary and when it comes to plan ago an into the country which is one- of hallmark of messaging the corporate rate perm neps was bigger. you're right you don't know individual rates will be end asked all right kathy we appreciate you coming in to talk about the taxes appreciate it. >> thank you very muc