Finalist, Pulitzer Prize for commentary, 2007

RUTH MARCUS COLUMNAdvance for release Wednesday, April 5, 2023, and thereafter(For MARCUS clients and FOR PRINT USE ONLY)For Print Use Only.By Ruth Marcus
 WASHINGTON -- As a presidential candidate in 2016, frantic to keep evidence of his extramarital affairs secret, Donald Trump made extensive efforts to buy the silence of the women involved. There's never been much doubt about that. The behavior of the candidate and his allies was a corrupt effort to keep voters from learning the truth about Trump.
 The hard question is whether those efforts also violated the criminal law -- specifically, now that a New York grand jury has indicted him on 34 felony counts, whether they violated the laws of the state of New York. On that front, the indictment unsealed on Tuesday is disturbingly unilluminating, and the theory on which it rests is debatable at best, unnervingly flimsy at worst.
 That is a scary situation when it comes to the first criminal charges ever lodged against a former president.
 I'm not saying prosecutors will lose this case. They could well win, and I hope they do, because a failure to secure a conviction will only inflame Trump and his supporters in their claims that the criminal justice system is being weaponized against them. But the fears I had in the weeks leading up to the indictment about the strength of the case against Trump were in no way allayed by Tuesday's developments.
 The indictment and an accompanying recitation of the underlying facts offers almost nothing in the way of new evidence against Trump. No surprise there -- the tawdry details of Trump's "catch and kill" scheme to suppress damaging information from adult-film actress Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal about their relationships with Trump have already been well-aired.
 They include the guilty plea by Trump fixer Michael Cohen, who admitted to paying off Daniels at Trump's behest and then securing reimbursement for the $130,000 in hush money by falsely describing the payments as legal retainers.
 Cohen admitted to, among other charges, violating federal election law -- specifically, making an illegal corporate contribution, and making a contribution in excess of contribution limits. But federal prosecutors neither brought charges against Trump -- he was president when Cohen was prosecuted, and therefore not subject to indictment under Justice Department practice -- nor pursued them after Trump left office.
 Which leaves open the question of whether New York state prosecutors can transmogrify this conduct into a state crime. Answer: maybe. And don't be fooled by the 34 counts: That healthy-sounding number doesn't signify anything about the strength of the case. They will all rise or fall together depending on whether prosecutors' theory of the case holds up.
 The theory is this: New York law makes it a crime to falsify business records. Ordinarily, that is just a misdemeanor. But if the falsification is done with intent to defraud and intent to conceal another crime, that act becomes a felony.
 "That is exactly what this case is about," Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said during a news conference following Trump's arraignment. "Thirty-four false statements made to cover up other crimes. These are felony crimes in New York state no matter who you are. We cannot and will not normalize serious criminal conduct."
 Okay, but what are the other crimes Trump is accused of covering up? The indictment doesn't say, but Bragg was asked on Tuesday, and he offered a few possibilities. First, he said, the doctored records "violated New York election law, which makes it a crime to conspire to promote a candidacy by unlawful means," including making false statements. Second, Bragg cited the federal election law cap on contribution limits.
 But, but, but. This is not well-trodden legal territory. If I understood Bragg's argument correctly, there is a certain circularity to saying that a false statement on corporate books becomes a felony, not a misdemeanor, because state election law makes it a misdemeanor to promote a candidacy by unlawful means, such as making false statements.
 Moreover, it's not at all clear that violating a federal law -- even if it could be proved that Trump did so -- would constitute the kind of other crime that would allow Bragg to bootstrap Trump's alleged conduct from misdemeanor to felony. As Joshua Stanton, Norman L. Eisen, E. Danya Perry and Fred Wertheimer wrote on the JustSecurity website last month, "the only appellate court in New York to have considered the meaning of 'offense' . . . found that it applied only to New York crimes."
 In addition, Trump's lawyers will argue that federal election law supersedes state law. The federal law states explicitly that its rules "supersede and preempt any provision of State law with respect to election to Federal office."
 Again, maybe Bragg's theory of the case will turn out to be solid. Maybe not. But this feels like a dangerous leap on the highest of wires.
 - - -
 Ruth Marcus' email address is ruthmarcus@washpost.com.

The Trump indictment is a dangerous leap on the highest of wires

Yale College

Harvard Law School

Gerald Loeb Award, Commentary, 2021

National Association of Black Journalist Salute to Excellence Award, Commentary, 2021

The Washington Post Eugene Meyer Award, the paper's highest journalistic honor, 2020

Distinguished Achievement Award from the Society for Advancing Business Editing and Writing, the organization’s highest honor, 2019

Hall of Fame for the Society of Professional Journalists Washington, D.C., Pro Chapter, 2019

Fellowship, Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, Wharton Seminars for Business Journalist, awarded by National Press Foundation, 2018

Salute to Excellence Award for Community Service, National Association of Black Journalists, 2010

Best in Business, series of columns, Society of American Business Editors, 2008

What To Do With Your Money When Crisis Hits: A Survival Guide

The 21 Day Financial Fast: Your Path to Financial Peace and Fre

Your Money and Your Man: How You and Prince Charming Can Spend Well and Live Rich

Spend Well, Live Rich: How to Get What You Want with the Money You Have

MICHELLE SINGLETARY COLUMNAdvance for release Wednesday, April 5, 2023, and thereafter(For Singletary clients and FOR PRINT USE ONLY)For Print Use Only.By Michelle Singletary
 I have long joked that I keep my car until I'm on a first-name basis with the local tow truck drivers.
 With the average price of a new vehicle at $47,680, it's no laughing matter.
 Then there is the cost of financing, which has gotten considerably higher because of the Federal Reserve's fight to beat back inflation.
 The average interest rate for a new vehicle was 7 percent in the first quarter, compared with 4.4 percent a year earlier. That's the highest level since 2008, according to new data from Edmunds, a car shopping website. For used vehicles, the average jumped from 7.8 percent to 11.1 percent.
 How does that translate to monthly payments?
 It's shockingly high.
 There were lots of new highs in the Edmunds data, which is based on aggregated information from hundreds of thousands of transactions each month at dealerships across the country.
 The average monthly payment for a new vehicle hit a record $730 in the first quarter, up from $656 in 2022. And 16.8 percent, or about 1 in 6 of them, are paying $1,000 or more a month - also a new all-time high.
 If that weren't bad enough, a lot of car buyers are rolling old loans into new car financing deals.
 In February, 44.2 percent of new vehicles purchased had a trade-in, and 18 percent of those trade-ins had negative equity, meaning they owed more on the car than it was worth.
 "Most Americans, let's be honest, don't pay cash any longer," said Jessica Caldwell, Edmunds's executive director of insights. "They take out loans, and that has made car buying very expensive."
 Here are five money-saving tips if you're in the market for a vehicle.
 - - -
 Shop around for financing
 Comparison shopping for financing is critical. Don't settle for what a dealer may offer. Check with your bank or credit union. Line up financing before setting foot on a car lot. If the dealer can match what you've secured elsewhere, fine. But at least you know if what they are offering is competitive.
 Definitely follow this tip if you're a minority car buyer. Last year, I wrote about a $3.38 million Federal Trade Commission settlement that showed how auto loan markups can, when applied unevenly, be discriminatory. The FTC had accused a Maryland dealership of discriminating against Black and Latino customers through higher financing costs and fees.
 Here's how markups work. The dealer submits an application to one or more lenders on behalf of a consumer. A lender, taking into account the applicant's credit history and other information, approves the loan for a specific annual percentage rate known as the "buy rate." In some circumstances, depending on its policies, the auto lender can permit the dealership to add a finance charge to the buy rate. This is the "markup." Unbeknown to many borrowers, the dealership may decide to increase the buy rate for no other reason than because it can. For example, a customer's buy rate might be 7 percent, but the dealer might tell the consumer he has been approved for a 9 percent loan. As the FTC noted in the settlement, the markup isn't related to a credit issue with the borrower.
 - - -
 Go for a shorter-term loan.
 The average loan term for a new car in the first quarter was about 70 months, according to Edmunds.
 "Sometimes people finance their vehicle for so long, they want a new car before they're even finished paying off the first car," Caldwell said. "So they're always in a cycle where they've never paid off their vehicle."
 Here's my rule of thumb when it comes to auto loans: If you can't afford the monthly payment with 48-month financing, you're buying above your means.
 But longer-loan terms and lower interest rates have allowed people to buy more expensive vehicles, Caldwell said.
 "Now we're in the opposite situation where interest rates have been rising, and they are actually quite high from a historical perspective," she said. "Extending your loan term doesn't seem like a great idea because it's just gotten much more costly."
 - - -
 Look for financing deals.
 With rates rising, Edmunds has seen an increase in lower-cost financing offers from automakers.
 Instead of offering cash back for a particular vehicle, the dealer might have a financing promotion.
 "Automakers are going to start subsidizing these loans because they need to move the metal," Caldwell said. "So you may see an offer for 3.9 percent or something a bit lower. I would encourage people to look for those types of programs. Last year, it was a desert in terms of incentives."
 But those deals are often reserved for consumers with excellent credit histories.
 - - -
 Improve your credit score.
 You may want to hold on to your older car while you work on boosting your credit score, which will put you in a better position to snag the best financing.
 The best way to increase your credit score is to pay your bills on time and reduce the amount of debt you're carrying.
 - - -
 Buy a cheaper car.
 Be flexible. Maybe you just can't afford a new car, or the exact make and model you've had your heart set on purchasing.
 With vehicle inventory still catching up to consumer demand, it's harder to negotiate the price of a new or used car. Couple that with rising interest rates on auto loans, and the best way to cut costs is to expand your search to a more affordable vehicle.
 - - -
 Call Michelle Singletary at 1-800-Ask-Post. Readers can also write to Michelle Singletary c/o The Washington Post, 1301 K St., N.W., Washington, D.C. 20071. Her email address is michelle.singletary@washpost.com. Follow her on Twitter (@SingletaryM) or Facebook (www.facebook.com/MichelleSingletary). Comments and questions are welcome, but due to the volume of mail, personal responses may not be possible. Please also note comments or questions may be used in a future column, with the writer's name, unless a specific request to do otherwise is indicated

Car payments are $1,000 for a lot of consumers. Here's why.

University of Maryland

Johns Hopkins University

2018 Finalist team, Pulitzer Prize for Public Service

2018 George Polk Award

2010 Urbino International Press Award

2013 Overseas Press Club Award for Foreign Affairs Commentary

Lifetime Achievement Award, International Committee for Foreign Journalists

Legion D'Honneur awarded by the French government

2004 Edward Weintal Prize

2000 Gerald Loeb Award for Commentary

As The Post’s foreign editor, Ignatius supervised the paper’s Pulitzer Prize-winning coverage of the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait

The Paladin

The Quantum Spy

The Director

Bloodmoney

The Increment

Body of Lies

The Sun King

A Firing Offense

The Bank of Fear

SIRO

Agents of Innocence

DAVID IGNATIUS COLUMNAdvance for release Wednesday, April 5, 2023, and thereafter(For Ignatius clients and FOR PRINT USE ONLY)For Print Use Only. Note language in graf 6By David Ignatius
 WASHINGTON - Saudi Arabia's coldly pragmatic decision this past weekend to cut oil production and raise prices sent a simple message: The United States doesn't call the shots in the Persian Gulf or the oil market anymore. For better or worse, the era of American hegemony in the Middle East is over.
 Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman pressed OPEC producers on Sunday to reduce production by about 1 million barrels a day, which boosted the price of crude oil by more than 6 percent to about $85 a barrel. For a Biden administration struggling to contain inflation and avoid recession, the Saudi-led price increase was as welcome as a poke in the eye.
 Saudi Arabia is hedging its bets, and so is the United States. Neither country wants a break in relations, but leaders in both capitals feel disrespected. It's not an easy or stable balance - especially for Israel, which wants better relations with Riyadh but depends absolutely on the reliability of U.S. power in the region.
 But life goes on, even for a jilted superpower. The Biden administration's "back channel" - CIA Director William J. Burns - visited the kingdom this week. He "discussed shared interests" with top Saudi officials and "reinforced our commitment to intelligence cooperation, especially in areas such as counterterrorism," a U.S. official told me.
 It is tempting to see the oil-production move by MBS, as the Saudi crown prince is known, as a pre-arraignment endorsement of former president Donald Trump. Certainly, he prefers Republicans, but he has been hedging his bets in the GOP, too. In February, MBS hosted Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) and a group of top GOP senators that included James E. Risch of Idaho and Tom Cotton of Arkansas. This week, the Saudis staged a lavish event in Miami hosted by Republican Mayor Francis X. Suarez, an ally of Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Trump rival.
 MBS is still loyal, in his way, to the former president who boasted to Bob Woodward, "I saved his ass" after the 2018 murder of Post contributing columnist Jamal Khashoggi. MBS's sovereign wealth fund has financed the LIV Golf tour that has showcased Trump's resorts and has put more than $2 billion in an investment firm run by Jared Kushner, Trump's son-in-law and former senior adviser.
 But I'm guessing that, for MBS, Chinese President Xi Jinping is the new Trump - the big guy who indulges the Saudi leader's ambitions as a regional powerhouse. When Xi visited Saudi Arabia in December, MBS organized a Gulf summit at which other countries joined in pledging cooperation on economic, energy and security issues.
 MBS has told Saudi confidants that the United States remains the kingdom's partner, but not its only partner. I am told that the crown prince explained to these insiders that while his predecessors would immediately grant U.S. requests, "I broke that because I want things in return." MBS is still buying Boeing airplanes, for example, but he just received a reaffirmation of U.S. protection in Burns's visit and a joint military exercise.
 The Biden administration has taken the latest Saudi rebuff calmly, in contrast to its anger after the kingdom sharply cut production in October. Officials note that crude oil prices were at 15-month lows, below $80 a barrel for much of March, and that analysts were forecasting a further slide below $70. Facing that kind of price decline, the Saudis often cut production.
 Biden administration officials are betting that prices will settle in the mid-80s, and that the overall economic effect will be limited. But if the market tightens and prices rise above $100 a barrel, it's not clear what the administration could do about it. Biden is not a president for whom this Saudi leader is likely to do any favors.
 Oil analysts argue that there is an upside. Prices had fallen to levels that discouraged spending for new production capacity. Modestly higher prices might encourage investment that "will be highly necessary when demand takes off" as the global economy revives, argues Andrew Gould, a former chief executive of Schlumberger and former board member of Saudi Aramco.
 As MBS explores partnership with his new best friend, Xi, he's becoming more assertive with such neighbors as the United Arab Emirates and Egypt. MBS told Saudi confidants last year that he had demanded concessions from both countries by the end of 2023. Egyptian President Abdel Fatah El-Sisi traveled this week to Riyadh, in a visit that "affirmed mutual concern for promoting common cooperation," a spokesman for the Egyptian president said. Tensions are said to remain with the UAE, but the Emiratis followed MBS's lead on the oil-production cut.
 For Israel, a headstrong MBS carries special risks. Israel has been seeking to normalize relations with the Saudis. But MBS just made a deal with Iran, Israel's mortal enemy, in a diplomatic bargain brokered by China, the United States' strongest rival. MBS wants it both ways: maintaining U.S. (and covert Israeli) protection while he ignores their interests. That won't work.
 The United States coddled a vulnerable Saudi Arabia for more than half a century because we needed its oil. Now, increasingly, we don't. What we want is a Saudi Arabia that behaves like a responsible partner, even as it inevitably puts Saudi interests first.
 - - -
 Contact David Ignatius on Twitter @IgnatiusPost

With oil production cut, the Saudis send a message to the U.S.

Harvard College

Kings College, Cambridge

2004 2nd place in the National Headliner Awards

2006 3rd place in the National Headliners Awards presented by the Press Club of Atlantic City

2002 & 2003, the Dallas Observer named him Best Columnist at a Daily Newspaper

A Darker Shade of Crimson: Odyssey of a Harvard Chicano (1993)

Contributer to Chicken Soup for the Writer's Soul (2000), of the best-selling "Chicken Soup for the Soul" series.

RUBEN NAVARRETTE COLUMNFOR IMMEDIATE PRINT AND WEB RELEASE(For Navarrette clients)By RUBEN NAVARRETTE JR.
 SAN DIEGO - The upcoming mega-fight between Ryan Garcia and Gervonta Davis - two undefeated lightweight boxers and knockout artists - has gotten personal. 
 The opening bell for the April 22 match hasn't even rung, and already Davis - who is African American - has hit Garcia - a Mexican American - with a cheap shot. 
 At a recent news conference, Davis declared, "I love my Mexican fans!" Then he engaged in a little cultural appropriation. "Tacos are definitely my favorite Mexican food," he said. 
 No harm, no foul. Then came the offensive part. 
 By the way, Davis claimed, Garcia is "not Mexican, really" because he was born in Los Angeles. "How can [Ryan] consider himself Mexican if he doesn't speak any Spanish?" Davis snarked. 
 Talk about a low blow. That jab will reverberate across the Southwest. That's where you'll find most of the 40 million Mexican Americans in the United States, inhabiting a region once owned by Mexico. For that tribe, my tribe, saying someone isn't a real Mexican because he doesn't speak Spanish amounts to fighting words.
 For me, this exercise of assessing ethnic authenticity summons bad memories. As a Mexican American who attended a predominantly White university, I have long been plagued by cultural insecurities. It feels like I spent half my time in college accusing Mexican American classmates of not being "Mexican enough" and the other half being told the same thing by other Mexican American classmates. And when you're on the attack, you look for soft spots where your opponent is vulnerable - like the fact that he has forsaken the language of his ancestors. 
 I've always wanted to speak better Spanish, my grandparents' native language. My accent is fine, but I need a larger vocabulary. I think in English - and then translate whatever I'm thinking into Spanish. 
 A Cuban American friend told me recently that he does the same thing and that he gets stuck when he talks his way into what he called a "language cul-de-sac."
 Garcia may not speak Spanish, but he understands it. His parents were, like him, born in the United States. But his grandparents hail from the Mexican state of Nuevo Leon, according to the sports site Marca.com. Garcia's father, Henry, is fluent in Spanish. 
 Davis's crack about Ryan not speaking Spanish clearly bothered the patriarch. 
 "We are Mexican, my parents are from Nuevo Leon," Henry emphatically told reporters. "In boxing, they know [Ryan] is Mexican. If he doesn't speak [Spanish] well, okay, what can we do? But in boxing, there is no language. Just punching. That's how you talk in the ring."
 If any of this sounds familiar, then you're probably accustomed to closely following another blood sport: politics. As a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020, Julián Castro, a former U.S. housing secretary, went through his own version of the Spanish inquisition. He was chided by White liberals in the media for not speaking well the language of his ancestors.
 At the time, Castro pushed back. He told a writer for New York magazine that his critics didn't "understand the reality of the Latino community in the United States" - a stew of English-dominant, Spanish-dominant and bilingual individuals. Also, Castro noted, "it's the common experience of people … whether they came over from Germany a long time ago, or Italy … second-generation Americans who might not be quite as fluent … in the mother tongue, but of course are still proud of their background."
 Castro - a friend of mine for more than 20 years - was correct on all counts. Do we say that Italian Americans are less "Italian" if they don't speak the language of the old country? Of course not. The same goes for German Americans and Chinese Americans. 
 Only Mexican Americans, it seems, have to pass this ethnic purity test. That's offensive and stereotypical. Some might even call it racist.
 That's an appropriate charge. It was racism that helped bring us to this point. Earlier generations of Mexican Americans were, in public schools, punished for speaking Spanish. And so they grew up to raise their children to speak only English. Our parents were told to master English, and now we're criticized for not speaking Spanish. 
 It's no wonder so many members of my tribe - Ryan Garcia and his family included - consider language to be such a touchy subject. It should be hands off. 
 Tread lightly. Or, like Gervonta Davis, you'll be in for one helluva fight. 
 - - -
 Navarrette's email address is crimscribe@icloud.com. His podcast, "Ruben in the Center," is available through every podcast app.

Boxer's crack about not speaking Spanish was a low blow

National Press Club Angele Gingras Award for Humor Writing 2016, Shorty Award 2016, Forbes 30 Under 30, Fifty Funniest People Right Now (Rolling Stone)

A Field Guide To Awkward Silences 

Nothing Is Wrong And Here IS Why

AP's US History: Important American Documents (I Made Up)

Alexandra Petri presents: Real or fake? A history quiz!

Harvard College, BA in English, Classics Secondary Field

Weidenbaum Center Award for Evidence-Based Journalism, 2010

Gerald Loeb Award, Finalist, 2011

Gerald Loeb Award, Finalist, 2012

Gerald Loeb Award, Finalist, 2018

Gerald Loeb Award, Finalist, 2019

Gerald Loeb Award, Finalist, 2020

Gerald Loeb Award, Finalist, 2021

Online Journalism Award, 2021

CATHERINE RAMPELL COLUMNAdvance for release Wednesday, April 5, 2023, and thereafter(For Rampell clients and FOR PRINT USE ONLY)For Print Use Only. 1 photoBy Catherine Rampell
 How do you negotiate with someone who has no idea what they want?
 That's the challenge for President Biden as Republicans say he must (A) satisfy their fiscal demands before they'll raise the debt limit; even though they (B) can't decide what those demands actually are; and they (C) have zero credibility for delivering 218 House votes for whatever those demands eventually turn out to be.
 Republicans were fine with the last president signing $4.7 trillion in new deficits into law even before covid-19 hit (plus, trillions more thereafter). Now that a Democrat is president, though, the GOP's born-again deficit hawks decided that Something Must Be Done about the nation's fiscal health.
 It's not clear what Something is, however, beyond taking a valuable hostage: the nation's debt ceiling.
 That's the statutory limit on how much the government can borrow to pay off bills that (BEG ITAL)previous(END ITAL) Congresses already agreed to. Not raising the debt ceiling would force the federal government to renege on some of those commitments, possibly missing payments on obligations such as interest payments, Social Security benefits and military salaries. The other potential consequences of an even accidental default include, in the near term, a global financial crisis; and, in the longer term, higher borrowing costs, because the United States would no longer look like the safe, reliable borrower we have always been.
 Higher borrowing costs mean (BEG ITAL)bigger(END ITAL) deficits going forward, of course. If Republicans have recently found religion on fiscal responsibility, they seem to still be sorting out the exact theological tenets.
 The rest of the GOP plan for reducing deficits is still TBD. Republicans say they want less debt. Unfortunately, they have ruled out virtually every mathematical means for achieving that outcome.
 To wit: They won't raise taxes (to the contrary, they have pledged to cut taxes further); they won't touch Social Security or Medicare; they won't slash defense or veterans' programs; and they won't zero out the rest of the nondefense discretionary budget, as would be required if they chose to extend all the Trump tax cuts and took all those other spending categories off the table, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.
 Not to worry: At least Republicans still pledge to cut "wokeism" from the budget! (This apparently means defunding the FBI.)
 Biden, for his part, has at least committed fiscal proposals to paper. I have quibbles with some elements of his budget, including some of his math. For example, the president's budget forecasts don't take into account the cost of extending most of the Trump tax cuts, which Biden now officially supports. But at least his ideas are out there for the rest of us to evaluate and for Republicans to counter.
 Republicans, on the other hand, appear to have abandoned any pretense of a counteroffer. They have no budget, nor even the basic outlines of one.
 In a letter in late March, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) accused the president of being "missing in action" on debt negotiations. Never mind, apparently, McCarthy's lack of concrete positions of his own, beyond platitudes about "reducing excessive non-defense government spending" (which ones are excessive?) and advocating "policies to grow our economy and keep Americans safe, including measures to lower energy costs." (Okay, how?)
 The same day, on CNBC, McCarthy defended his caucus's lack of budget by saying, "The budget doesn't have anything to do with the debt ceiling." Rep. Kevin Hern (R-Okla.), chair of the Republican Study Committee, used nearly identical language in telling the Hill: "I don't think the budget has anything to do with the spending limit."
 To be clear: I agree!
 Raising the debt ceiling is about making good on (BEG ITAL)past(END ITAL) obligations; budget proposals are about (BEG ITAL)future(END ITAL) spending and tax decisions. These things should not be linked. Congress should pass a clean debt limit increase or suspension without preconditions, just as Republicans repeatedly agreed to do when Donald Trump was president. Since then, however, Republicans have tried to bundle the two unrelated things, treating one as a useful hostage to force (again, TBD) changes to the other.
 Last week, House Budget Committee Chair Jodey Arrington (R-Tex.) let slip the real reason there is neither a detailed GOP fiscal plan nor a concrete set of principles for one. Convincing 218 lawmakers (that is, a House majority) to commit to a budget is not "as easy as when I was a freshman here," he said.
 In other words: The GOP caucus is a cacophonous mess. Republicans don't know what they want; they only know they don't want the thing Democrats are offering. Which is reminiscent of the dynamics of many other major policy debates in recent years.
 And yet Republicans keep demanding that Biden sit down, negotiate and make concessions. Each time they do, the rest of us should respond: Concessions on (BEG ITAL)what?(END ITAL)
 - - -
 Catherine Rampell's email address is crampell@washpost.com. Follow her on Twitter, @crampell.

The GOP has no idea what it wants on the budget, but it's definitely not that

Princeton University

Lizzie and Laura have opposite stress schedules.

Reply All

Pearl hopes Frank found the two Easter eggs in his exhaust pipe.

Fort Knox

Drew questions seeking the approval of someone you think has bad judgment.

Reply All Lite

Frank finds at least one of Pearl's Easter eggs -- in his shoes.

Drew got your note, he just forgot about it immediately.

Now Lizzie and Drew just have to figure out how to cast their reality show.

trump-history-56758d04-cf5c-11ed-bae5-821b8594ca6f.jpg

What does Trump's indictment mean for the country?

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 For a half-century, Donald Trump has portrayed himself as the consummate dealmaker - and the ultimate escape artist, a serial entrepreneur turned politician who managed to avoid major consequences despite having been investigated in every decade of his adult life by federal and state agencies, by bankers and casino regulators, by legions of prosecutors and competitors.
 He's been investigated over matters small and huge: over alleged lobbying violations in New York state and whether he played a role in the Russian government's effort to interfere with the 2016 U.S. presidential election. He was the only president to be impeached twice, yet he was acquitted both times.
 Now, 50 years after federal officials first accused Trump and his father of violating laws that barred racial discrimination in apartment rentals, the former president has been indicted, according to multiple people briefed on the matter. While the indictment has not been made public, a Manhattan grand jury has been investigating the payment of hush money to a professional stripper and adult film actress who threatened to go public with her allegation that Trump had an affair with her years before he won the White House.
 The indictment of the former president is likely to spark a political firestorm and might break new ground legally. It is also a moment that Trump has long believed could never happen - a criminal charge that could theoretically put him behind bars after a career of dodging findings of guilt in forums from Trenton, N.J., to Brooklyn to the U.S. Capitol.
 "Donald was always fearless," said Barbara Res, an engineer and attorney who was a top executive at the Trump Organization for two decades. "He absolutely believed he was above the law. He loved cutting corners. He loved suing people."
 To Trump, an indictment is a first step in a very public drama that he believes will ultimately accrue to his benefit, according to people who have worked closely with him through the years, bolstering his support among his base and winning sympathy from other voters who might not like him but also don't believe that a former president should be prosecuted in a case stemming from an alleged extramarital affair.
 Trump, now in his third consecutive presidential campaign, will win in 2024 because of the Stormy Daniels case, said his new lawyer Joe Tacopina, speaking on MSNBC: "I believe this will catapult him into the White House. . . . Because this will show how they are weaponizing the justice system. They're taking the vote out of the voters' hands."
 The indictment in the Daniels case comes amid an Atlanta-area investigation into Trump's role in seeking to overturn the 2020 election results in Georgia, and a special counsel's federal investigations into Trump's actions leading up to the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the Capitol, as well as his handling of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago, his South Florida estate and private club.
 Already, Trump's statements about the Daniels case have followed a pattern he set as far back as 1973, when federal prosecutors accused Trump and his father, Fred, a prominent New York City apartment developer, of turning away Black people who wanted to rent from them. In that case, Trump first denied the allegation, then said he didn't know his actions were illegal, and then, through his lawyer, accused the government of conducting a bogus "Gestapo-like investigation."
 This time, Trump initially said he'd never had any sexual relationship with Daniels or that, as he told friends privately, Daniels was not his type. Then, he said he didn't know Daniels had been paid $130,000 to remain silent about their alleged relationship, which he denies existed. And then he said that perhaps he had known about the payment, but that he never ordered his attorney, Michael Cohen, to make it.
 Finally, Trump spokesman Steven Cheung said in a statement Thursday evening that "From Russia, Russia, Russia, to the Mueller Hoax, to Impeachment Hoaxes 1 and 2, and even the Unlawful Mar-a-Lago Raid, Democrats have investigated and attacked President Trump since before he was elected - and they've failed every time. Now Democrats are at it again, pushing the 'Nuclear Button' and attacking a president because of a disgraced extortionist."
 Trump's attitude toward law, lawyers and the notion of legal jeopardy closely tracks his approach to business, politics and personal relationships: He has said that he believes in instinct and gut over expertise and rules, that any publicity is good publicity, and that most Americans admire successful people even when - or especially when - they skirt the rules.
 Just as he improvised his way through episodes of "The Apprentice," the NBC reality show that ran from 2004 to 2017 and jump-started his pivot into politics, Trump has said he prefers to wing it when it comes to sitting for depositions or appearing as a witness. Longtime aides say he has always believed investigations into his business practices or personal life were politically motivated and that he could persuade any jury that he's been singled out for unfair attack.
 Whether the forum is a television show, a courtroom or a political debate, Trump contends he can outperform any adversary. "I've never had lessons," Trump said in a 2015 interview with The Washington Post about why he doesn't rehearse for debates. "Either you're good at it or you're not good at it."
 Trump's confidence that he can finesse legal proceedings stems from two sources: his father, who cultivated close ties with Democratic Party officials and well-connected lawyers, and New York power broker Roy Cohn, a lawyer - later disbarred for fraud and misrepresentation - who taught the young Trump how to turn tables on prosecutors.
 In 1973, when Trump met Cohn at Le Club, a members-only New York nightspot, the 27-year-old and his father were under investigation by the Justice Department for discriminating against Black New Yorkers in renting apartments. Donald Trump was just starting his own business, seeking to build in Manhattan, which he saw as a major step up from his father's base in Brooklyn and Queens. Trump had been rejected by Le Club, but finally won admission when he promised not to hit on married women there, as Trump recounted in his book, "Trump: The Art of the Deal."
 At their first meeting, he told Cohn: "I don't like lawyers. . . . They are always looking to settle instead of fight."
 Cohn agreed and advised Trump to tell the feds "to go to hell and fight the thing in court." Cohn spelled out a strategy Trump would use for the rest of his career: When attacked, counterattack with overwhelming force.
 On behalf of Trump, Cohn filed a $100 million counterclaim against the government. In a deposition, Trump toyed with prosecutors, contending that he was "unfamiliar" with housing discrimination law.
 His counterclaim was tossed out of court, but Cohn and Trump managed to stretch the proceedings over two years, finally agreeing to a settlement in which Trump admitted no wrongdoing. In the meantime, he won a load of free publicity - negative stories "can be very valuable to your business," he said back then - and established himself as a fighter.
 Over the next half-century, Trump would push back in similar ways against casino regulators who alleged his business empire had become financially unstable, against New York state's effort to shut down his Trump University for defrauding students, and against Congress as it twice impeached - and acquitted - the 45th president for "high crimes and misdemeanors."
 In the Daniels case, Trump has deployed almost the identical playbook he learned from Cohn, starting with his blanket denial that he had an affair with the adult-movie star after they met at a celebrity golf tournament in Lake Tahoe, Nev., in 2006, when she was 27 and he was 60.
 Trump has a long history of marketing himself as a billionaire playboy with a knack for dating top models. Before, between and during his three marriages, he arranged to be photographed with beauty pageant winners and models in skimpy outfits, visited Hugh Hefner's Playboy mansion, bought and managed beauty contests, and ended up in legal battles with women who said he had groped them or had affairs with them.
 Those disputes generally ended in settlements, with the women involved receiving a payment and agreeing to sign a nondisclosure pact. Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, revealed in 2018 that Cohen, Trump's attorney, had paid her $130,000 in the final weeks of the 2016 campaign to remain silent about an alleged sexual relationship with Trump.
 Trump later admitted that he personally reimbursed Cohen for the hush money payments "to stop the false and extortionist accusations made by her about an affair."
 Although the politics of sexual abuse cases have changed markedly in recent years, Trump's alleged improprieties have had little apparent impact on his popularity, a phenomenon that sets him apart from political and entertainment figures such as comedian Bill Cosby, Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein, TV talk-show host Charlie Rose or U.S. Senate candidate Roy Moore of Alabama. This could be because voters long ago factored Trump's personal behavior into their opinion about him as a candidate, or because he has persuaded die-hard supporters that he truly is a victim of "fake news."
 Popular attitudes toward politicians' sexual misbehaviors tend to break along partisan lines. A quarter-century ago, many Democrats argued that President Bill Clinton's affair with a White House intern was a private matter, while many Republicans viewed it as an example of public corruption. Similarly, in recent years, many Democrats have seized on allegations against Trump as proof that he was unfit for office, while many Republicans embraced his denials and said his policy achievements were more important than any personal misdeeds.
 The public's perception of cases like this can flip virtually overnight depending on which party the accused belongs to. When the Deseret News in Salt Lake City conducted a national poll about adultery at the beginning of the 2016 campaign, almost two-thirds of Democrats said an extramarital affair wouldn't affect their voting decision, while just under half of Republicans agreed that an affair wouldn't matter.
 One year later, when the same poll posed the same question in a country where Trump was president, the results were upended: Then 57 percent of Republicans were willing to look past an affair, while 47 percent of Democrats were ready to ignore a candidate's indiscretions.
 The Daniels case, meanwhile, centers not on whether Trump had an affair but on the hush money and whether it was an illegal campaign contribution.
 Why that question, rather than Trump's actions leading up to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol or his efforts to overturn the Georgia election results, has led to the first indictment of a former president is more a matter of the vagaries of different prosecutors' approaches to their cases than any reflection of the relative importance or validity of the accusations.
 Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg has said his decision to press charges would be based on his investigators' confidence in their ability to prove the case. His prosecutors "are going through documents, interviewing witnesses, and exploring evidence not previously explored," Bragg told The Post last year. "In the long and proud tradition of white-collar prosecutions at the Manhattan D.A.'s Office, we are investigating thoroughly and following the facts without fear or favor."
 Those who have worked closely with Trump through past legal troubles say that despite his public bravado, he sometimes privately shows genuine concern that he could end up financially ruined or behind bars.
 "Oh, my God, this is terrible," Trump said after learning that former FBI chief Robert S. Mueller III would be the special counsel in the federal investigation of Russia's effort to interfere in the 2016 election, according to Mueller's final report. "This is the end of my presidency. . . . I'm f---ed."
 Similarly, when representatives of 30 banks confronted Trump in 1990, when he owed $3.2 billion and the bankers put liens on his house, boat and Florida mansion, "he was scared," Res said. "He stopped bragging so much. He was subdued. It was a visceral thing and we all saw it."
 But more than three decades later, much as she would like to see Trump held accountable, Res has come to believe that he will outmaneuver prosecutors who come after him.
 "I don't think they'll get him," she said. "Just like Mueller backed off, they won't have the courage to go after him all the way. But oh, that would be so great."
 ---Video Embed CodeVideo: A presidential historian discusses the immediate and long term outcomes behind the indictment of former president Donald Trump.(The Washington Post)Embed code: &lt;iframe src=&quot;https://www.washingtonpost.com/video/c/embed/39c6eac4-0cbb-4384-baff-073ffbe80a21?ptvads=block&amp;playthrough=false&quot; width=&quot;480&quot; height=&quot;290&quot; data-category-id=&quot;other&quot; frameborder=&quot;0&quot; webkitallowfullscreen mozallowfullscreen allowfullscreen&gt;&lt;/iframe&gt;</text>
 </story></html> trump-history Trump indictment follows 50 years of investigation on many fronts Justice Marc Fisher partner-exclude ellipsis

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 As Donald Trump seeks to mobilize his base against a potential indictment, a big question is: Just how big is Trump's true-believer base? How many people are willing to stand by Trump no matter what?
 This matters both when it comes to any backlash against an indictment - around which Trump has increasingly alluded to the prospect of violence - and for Trump's 2024 presidential prospects.
 The answer: Die-hard support remains substantial. But the number has clearly shrunk. And it's apparently not a majority of the Republican Party.
 This is a somewhat subjective exercise, but there are a number of measures we can isolate.
 One of the best ways to look at the question is to focus on how many Republicans view Trump not just favorably but "very" or "strongly" favorably.
 And by this measure, Trump's support has declined significantly since his 2020 defeat. While Fox News polling in October 2020 showed that 7 in 10 Republicans had a "strongly" favorable opinion of him, by December 2022, that 69 percent had dropped to 43 percent.
 Unfavorable views of Trump have increased from around 1 in 10 Republicans to around 2 in 10 over that span, but nearly as significant is the movement from "strongly" favorable to merely "somewhat" favorable.
 And the movement has been steady.
 While few pollsters have regularly broken down perceptions of Trump in this way, data from those who have done so echoes Fox's data.
 An AP-NORC poll from January showed just 14 percent of Americans overall viewed Trump "very favorably." That was Trump's lowest number on record - and it was half what it was in 2019.
 Similarly, the Pew Research Center has employed something it calls a "feeling thermometer" on Trump - basically asking people to assign a number to how they view the former president. The percentage of Republican-leaning voters who gave him a "very warm" number (between 76 and 100) was 41 percent. That was his lowest mark since the 2016 campaign, and it was down from 61 percent in April 2020.
 Another telling measure is how many Republicans view themselves as Trump-first rather than party-first. NBC News has asked this question frequently, gauging whether GOP-leaning voters view themselves more as supporters of Trump or supporters of the party.
 NBC's most recent poll, in January, showed 33 percent viewed themselves as Trump-first. That's compared to a majority who often said so while he was in office.
 Related to the above is the percentage to profess to be 2024 dead-enders - that is, those who would want Trump to run as an independent if he was denied the GOP nomination. This is an instructive measure, because it represents a scenario that would in all likelihood cost the GOP the presidency (whether its advocates realize that or not). It would effectively be a protest vote.
 In a Monmouth University poll last month, 27 percent of Republican-leaning voters said they would want Trump to run as an independent (vs. 67 percent who wouldn't). In another poll, 28 percent said they would actually vote for Trump in that scenario, even if Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis was the GOP nominee.
 Which brings us to the possible indictment.
 Marist came out with a new poll Monday that also sheds some light. What's perhaps most interesting about it is that it shows a majority of Republicans acknowledging that Trump has done something unethical related to the various investigations of him.
 The percentage who think he's done "nothing wrong," by contrast: 45 percent.
 So 45 percent say he's done nothing wrong, 41 to 43 percent have a strongly favorable opinion of him, 33 percent view themselves as Trump-first rather than party-first, and nearly 3 in 10 at least profess a willingness to back him as an independent.
 These are all different measures suggesting varying degrees of true devotion, but none are approaching a majority right now. And most used to be majority views in the GOP.
 That doesn't mean there couldn't be a rallying effect among GOP-leaning voters if Trump is indicted; Trump retains substantial goodwill among Republicans, and perhaps enough Republicans will buy into his claims of persecution that it will resolidify his base. In addition, we're still talking about significant numbers - even in their depressed state - that could just about be enough to deliver him the nomination again, or cause major problems if we see the unrest Trump is clearly toying with.
 But Trump has also been harping on these themes for a long time, and he's continued to see his base erode despite that.
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 </story></html> trump-analysis How big is Trump's true-believer base? The Fix partner-exclude Aaron Blake ellipsis

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