The Early Word: Rain

In Today’s Times:
President Obama’s recent woes have energized and unified Congressional Republicans, but the G.O.P. is taking a measured approach in its responses to the controversies that have ensnared the president and his administration, as the party seeks to avoid the kind of backlash that followed President Clinton’s impeachment trial, Jonathan Weisman writes.

The president named a budget official to serve as the acting commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service as he seeks to move the agency past a scandal involving the potentially illegal targeting of conservative political groups for additional scrutiny, Michael D. Shear reports. Steve Miller, who resigned the post this week, is expected to face tough questioning on Friday as the House Committee on Ways and Means takes up the inquiry.

The drizzle-turned-patter of spring rain that interrupted President Obama’s joint news conference with the Turkish prime minister in the Rose Garden on Thursday, Mark Landler writes, helped create the perfect weather metaphor for the president’s current predicament: “struggling to find his footing, under a deluge of legal investigations at home and intractable problems abroad,” and in a “ragged relationship with the news media.”

The threat of a Republican-led filibuster hangs over Gina McCarthy to lead the Environmental Protection Agency after Democrats on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee voted to send her nomination to the floor, John M. Broder reports.

By contrast, 97 Senators voted to confirm Ernest J. Moniz to become the next Energy secretary, and the Judiciary Committee moved Sri Srinivasan’s nomination to the Federal Appeals Court for the District of Columbia to the chamber floor. But the fight over Ms. McCarthy’s nomination and that of Thomas E. Perez to lead the Labor Department has Democratic leaders in the Senate considering changing the rules to limit the Republicans’ ability to use the filibuster on presidential nominees, Jeremy W. Peters writes.

Mr. Obama is pushing military leaders to find ways to “protect, even empower, victims of sexual assault or harassment,” as Senator Kirsten E. Gillibrand, Democrat of New York, garners support for her measure aimed at encouraging victims to come forward without fear of retaliation, Thom Shanker and Jennifer Steinhauer write.

As Congress mulls changing the legal basis for the war on terrorism, a top Pentagon official, who expects the battle against Al Qaeda to continue for another decade or two, is urging Congress to leave the existing “authorization to use military force” intact. Charlie Savage explains that the discussion over whether to modify the existing AUMF has split advocates who want to avoid a “forever” war from those who support continuing a wartime approach to counterterrorism.

Happening in Washington:
Economic reports expected Friday include leading economic indicators for April from the Conference Board at 10 a.m., and the Congressional Budget Office’s score of President Obama’s 2014 budget proposal in the afternoon.

At 9 a.m., the former acting commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service and the Treasury inspector general for tax administration will testify before the House Committee on Ways and Means as the panel looks into charges that the I.R.S. targeted applicants for tax-exempt status based on political leanings.

President Obama will spend most of Friday in Baltimore on the second stage of his “middle-class jobs and opportunity tour.” He will visit an elementary school (11:35 a.m.), a dredge manufacturer (1:05 p.m.), where he will give remarks (1:20 p.m.), and a community center (2:15 p.m.).