In Today’s Times:
- The White House said Thursday it believes the Syrian government has used chemical weapons on a small scale in its civil war but added that it needs more evidence before taking action as President Obama warned it would, Mark Landler and Eric Schmitt report.Â
- A bipartisan group of senators is quietly working to revive the gun debate, looking for lawmakers willing to change their votes and building a campaign to harness broad public support for a major overhaul, Jeremy W. Peters reports.
- Lawmakers, counterterrorism officials and experts were divided Thursday over whether the nation’s security apparatus had failed to prevent the bombings at the Boston Marathon after Russia warned the United States two years ago that one of the suspects was a radical Islamist, Scott Shane, Michael S. Schmidt and Eric Schmitt report.
- Three former presidents joined the current one in honoring George W. Bush at the dedication of his presidential library in Texas on Thursday, putting aside arguments over the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to focus on the positives, Peter Baker reports.
Washington Happenings:
- Mr. Obama will speak at the Planned Parenthood Gala in Washington on Friday before meeting with King Abdullah II of Jordan in the afternoon. Later, he is scheduled to talk to business leaders who have significant interests in Mexico and Central America before his trip to Mexico and Costa Rica next week.
- In the wake of the Boston Marathon bombings, a House Foreign Affairs subcommittee will hold a hearing on Islamist extremism in Chechnya at 10:30 a.m.
- The Commerce Department will announce the first-quarter gross domestic product at 8:30 a.m.
