In Today’s Times:
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President Obama’s reputation and Democratic hopes to put Hillary Rodham Clinton in the White House in 2016 are “hanging in the balance†after a veteran diplomat said he was demoted in Libya for challenging the Obama administration’s response to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in Benghazi and its version of events, Scott Shane, Jeremy W. Peters and Eric Schmitt write.
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Seeking to change a military court system that has unsuccessfully relied on commanders to handle allegations of sexual assault in the military, Senator Kirsten E. Gillebrand, Democrat of New York, is set to introduce legislation that would give military prosecutors more power to prosecute the cases, a move that is certain to ruffle feathers at the Pentagon, Jennifer Steinhauer writes.
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Economists believe Washington’s obsession with reducing the federal deficit via austerity measures is a drag on the economic recovery, undermining growth and driving up unemployment, Jackie Calmes and Jonathan Weisman report.
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The credibility of a study critical of the immigration overhaul proposed in the Senate is in question after it surfaced that one of the co-authors asserted in 2009 that Hispanics have a lower I.Q. than whites, Ashley Parker and Julia Preston write.
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Facing the possibility that President Obama could approve the controversial Keystone XL pipeline, opponents of the project are pushing for a tradeoff, like stronger policies on energy and climate change, John M. Broder writes.
Happening in Washington:
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Economic data expected Thursday include employment data for April and weekly jobless claims at 8:30 a.m., followed at 10 a.m. by wholesale trade inventories for March and weekly mortgage rates.
- The House Committee on Homeland Security will hold a hearing on the Boston bombings at 9 a.m.
- At 9:15 a.m., the Senate Committee on the Environment and Public Works will meet to consider the nomination of Gina McCarthy to be the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency.
- The Senate Judiciary Committee is scheduled to vote on Srikanth Srinivasan’s nomination to be a judge on the federal appeals court in Washington during a meeting at 10 a.m.
- At the same time, a subpanel of the Senate Committee on Appropriations will consider the Department of Agriculture’s 2014 budget proposal with testimony from Tom Vilsack, the agriculture secretary, and the agency’s budget officer and inspector general.
- At 10 a.m., families of members of the Navy’s SEAL Team 6 and military experts will talk about the government’s roles in the deadly helicopter crash that followed the raid on Osama bin Laden’s compound in Pakistan.
- At 8 a.m., Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. is set to meet with Senator Patty Murray, Democrat of Washington, who introduced a bill to help sexual assault victims in the military.
