Washington, DC

1. Domestic security debate
2. Wright flip-flops
3. Surveillance fight builds
4. Vote-by-mail problems
5. Kerry’s case for nuclear

Exxon announces move to Texas, ▼ 1.2% anyway.

Trump admin split on threat communication

As two violent incidents this month spark questions about domestic security, the Trump administration is debating its own approach to warnings about potential homegrown threats related to the Iran war, Semafor’s Shelby Talcott reports. “There’s just a lack of consistency,” one administration official said in an interview. “Some things need to actually be addressed rather than the normal strategy of just calling everything fake outrage.” The debate over how to notify Americans of Iran-related risk follows a deadly shooting in Texas earlier this month and what police have described as a weekend “act of ISIS-inspired terrorism” in New York City. White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson took issue with past reports that a bulletin about domestic security risks got blocked; an FBI spokesperson said that “sometimes the timing of messages changes depending on the need for interagency partner input.”

Navy escort flip-flop destabilizes oil prices

Crude oil prices are still sensitive to White House updates on Iran — witness today’s drop-then-spike after a high-profile flip-flop. Energy Secretary Chris Wright posted on X Tuesday afternoon that the US Navy had escorted an oil tanker safely through the Strait of Hormuz, raising hopes that the trade route was reopening. About an hour later, Wright deleted the post without explanation; crude prices climbed. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed at a briefing that the Navy hadn’t accompanied any vessels through the region, but that the option was on the table, as Trump has said in recent days. Crude prices closed below the $100 threshold that had sparked a market frenzy Monday, but they remain about one-third higher than prices before the war. Until trade resumes at scale, relative stability would be a victory for the White House.

Wyden: Public will be ‘stunned’ by surveillance

Congress will soon plunge into a debate about surveillance as warrantless authorities expire on April 20. Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., said Tuesday there’s a lot that the American people don’t know about it. Speaking on the Senate floor, Wyden said he’s been asking Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard to declassify secret information that “affects the privacy rights of the American people” and is still awaiting an answer. “The American people are going to be stunned that it took so long and that Congress has been debating this authority with insufficient information,” Wyden said. Wyden said he can’t talk about it yet, because the program is still classified, but we followed up anyway. He said his speech was intended to raise awareness about the program, so it doesn’t blindside the public: “That’s what I was trying to do.”

 — Burgess Everett

Republicans cool to mail-in ballot ban

Trump’s call to add a ban on no-excuse mail-in voting to a bill that would add new ID requirements to vote was met with a cool response from Republicans at the State of the Union, and they don’t seem to be warming to it. On Monday Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., balked: “I don’t want the federal government telling me that I can’t have mail-in voting or absentee ballot voting.” Historically, mail-in voting has favored Democrats, a point Trump has made repeatedly since 2020. But the gap between the parties has narrowed and many red states have invested in getting voters to drop off or mail their ballots early. Trump has said he won’t sign any bills until the SAVE America Act reaches his desk, but the new provision makes finding the votes even harder for Senate Majority Leader John Thune.

View: John Kerry wants industry to back nuclear

Nuclear power enjoys something rare in Washington — bipartisan support and continuity between presidential administrations. That’s good news, because electricity demand is rising rapidly and increasingly central to economic strategy, driven by the growth of data centers, advanced manufacturing, infrastructure electrification, and industrial reshoring. While nuclear power is supported by policy, capital commitments, and politicians across the aisle, the missing ingredient is execution at scale, writes former Secretary of State John Kerry for Semafor.

Bilt Rewards launched in 2019 with a simple idea. If you can get credit-card rewards for buying a round of drinks, why can’t you get them for paying your rent? After a shambolic and short-lived partnership with Wells Fargo, the company is back with bigger ambitions: to be the platform powering 12% of the economy — housing services — plus a big chunk of what people spend on dining, workouts, healthcare, and other local services. On this week’s episode of Compound Interest, co-hosts Liz Hoffman and Rohan Goswami sit down with Bilt CEO Ankur Jain to unpack its Amex-Shopify-Square ambitions—and why every company wants to be a membership club.

Iran

• The US and Iran are ramping up their threats as the war enters its 11th day.
• The Pentagon says 140 service members have been wounded since the start of the conflict.
• Russian leaders told President Trump that they did not share intelligence with Iranians, according to special envoy Steve Witkoff. — CNBC
• Iran’s regime is battered, but still in control and able to fight, though attacks on its neighbors have eased.
• Pro-Iran accounts are spreading fake videos that appear to show Trump and Jeffrey Epstein together. — WaPo

Politics

• Trump is privately polling advisers on who should be his political heir, Secretary of State Marco Rubio or Vice President JD Vance. — WSJ
• Republican strategists are anxious about the Iran war ahead of the midterms. — WaPo
• Senate Republicans are facing pressure from farmers for a bailout as the Iran war drives up fertilizer prices.

Courts

• Supreme Court Justices Ketanji Brown Jackson and Brett Kavanaugh sparred at a public event over the court’s use of emergency rulings.
• The DNC has sued to find out if the Trump administration has plans to send armed officers to polling places.
• Voting machine company Smartmatic said it has been targeted by the DOJ in a criminal case over the 2020 election.

Business

• Polymarket is turning to Palantir to monitor suspicious betting. — Bloomberg
• The National Bureau of Economic Research cut ties with former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers over his relationship with Epstein.
• A Trump family-linked group is being probed as part of an inquiry by the House committee on China into Chinese stock scams.

Media

• USA Today named Jamie Stockwell, who recently left The Washington Post, as its new top editor.
• A retired South Florida anchorman, Eliott Rodriguez, is running for Congress as a Democrat for the seat held by Republican Rep. María Elvira Salazar.

Oversight

• The IRS’ top watchdog is investigating a whistleblower accusation that a DOGE employee took Social Security Administration data with him on a thumb drive and planned to share it with a new private employer. — WaPo
• A congressional committee discovered seniors paid billions in extra Medicaid premiums due to alleged overpayments to Medicare Advantage plans.

Correction

• A chart in yesterday’s edition incorrectly labeled the unit by which urea fertilizer is sold. A corrected version appears online.

— House Speaker Mike Johnson.

Laura McGann, editor

With help from Elana Schor, senior Washington editor, and Morgan Chalfant, Washington briefing editor

Graph Massara and Lauren Morganbesser, copy editors

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