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Pope's funeral turns into diplomatic opportunity
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This is Washington Edition, the newsletter about money, power and politics in the nation’s capital. Today, White House correspondent Catherine Lucey looks ahead to the president’s trip to Rome for the pope’s funeral. Sign up here and follow us at @bpolitics. Email our editors here.

Narrow Window

The funeral for Pope Francis tomorrow will draw a who’s-who of world leaders, many of whom also will be angling to get a private moment with Donald Trump. 

With tariffs and trade conflicts rocking financial markets and the war in Ukraine raging on, some heads of state are looking at the US president’s brief trip to Rome as a potential opportunity to plead their case. 

Trump and first lady Melania Trump depart for Rome Photographer: BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP

Of course, the window for meaningful work is small. Trump’s schedule had him arriving in Rome late tonight and leaving tomorrow after the funeral. But Trump long has conducted diplomacy in an untraditional manner. He’s leaning into the idea that there could be productive conversations with at least some of the more than 50 heads of state expected.

“I’d like to take care of all of them,” he said yesterday, “but we have many of them there, and they all want to meet, and they want to meet about trade, and we are making some great inroads and great deals.”

Among those who may attend is Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskiy, who is under pressure from Trump to make concessions to get a peace agreement with Russia. Two key US allies, Britain’s Keir Starmer and France’s Emmanuel Macron, also are expected to be there.

As he left the US today, Trump praised Francis, with whom he often clashed on issues like like immigration and climate change. “He loved the world,” Trump said. “I met him twice. I thought he was a fantastic kind of a guy.” 

One mourner who might not be seeking Trump out? Joe Biden. A devout Catholic who met with Francis a number of times — including when Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni made the unprecedented gesture of bringing the pope to the Group of Seven by the Adriatic Sea — the former president is often blamed by Trump for everything from economic woes to wars. — Catherine Lucey

Don’t Miss

A state judge in Wisconsin was charged by the FBI with obstructing federal officials who tried to detain an undocumented immigrant scheduled to appear in her courtroom last week.

Volodymyr Zelenskiy acknowledged that Ukrainian forces would be unable to regain control over Crimea and said the US won’t have to commit troops as part of security guarantees in an apparent overture to Trump.

Trump suggested another delay to his higher so-called reciprocal tariffs was unlikely, and said that he wouldn’t drop duties on China unless Beijing offers “something substantial” in return.

China’s government is considering suspending its 125% tariff on some US imports, people familiar with the matter said, as the economic costs of the tit-for-tat trade war weigh heavily on certain industries. 

Consumer sentiment in the US fell to one of the lowest readings on record and long-term inflation expectations climbed to the highest since 1991 on fears of the economic fallout from tariffs.

As Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell tries to ensure tariffs won't ignite inflation through the economy, being called “Mr. Too Late” by Trump is better than being Mr. Wrong.

Economists surveyed by Bloomberg anticipate Trump’s trade war will hit economic growth this year and next as tariffs push prices higher and put a dent in consumer spending.

The Trump administration said it would reinstate hundreds of international student visas that were revoked over the last few weeks, a major policy reversal that follows a spate of lawsuits.

The Education Department is launching an investigation into the University of California, Berkeley, claiming the school’s disclosures over foreign funding “may be incomplete or inaccurate.”

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that it’s confirmed 884 measles cases this year, an 11% increase from a week ago as the outbreak has now touched more than half the country. 

Former Representative George Santos, a onetime rising Republican star who made elaborate false claims about his background, was ordered to serve more than seven years in prison for stealing campaign funds.

Trump told Time magazine he would veto any legislation that cuts Social Security or federal health coverage for older and low-income Americans.

Watch & Listen

Today on Bloomberg Television’s Balance of Power early edition at 1 p.m., hosts Joe Mathieu and Kailey Leinz interviewed Christopher Smart, managing partner at Arbroath Group, about what’s ahead for the US and its trading partners as well as the IMF and World Bank meetings that are wrapping up in Washington.

On the program at 5 p.m., they talk with former US Trade Representative Susan Schwab about potential negotiations on Trump’s tariffs.

On the Big Take podcast, Bloomberg senior reporter Josh Eidelson joins host Sarah Holder to dig into the debate over subminimum wage — a section of employment law that lets companies pay certain employees with disabilities less than the federal minimum wage — and the future of the program under Trump. Listen on iHeart, Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

Map of the Day

The number of births in the US last year rose 1% after falling in 2023, based on provisional data from the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics. But the distribution of newborns was quite varied. The number of births in 15 states and the District of Columbia declined in 2024, led by Louisiana, and Mississippi. Largely because it’s the most populous state at more than 39 million people, California registered 401,515 births — the most in 2024. However, the biggest annual increases were in Florida, Colorado, North Carolina, Texas, Washington and Utah. The number of births in California was just 11,000 more than in Texas, which has a smaller population of 31.3 million. — Alex Tanzi

What’s Next

The House and Senate are on break until Monday.

Job openings and layoffs in March will be reported on Tuesday.

The Conference Board’s gauge of consumer confidence in April is set for release on Tuesday.

The Fed’s preferred inflation gauge, the PCE price index, for March will be reported Wednesday.

Pending home sales in March also will be reported Wednesday.

The April unemployment rate will be reported next Friday.

Factory orders for March also are released next Friday.

The Federal Reserve next meets May 6-7.

Seen Elsewhere

  • Florida first lady Casey DeSantis' charity got a $10 million donation from a Medicaid contractor that was then funneled to two nonprofit political committees that helped Governor Ron DeSantis defeat a ballot measure, the New York Times reports.
  • Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth had an unsecured internet connection set up in his office, bypassing Pentagon security protocols, in order to use the Signal messaging app on a personal computer, the Associated Press reports.

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