California cleanin’. Mr. Trump has shifted his fraud cleanup blitz to California, pitting Mr. Vance, his new fraud czar, against Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat who could face off against the vice president for the White House in 2028.

Mr. Newsom lashed out at the vice president after the Justice Department announced that it had arrested a group of health care workers accused of bilking Medicare out of $50 million in fake hospice care in a California sting.

The operation was conducted in coordination with the new White House fraud task force, headed by Mr. Vance, who announced the raid on social media.

Mr. Newsom said the Trump administration is “home to the biggest fraudsters on earth.” He has launched a state-run “Stop Fraud” website that serves as a portal for reporting fraud but mostly promotes Mr. Newsom’s actions that he says have cut billions of dollars in fraudulent spending in the state, long before Mr. Vance stepped into his new role.

The Justice Department is investigating Cassidy Hutchinson, a former Trump White House aide who became a star witness in congressional Democrats’ probe into Mr. Trump and the attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

Republicans had been pushing for the probe, saying Ms. Hutchinson’s version of events that day — including claims that Mr. Trump tried to grab the wheel and force his Secret Service agents to take him to the Capitol — was belied by the testimony of the agents themselves.

Georgia Rep. Barry Loudermilk, who heads the House GOP’s own subcommittee probing Jan. 6, referred Ms. Hutchinson to the Justice Department for a perjury probe this year.

Some Justice Department officials expressed skepticism that a viable criminal case could be made against Ms. Hutchinson. The inquiry was opened in recent weeks under former Attorney General Pam Bondi.

Mr. Trump is celebrating America’s 250th anniversary in grand style while drawing scowls from his detractors by putting his stamp on official items such as national park passes and U.S. currency.

Mr. Trump is not the first president to capitalize on America’s milestone birthdays, but he is doing it in his trademark style.

In 1976, President Ford reaped all the political benefits he could from bicentennial celebrations in that election year amid a difficult campaign to stay in the White House. (He lost).

President Coolidge put his mark on the 1926 celebration by having his visage grace a commemorative half-dollar coin.

So, it was not entirely out of the ordinary when a federal arts commission last month approved the design of a 24-karat gold commemorative coin bearing Mr. Trump’s image to be issued as part of America’s birthday celebration. The president’s image will also appear on national park passes as part of the birthday bash.

And the Treasury announced that it would put Mr. Trump’s signature on all new paper currency “in honor of the 250th anniversary” of the U.S.

Two can play this game. Congressional Republicans are warning Democrats that they will regret their push to defund Immigration and Customs Enforcement and border patrol, saying it sets a new precedent for annual spending battles.

The Department of Homeland Security has been shut down since Feb. 14 because of Senate Democrats’ nearly united filibuster of immigration enforcement funding.

The hardball tactics could come back to bite Democrats in future spending negotiations, Republicans vow.

“Congressional Democrats have done real damage to the appropriations process by repeatedly forcing government shutdowns and refusing to fund entire agencies,” said Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Susan Collins, a Maine Republican who is not known for her partisan tit-for-tat-ship. “Their refusal to fund ICE and Border Patrol leaves our borders and our country less secure and sets a precedent that they may one day come to regret.”

Republicans plan to spend $342 million to hold onto the Senate majority in November as Democrats eye the turbulent economy and war in Iran to boost their chances of a takeover.

The Senate Leadership Fund, the top super PAC for the GOP, announced plans to spend the money defending five seats and flipping three other seats.

The PAC described the spending as “unprecedented” and its “largest investment ever,” and said the organization is confident the GOP will hold onto the majority. The GOP currently controls 53 of the Senate’s 100 seats.

Democratic Senate candidates have outraised many of their Republican opponents in Ohio, New Hampshire and other battleground races, according to filings with the Federal Election Commission earlier this year. The Senate Leadership Fund’s spending is intended to help make up the difference.

Cash-starved states run by Democrats are moving to squeeze more revenue out of their wealthiest residents with a new “millionaires tax,” and the strategy is gaining growing appeal for House and Senate Democrats.

Democrats in Congress are pitching populist federal wealth taxes for the richest Americans as they eye winning the 2026 election and taking over Congress.

Maryland, Massachusetts and Minnesota have raised taxes on their wealthiest residents, while California, Rhode Island and Connecticut are weighing their own plans to tax the rich. New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani ran — and won — on a promise to raise the city’s income tax on its wealthiest residents from 3.9% to 5.9%, which would be paid on top of the state’s 10.9% tax on the income of top earners.

On Capitol Hill, the concept of a national wealth tax is rapidly picking up support among House and Senate Democrats, who say it’s high time to make the richest Americans fork over “their fair share” to help fund universal day care, free community college, expanding Medicare and more.

Former Attorney General Pam Bondi will not appear before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee as part of the panel’s investigation into convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

She will not comply with a subpoena to sit for a closed-door deposition, the Justice Department informed the committee. It sought her testimony as attorney general, but Mr. Trump fired her last week, replacing her with the deputy, Todd Blanche.

“The Department of Justice has stated Pam Bondi will not appear on April 14 for a deposition since she is no longer Attorney General and was subpoenaed in her capacity as Attorney General,” a spokesperson for the committee said in a statement.

Ms. Bondi was expected to be questioned about the Justice Department’s handling of the investigation into Epstein and the release of its files, which were mandated to be made public after Congress passed the Epstein Files Transparency Act last year.

First, admit the problem. A federal court rejected Minnesota’s attempt to restart Medicaid funding that the Trump administration had halted over concerns people are stealing the money, with the judge saying even the state has acknowledged it has a “serious fraud problem.”

Judge Eric Tostrud, a Trump appointee, said Minnesota may still prevail later in the case, but for now the federal government is on relatively solid legal footing in deferring more than $250 million in Medicaid money to prod the state to combat fraud.

The ruling is a striking win for Mr. Trump, who had ordered his administration to take steps to punish Minnesota over a series of public benefit scandals, particularly involving the Minneapolis area’s large Somali community.

A federal judge ordered ICE to let priests, ministers and other faith leaders into the migrant processing center in Chicago’s suburbs, saying the total ban the agency had been enforcing is a violation of religious rights.

U.S. District Judge Robert Gettleman, a Clinton appointee, said ICE must allow daily visits for the clergy who sued.

The federal government said it allows visits by clergy who are invited by detainees but doesn’t allow the clergy to initiate visits.

Judge Gettleman said the Religious Freedom Restoration Act requires the government to avoid burdening someone’s religious practice if there is a way it can be accommodated.

Relatives of Iran’s IRGC leaders living in the U.S. should be hunted down and deported back to the Islamic republic, writes Commentary Editor Kelly Sadler.

Joseph Curl questions many of Mr. Trump’s recent actions, from his Sunday expletive-laden social media post to his sacking of Attorney General Pam Bondi.

Austin Gae argues that legislation from Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, New York Democrat, and Sen. Bernard Sanders, Vermont Democrat, to halt data center construction would cause an economic disaster.