Emails and other documents suggest the IRS's procedures to target conservative groups for added scrutiny were developed by lower-level employees.

The Obama administration is set to restart transfers of detainees from Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, kick-starting a long-stalled drive to close the prison.

Sen. Patrick Leahy has tried since 2003 to give people in same-sex relationships the right to sponsor their foreign partners for green cards, as married heterosexual couples can do. On Tuesday, he may have lost his best chance in recent years to push the measure into law.

Bernanke said the Fed could begin winding down its bond-buying program at one of its "next few meetings" if the economy continues to improve, but warned that a step down won't mean the Fed has started a one-way march to the exit.

Former U.S. Rep. Anthony Weiner launched his campaign for mayor of New York City, asking voters to give him a second chance.

Capital: Columnist David Wessel explains the fine line between monetary policy and currency manipulation, and why the former is OK but the latter is not.

The IRS flap eats away at the underpinnings of what Obama promised in 2008: a revival of confidence that government is capable of solving problems, writes Gerald F. Seib.

Apple's tax strategies came under harsh scrutiny Tuesday in the Senate, where lawmakers are finding it far easier to call for a simpler tax code than to produce one.

Lois Lerner, the head of the IRS office that targeted conservative groups, intends to invoke her constitutional right against self-incrimination and decline to answer questions at a hearing on Wednesday.

City Councilman Eric Garcetti will become the next mayor of Los Angeles, home to nearly 4 million residents.

An Orlando, Fla., man whom U.S. law enforcement questioned as an associate of the Boston bombing suspects was shot and killed after he tried to attack an FBI agent.

More than half of U.S. doctors have switched to electronic health records and are using them to manage patients' basic medical information and prescriptions.

The Senate Judiciary Committee passed a sweeping reworking of immigration laws on Tuesday evening, giving a bipartisan bill its first formal stamp of approval in Congress.

Federal investigators apparently accessed records of calls to and from a phone number at Fox News Channel in their leak investigation of a former State Department contractor, according to a court document.

The Chemical Safety Board, which investigates industrial accidents, said a rival federal agency has thwarted its efforts to delve into last month's deadly fertilizer-plant blast in West, Texas.

Tim Cook challenged Senate investigators who reported Apple paid no corporate income tax on tens of billions of dollars in overseas income over the past four years and urged reforms.

Lawmakers are tussling over the Obama administration's plans to create a small army of assistants to guide millions of Americans, as they sign up for new health-insurance options available this fall.

U.S. regulators will soon vote on which large nonbank financial firms will face much stricter government oversight, Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew will tell Senate lawmakers Tuesday.

The IRS briefed the Treasury Department extensively last month about a looming report that would find the agency had inappropriately targeted applications from conservative groups seeking tax-exempt status.

Apple paid no corporate income tax to any nation on tens of billions of dollars in income over the past four years, Senate investigators disclosed ahead of a hearing on Tuesday.