Alex Wong/Getty Images(NEW YORK) -- Former New York Congressman Anthony Weiner has finally declared himself a candidate for New York City mayor.

In an ad posted on YouTube late Tuesday night, the democrat says, "I'm running for mayor because I've been fighting for the middle class and those struggling to make it my entire life."

Weiner adds that he hopes he gets a "second chance to work for you," admitting that he's "made some big mistakes" and "let a lot of people down."

"But I've also learned some tough lessons," he says.

Weiner resigned from Congress in 2011 after he revealed that he sent sexually inappropriate texts and photos to women after first denying that he had.  His wife, Huma Abedin, an aide to Hillary Clinton, stood by his side.

The couple, who has a 1-year-old son together, are both featured in the new ad, titled "Anthony Weiner for Mayor."

"We love this city and no one will work harder to make it better than Anthony," Abedin says in the video.

Weiner wraps up the ad by saying, "I will fight for you every single day.  Thank you for watching."

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Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call(OKLAHOMA CITY) -- Republican Rep. Tom Cole, whose district took a direct hit from a powerful tornado on Monday, said the residents of the tornado-ravaged towns in Oklahoma need help, not a political battle over funding in Washington.

“Once a disaster starts, to me that’s the end of a discussion. Now we need to focus on the Americans that are in a difficult spot,” Cole told ABC News in an interview Tuesday. “They don’t need to be watching a big political battle, they need to be sure they’re getting help.”

Cole is one of only two members of Oklahoma’s seven-person congressional delegation who voted in favor of a bill funding disaster aid after Superstorm Sandy, raising questions about whether they would change their stance on emergency funding in light of a tragedy in their own state.

Oklahoma’s Republican Sen. Tom Coburn on Monday reiterated his opposition to funding disaster relief without first identifying corresponding budget cuts, if Congress is forced to allocate additional funds.

Cole said he believes that the $11 billion the Federal Emergency Management Fund has in its disaster relief fund should be enough to cover the rebuilding and relief efforts in Oklahoma. But he added that, like with Sandy, relief should come first.

“You have to remember in Oklahoma, in my district or any place, you’re one tornado away from being Joplin[, Missouri],” Cole said. “I don’t begrudge other people. I know they’re trying to do the right thing.”

But he added that he’s always felt strongly about disaster aid.

“I felt exactly the same way about [Hurricane] Katrina, and we spent as much money on Katrina as we did on Sandy, if not more,” he said.

Cole spoke to ABC News from the ground in Oklahoma, where he said the federal and local response has been “swift and robust.”

“The feds have been terrific. The resources have been there and the response has been excellent,” said Cole, who toured the devastated region along with the other members of the state’s congressional delegation.

Cole’s hometown of Moore, Okla., was nearly destroyed by the mile-wide storm. Cole said he had memories of working as a teenager at one of the local schools that was all but destroyed by the storm.

“Now you can’t think about it without thinking about the horror that happened there,” Cole said. “The school was the safest, calmest building in the immediate area. Everybody made the right choice, they were just in the wrong place at the wrong time."

“There’s not a lot that can stand up to an F4 or an F5 [tornado],” he added.

Cole said that after speaking with President Obama on Monday night he is confident the White House and the Republican-controlled House of Representatives will do what it takes to provide assistance to his constituents.

“A Democratic president and a Republican majority leader…I think they’ll do the right thing and the congressmen will follow their lead,” Cole said.

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Official White House Photo by Pete Souza(WASHINGTON) -- Treasury Secretary Jack Lew called the unfair scrutiny the Internal Revenue Service gave some tea party groups “outrageous methods,” adding that while the “conduct was not politically motivated it was unacceptable and inexcusable.”

“Administering the tax code without any hint of bias is a solemn obligation that must be carried out with the highest of standards,” Lew said in a Senate Banking Committee hearing Tuesday. That was why once he learned of the practice he took steps, including asking for the resignation of acting IRS Commissioner Steven Miller, he said.

Miller was subject to a term limit that would have forced him out of the job in three weeks anyway.

Lew said he has directed incoming Acting Commissioner Daniel Werfel, who begins Wednesday, to “carry out a thorough review,” including “making sure that those who acted inappropriately are held accountable for their actions,” as well as “examining and correcting any failures in the system that allowed this behavior to happen,” and “taking a forward-looking view in determining whether the IRS has systemic problems that need to be addressed.”

Werfel will report back to him within 30 days so he can report back to the president “to make sure that nothing like this ever happens again,” Lew said.

Throughout the mostly respectful, but at times contentious, questioning, Lew denied over and over again any political motivation for the IRS’ behavior.

Lew also said he had no idea that the IRS was planning on revealing the scandal the way it did: by planting a question at an American Bar Association conference.

He said it was the “discretion of the IRS to decide how to manage the matter” and it is the “guiding principle for the Treasury Department in IRS investigations…to not interfere in any way,” but it’s not a strategy he would have supported.

“I wasn’t asked about this,” Lew told the committee. “I would have advised against doing that, but it was a decision for the IRS to make.”

Lew told the committee that he first became aware of the targeting of tea party groups on March 15, when he first met with Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration J. Russell George, who told him there was an audit of 501(c)(4) activity and  “there might be troubling findings,” but he said the inspector general “did not describe them in detail.”

“I then did not learn any more about it until it became public,” Lew said, noting that it was Friday, May 10, when he was attending the G-7 meetings in the United Kingdom. He said he was “outraged” when he found out and did not get a copy of the IG report until Tuesday, May 14, the same day it became public.

Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., was one of the senators most persistent with Lew, asking him what steps he took after his initial meeting with the inspector general when he first learned of the audit.

“The practice at Treasury, quite appropriately, is when you’re notified of an IG investigation, you allow the IG to do their work,” Lew answered. “You don’t get in the way. You make sure that they have access to whatever they need access to to complete their audit. And that is what Treasury was doing. I don’t think he expected me to take any action at that time, because I was awaiting his report, which I received last Tuesday.”

Shelby noted that before Lew became secretary of the treasury he was President Obama’s chief of staff at the White House, beginning that position in January 2012.

“So when this was going on in Cincinnati, you were the chief of staff at the White House,” Shelby said, which Lew replied was correct.

“And you had no knowledge whatsoever of anything amiss dealing with the IRS approval, disapproval, delay or anything of specific groups?” Shelby asked, referring to Lew’s time at the White House. Lew answered again that he was not made aware of the scrutiny until March 15.

“I know that questions had been raised,” Lew said. “The fact is, this audit was a publicly posted audit in October 2012. So the fact that an audit was going on was a matter of public record. I had no specific knowledge.”

Shelby then asked Lew if he believes, as the IRS has said, that the targeting was done solely by the Cincinnati office or if it is “part of a culture at the Obama White House.”

“I’ve read the IG report quite carefully, and I think it’s very important to note that there’s no suggestion of any political interference with the process of making these determinations,” Lew said. “There is unacceptable behavior that happened at the IRS. That has to stop, and it can’t happen again. But there was no suggestion of any political intervention.”

When Shelby pressed again, Lew repeated his assertion.

“I have seen no suggestion of any political involvement at all,” he said. “What I’ve said and what I believe is that it was unacceptable, and whoever is responsible should be held accountable....What I think is that the Cincinnati office exercised very poor judgment and used criteria that are unacceptable. And we’ve made it clear that the IRS has to be beyond any suspicion of bias.”

Although Lew promised reform, he also stressed that he “will not cross that line into the administration of the tax system, because the cure could be worse than the disease.”

“We need to make sure that there’s no political involvement in the administration of the tax system,” Lew said. “And the management of the IRS is very much the responsibility of the Treasury secretary. The administration of the tax system has to be within the IRS and apart from politics.”

When Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., questioned Lew, he blamed the scandal on the “culture” at the White House, saying “the indignation that you showed on the front end, to a degree, is kind of laughable in that, when you have the president of the United States and the vice president and other leading folks in our administration using the type of language to describe the folks that were targeted — demonizing, villainizing — I think it’s — you would expect that bureaucrats at lower levels are going to act in a way that they acted.”

Lew answered that “the president’s reaction to this was exactly the same as mine. It was outrage” and “he has taken no step ever to condone this kind of behavior.”

Sen. Dean Heller, R-Nev., also took exception with Lew not asking the inspector general for more details and said the “IRS has violated the trust of the American people.”

Heller ended his questioning by calling for a special counsel to investigate the scandal.

Committee chairman Sen. Tim Johnson, D-S.D., began the hearing with an offer of condolences to the people of Oklahoma, which was struck Monday by a horrific tornado, saying his “thoughts and prayers are with the families of Moore, Oklahoma, and our colleague here on the committee, Senator Coburn. It is a difficult time as families mourn the loss of loved ones and begin rebuilding their community.”

Lew also expressed his condolences. as did others including Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., who is originally from the state.

“I will hold them all in my prayers,” Warren said. “It’s a terrible catastrophe there.”

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Win McNamee/Getty Images(WASHINGTON) -- Douglas Shulman, the former commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service, said Tuesday he was “dismayed and saddened” that his agency had improperly targeted conservative groups, but declined to offer a direct apology and dismissed suggestions that he misled Congress.

The testimony from Shulman, who was making his first public appearance since the IRS controversy broke into the open two weeks ago, did not satisfy members of the Senate Finance Committee. He faced more than three hours of stern questioning from Democrats and Republicans, but said “I don’t believe I was aware” when asked why he had not informed Congress about potential problems percolating at the IRS office in Cincinnati.

“I agree that this is an issue that when someone spotted it, they should have brought it up the chain and they didn’t,” Shulman said. “Why they didn’t, I don’t know.”

Shulman, who was first appointed by President George W. Bush, acknowledged that the scandal had placed a “blemish” on the IRS. But he said the task facing the IRS was “very, very, very, very difficult,” given the rapid rise of groups seeking tax-exempt status.

Shulman, whose term ended last year, said he was aware back then that the inspector general overseeing the IRS was reviewing reports of conservative groups’ being targeted. But he said he didn’t know the details and only became aware of them recently, six months after leaving his post.

He said he was not directly involved with approving tax-exempt requests by groups. He said he thought it would be “inappropriate to get involved with cases” because he was a political appointee.

Sen. Max Baucus of Montana, chairman of the committee, ordered a second round of questioning after he said the answers had been unsatisfactory.

“The American people have every right to be outraged,” the Democrat said.

Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, was among the committee members who expressed outrage with Shulman.

“The buck doesn’t stop with you?” asked Cornyn, who repeatedly pressed for an apology.

“I certainly am not personally responsible for creating a list that had inappropriate criteria on it,” Shulman said.

He added, “This happened on my watch. I very much regret that this happened on my watch.”

With a stern tone, Cornyn replied, “I don’t think that qualifies as an apology.”

The senators also repeatedly pressed Steven Miller, the outgoing acting IRS commissioner who was dismissed last week by President Obama, for new details about what officials in Washington were aware of the targeting practices -- and when.

Miller said he assumed responsibility for the unusual nature of how the controversy burst into public view. A question was planted at a May 10 meeting with tax lawyers, a week before the Treasury Department’s inspector general was set to release an investigation accusing the IRS of misconduct in its treatment of tea party and other conservative groups.

“We thought we’d get out an apology,” Miller said. “Obviously, the entire thing was an incredibly bad idea.”

As he did during an appearance before a House committee last week, Miller also apologized “for the mistakes made and the poor service.” He said, “partisanship or the perception of partisanship does not belong in the IRS,” but adding that the decisions were not politically motivated.

“I think foolish mistakes were made by people trying to be more efficient,” Miller continued, “not partisan.”

Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah, the ranking Republican on the committee, pressed the two IRS officials on why they have not corrected their previous testimony to Congress when they denied that tea party and other conservative groups were being singled out for exhaustive reviews. He accused Miller of committing a “lie by omission.”

“Why did you mislead me?” Hatch said.

“I did not lie, sir,” Miller replied.

The inspector general overseeing the IRS, J. Russell George, said he had no reason to believe the conservative groups were targeted because of political bias by IRS agents. But he said his office continued to investigate.

“This matter is not over as far as we are concerned,” George said.

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Official White House Photo by Pete Souza(WASHINGTON) -- A group of seven young people shared their personal struggles with the immigration system during a meeting with President Obama and Vice President Biden on Tuesday.

While senators continued to haggle over the details of a bipartisan immigration bill on Capitol Hill, Obama and Biden shied away from policy specifics during a nearly hour-long talk in the Oval Office. Instead, they heard personal appeals for a complete overhaul of the system.

"[We] told just a few of the millions of personal stories that are the real moral, political case for immigration reform," Melissa McGuire-Maniau, an Air Force veteran from Florida who participated in the meeting, told reporters.

Until recently, McGuire-Maniau's husband was undocumented and she said that, despite her military service, she "never really had to face fear until ICE came repeatedly to our home attempting to deport my husband."

He recently became a legal resident of the U.S., according to the Fair Immigration Reform Movement (FIRM), the organization that helped assemble the meeting.

Participating in the meeting were two recipients of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program and five people who have legal status, but have either parents, spouses or siblings who are undocumented. The White House reached out to FIRM last week to put together the meeting, according to organizers.

Obama has received pressure from immigrant-rights groups and Latino organizations over some of the key details of the immigration bill, such as the length of time and eligibility requirements for the pathway to citizenship. Activists have also called on the president to halt deportations for those who are eligible for legalization under the Senate's plan, a plea that Obama has rejected.

But organizers said that none of those potential points of conflict came up during the Tuesday afternoon meeting.

"We didn't have that conversation, we shared stories and we sat on couches," said Kate Kahan, the legislative director for the Center for Community Change, who was present at the meeting. "It was really about exchanging stories, and the president and vice president listening to those stories."

Obama did say that passing the bill through Congress would be a "challenge," according to Kahan, but added that having immigrants speaking out about their personal stories helps.

Two of the immigrants who met with Obama and Biden said both were "visibly moved" by their stories. One of them was Mehdi Mahraoui, 22, a legal permanent resident from New York City.

Mahraoui's parents and oldest sister are currently in deportation proceedings, but another sister is a U.S. citizen.

"I can see in his eyes he felt our pain," Mahraoui told ABC/Univision.

"I am confident the bill is going to be passed because of the simple fact that people like me are at the front line of the debate," he continued. "Instead of looking at looking at the policies and the numbers, they are looking at people's stories and how it's impacting families."

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SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty Images(WASHINGTON) -- Offering prayers and assurances to the victims of the devastating tornado in Oklahoma, President Obama on Tuesday said he is instructing the federal government to provide the people of Moore with everything they need “right away” as they recover from “one of the most destructive tornadoes in history.”

“As a nation, our full focus right now is on the urgent work of rescue and the hard work of recovery and rebuilding that lies ahead,” Obama said in a White House statement.  “Our prayers are with the people of Oklahoma today, and we will back up those prayers with deeds for as long as it takes.”

The president spoke shortly after he was briefed on the federal response in the Oval Office by Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism Lisa Monaco, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, Chief of Staff Denis McDonough and Deputy Chief of Staff Alyssa Mastromonaco.

Federal Emergency Management Agency Director Craig Fugate was on his way to Oklahoma.

“The people of Moore should know that their country will remain on the ground, there for them, beside them, as long as it takes, for their home and schools to rebuild, businesses and hospitals to reopen, their parents to console, first responders to comfort, and of course, frightened children who will need our continued love and attention,” Obama said, as he stood alongside Vice President Joe Biden, Napolitano and FEMA Deputy Administrator Richard Serino in the State Dining Room.

“There are empty spaces where there used to be living rooms and bedrooms and classrooms.  And in time, we're going to need to refill those spaces with love and laughter and community,” the president said.

Late last night, Obama signed a “major disaster declaration” for Oklahoma and ordered federal aid to start flowing to the victims.  He also spoke by phone in the Oval Office with Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin to express his concern and offer aid.

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Official White House Photo by Pete Souza(WASHINGTON) -- President Obama late Monday declared a state of emergency in Oklahoma after a massive tornado ripped through the city of Moore, leaving at least 24 people dead and more than 100 injured.

In a statement, the White House said the president "ordered Federal aid to supplement state and local recovery efforts in the area affected by severe storms and tornadoes beginning on May 18, 2013, and continuing."

"The President's action makes federal funding available to affected individuals in the counties of Cleveland, Lincoln, McClain, Oklahoma, and Pottawatomie," the statement continued.

Earlier on Monday, Obama spoke with Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin to "express his concern for those who have been affected by the severe weather" and make clear that his administration, through the Federal Emergency Management Agency, "stands ready to provide all available assistance," according to a readout of the call.

"The President told Governor Fallin that the people of Oklahoma are in his and the First Lady’s thoughts and prayers and, while his team will continue to keep him updated, he urged her to be in touch directly if there were additional resources the Administration could provide," the readout said.

Obama is scheduled to make a statement on the damage at 10 a.m. ET Tuesday.

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Win McNamee/Getty Images(NEW YORK) -- Americans in a new ABC News/Washington Post poll sharply reject the targeting of conservative groups by the Internal Revenue Service, suspect an administration cover-up of the Benghazi incident and express substantial distrust of the federal government more generally.
 
Yet the national survey also finds no backlash against Barack Obama, at least at this point. His job approval rating is stable, albeit at a tepid 51 percent; he’s aided by accelerating economic optimism as well as by comparison with the much less-popular Republicans in Congress.

See a PDF with full results and charts here.

Longer-term impacts of contentious current issues remain to be seen, but there’s potential for significant damage to the administration. Americans by a vast 74-20 percent see the IRS’ behavior as inappropriate, with most feeling that way strongly – and 56 percent see it as a deliberate attempt to harass conservative organizations, not a mere administrative error.
 
The public divides on whether or not the administration is honestly disclosing what it knows about the IRS’ actions; 45 percent suspect a cover-up, 42 percent instead see full transparency. And more than a third overall in this poll, produced for ABC by Langer Research Associates, think these actions not only are inappropriate, but illegal.
 
Further, on the attack on the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya, last fall, suspicions of a cover-up rise to a majority, 55 percent. And in this case only a third of Americans are persuaded that the Obama administration is disclosing honestly what it knows about what occurred.
 
Beyond this negative view of the administration’s disclosure on Benghazi, Americans divide evenly on whether Republican criticisms on the issue reflect legitimate concerns or “political posturing.” But Hillary Clinton’s reputation thus far is largely intact: Despite criticisms of her handling of the incident, 62 percent approve of her work as secretary of state overall, down a bit from about six months ago but still a strong rating.
 
DISTRUST – Another result underscores the level of general distrust of the federal government. Americans by 54-38 percent say they think the government is doing more to threaten the rights of average Americans than to protect those rights. That’s not IRS-specific, however, since it was about as high in a similar Pew Research question in January.
 
There’s a high level of partisanship in suspicion of the government: Seventy-one percent of Republicans see it more as threatening than as protecting their rights, while just 31 percent of Democrats agree. But the balance is tipped by political independents, among whom a clear majority (61 percent) sees the government more as a threat than a source of protection.
 
Beyond politics, there’s an apparent economic element to trust in government, suggesting a perceived right to economic opportunity. People who see or expect economic recovery are much more likely than economic pessimists also to think that the government is protecting rather than threatening most people’s rights – regardless of their political or ideological preferences.
 
Beyond a sense of general distrust, there’s broad public concern about press freedoms, an issue related to federal prosecutors obtaining Associated Press telephone records in an effort to find the source of classified information about terrorism that was leaked to the news agency. Americans by 69-29 percent in this poll say they’re concerned that in trying to protect classified information the federal government will improperly intrude on the freedom of the press.
 
Specific to the AP issue, however, the public by 52-33 percent says prosecutors were justified in obtaining phone records via a court order, with results, in this case, similar across partisan and ideological lines. That may be because the leak related to terrorism, an issue on which the public tends to side with investigative efforts over privacy rights. Further, it’s not clear if the administration used a court order or instead a grand jury subpoena, which is not technically a court order but has a similar effect. Specifics on this issue, as well as other particulars of the case as they become known, could influence public attitudes.
 
OBAMA/ECONOMY – None of these issues appears to have impacted views of the president’s job performance; his approval rating, now 51 percent, has been essentially unchanged after slipping in March from a brief post-election foray into the mid-50s. An open question, though, is whether the president may have gained ground had these controversies not arisen.
 
In any case, strong sentiment about the president now divides evenly, after tilting slightly more negative in March and April. Moreover, the partisan gap in views of his performance, while still vast, is its smallest since December 2011, and Obama has majority approval among men for the first time since December 2010. Both may reflect the effects of an improving economy.
 
On that score, 56 percent of Americans now say the economy is beginning to recover, up by a dramatic 20 percentage points in the past year and a half, to the most since ABC and the Post first asked the question in late 2009. The change is broadly based, but strongest among financially better-off adults.
 
Additionally, more than half, 53 percent, now say they’re optimistic about the economy’s prospects in the year ahead, a majority for the first time in four years. (A steadier majority, two-thirds, expresses optimism about their own finances.)
 
These economic views, as noted, are closely related to political sentiment; Obama’s rating is far higher among those who see economic gains.
 
None of this means the economy’s in great shakes; Americans divide evenly, 48-48 percent, in approval or disapproval of how Obama’s handled it overall, with more “strongly” negative views than strongly positive ones. But that’s still one of his best scores on the economy since mid-2009. A little more than a year ago, by contrast, more disapproved than approved by a 21-point margin.
 
THE GOP – Obama also benefits from a comparative advantage vs. the Republicans in Congress. Regardless of his own rating on the economy, he leads the GOP in trust to handle it by 46-37 percent. That’s fluctuated; it’s a bit better for the president now than in March, but down from his wider 18-point advantage on the economy during his post-election bump in December.
 
Obama has a larger advantage in a more general question: Fifty-one percent of Americans say he is “mainly concentrating on things that are important to you personally.” That’s 8 points more than say the same about the Democrats in Congress – and 18 points more than say so about the Republicans.
 
Notably, Obama also is well ahead of his predecessor. At about this point in George W. Bush’s second term just 41 percent said he was focused on issues important to them, 10 points weaker than Obama’s score. Similarly, at that point 55 percent said Bush had done more to divide than to unite the country; 45 percent say the same about Obama now, with more undecided.
 
TEA TIME – In one division of interest, this poll finds a continued roughly even split in views of the Tea Party political movement, with 40 percent of adults saying they support it overall, 43 percent opposed. “Strong” support for the movement, at 10 percent, is numerically its lowest on record, and just about half the level of strong opposition, 22 percent.
 
Sizable majorities of Tea Party supporters and opponents alike say it was inappropriate for the IRS to single out conservative groups for extra scrutiny on their applications for tax-exempt status. At the same time, Tea Party aficionados are much more apt than its critics to think the IRS’ actions constituted intentional harassment, were illegal and are the subject of an attempted cover-up by the Obama administration.
 
ONWARD AND (POLITICALLY) DOWNWARD? – This survey, in sum, finds items for individuals across the political spectrum to enjoy, and others for them to worry about. After years in the tank, views on the economy unabashedly are improving, a positive result any way you slice it. That’s helping to support the president’s ratings, as are his comparisons to the long-lagging GOP. But the IRS issue, in particular, looks to pose a real risk to the administration, given the depth and breadth of criticism about it.
 
Most threatening, perhaps – to both sides of the aisle – is the public’s political mood more broadly. Views of the government as a threat ebb and flow, but are not new; as long ago as 1995, 55 percent in a Los Angeles Times poll said the government’s activities threatened their constitutional rights. But the return to that sentiment is a clear negative.
 
There are others: Even with improving economic views, 57 percent in this poll say the country continues to head “seriously off on the wrong track.” And while a majority now expresses economic optimism, when Americans are asked the likelihood that Obama and the Republicans will work together in the year ahead, the response is pessimistic by a resounding 2-1 margin.

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