Donald Trump summoned the nation to the Oval Office Tuesday night for a defense of his border wall. He offered nothing new. Instead, the president complained about Democratic opposition to his $5.7 billion funding demand, reprising misleading statements and ominous anecdotes of crimes allegedly committed by undocumented immigrants. Tomorrow is Day 20 of the government shutdown. —Josh Petri

Here are today's top stories

Negotiations continued Wednesday as Trump threatened to declare a national emergency if he doesn't get a deal to fund his wall and walked out of a meeting with congressional leaders. Democrats and some legal experts have said such a move may be illegal.

Rod Rosenstein, who appointed Special Counsel Robert Mueller to investigate Russian meddling in the U.S. presidential election, is expected to leave the Justice Department after a new attorney general is confirmed.

Leggings made LuLaRoe founders Mark and DeAnne Stidham millions of dollars. So where'd the money go?

China and the U.S. concluded three days of trade talks with a cautious sense of optimism that the world’s two biggest economies might be able to reach a deal that ends the trade war.

The Department of Agriculture is throwing out Obama-era school nutrition standards and tossing a lifeline to the dairy industry, Bloomberg Businessweek reports. It’s called more fat, sugar, and salt for your kids.

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and his wife MacKenzie are divorcing after what they called "a long period of loving exploration." The split could make MacKenzie the world's richest woman. 

What's Sid Verma thinking about? The Bloomberg cross-assets reporter is looking at credit markets. They're suddenly roaring back, he says, and that's giving the green light to equity bulls.

What you'll need to know tomorrow

• Experts say 2019 will be a good year to buy a house.
• Goldman Sachs's $500 million lawyer has called it quits.
• Oil surged above $52 a barrel.
• Trump formally nominated an ex-coal lobbyist to head the EPA.
• Robert Mercer's sheriff's badge has been revoked.
• How many push-ups should you do on a plane?
• Tiffany will begin telling customers where its diamonds' come from.

What you'll want to read tonight

A Tesla Road Trip Is Less Fun Than You'd Think

Driving an electric car around town is one thing, but what happens on a long road trip? We tried to make a 715-mile battery-powered voyage from Paris to Mannheim and back to find out. Here's a bit of a spoiler: You spend a lot of time hanging around parking lots.

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