NICK CORASANITI

Donald Trump took steps to appropriate much of the Republican National Committee’s financial and political infrastructure for his presidential campaign Monday, amid signs that he and the party would lag dangerously behind the Democrats in raising money for the general election.

The Republican debate stage will be noticeably smaller when the candidates gather in Charleston, South Carolina, on Thursday night for their first debate of the year.

The death this week of James Brady, the former White House press secretary, has been ruled a homicide nearly 33 years after he was wounded in an assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan, police department officials here said on Friday.