Sen. John Ensign may be indicted for structuring

Structuring is a broad term that refers to the crime of creating financial transactions to evade reporting requirements — for example, a $96,000 payment to your mistress laundered through a trust controlled by your parents and calling it a “gift” instead of what it obviously was: a severance payment that had to be reported.

The department is being very deliberate in assembling a case against Ensign. Two former federal prosecutors in the past two weeks have said there is enough evidence to indict Ensign. But Justice has a mountain of documents and e-mails that, combined with the senator’s own admissions or statements in e-mails, would seem to amount to a formidable case.

Ensign has not yet been indicted. But should he be, the GOP will have a national nightmare on its hands.