Biden: ‘I'm Not There Yet’ On Invoking 14th Amendment to Pay Debts
VP hasn't gotten enough credit, president adds
President Biden isn't yet ready to take extraordinary steps, such as invoking the 14th Amendment, to solve the looming crisis on the federal debt ceiling.
He also believes that Vice President Kamala Harris isn't getting the “credit she deserves.”
The president made these points during a new, on-camera interview with MSNBC host Stephanie Ruhle.
Biden and the top four leaders of Congress — Republican House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.), Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) — are scheduled to meet Tuesday to discuss a path forward on raising the government's debt ceiling.
The federal government has hit its cap on paying its bills, and the extraordinary measures which Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has been using in the meantime will run out as early as June 1.
Although Congress has approved an increase in the government's debt limit dozens of times under presidents of both parties in past decades, McCarthy and other House Republicans want to hold such an increase hostage to Biden and Democrats agreeing to a raft of draconian cuts in federal spending.
The president, however, has ruled out any such negotiations while using the debt ceiling as a political weapon.
With the future of the US economy at stake, some have suggested that Biden invoke Section 4 of the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution to ensure debts are paid.
That section reads:
The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void.
Biden told Ruhle that he's not yet prepared to take that step, while acknowledging that some Republicans actually want to take the nation over the debt-limit cliff because they believe that the potential political damage to the Democratic president would be worth it.
“I’m not there yet,” Biden said. “Here’s the deal, I think that’s, first of, all this is not your father’s Republican Party. This is a different group. I think that we have to make it clear to the American people that I am prepared to negotiate in detail with their budget” but not connected with a debt-ceiling increase.
Meanwhile, Biden pushed back on the unpopularity some see surrounding his vice president, Kamala Harris.
“I just think that Vice President Harris hasn't gotten the credit she deserves. She was an attorney general in the state of California, she has been a United States senator, she is really very, very good,” Biden said. “And with everything going on, she hasn't gotten the attention she deserves.”
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