'Show Me Your Budget, I’ll Show You Mine'
Top Dems, including President Biden, keep up offense over debt-ceiling vote
President Biden and other top Democrats show no inclination to yield in the game of chicken Republican House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has set up over the US government's debt ceiling.
The federal government officially hit its debt limit earlier this month, requiring Congress to approve an increase just so that the government can continue to pay the bills it's already accrued in past years.
Should Congress fail to increase the federal debt ceiling, the federal government will eventually fall into default and cause a national and global economic meltdown.
The government has begun taking “extraordinary measures” to prevent default, although those measures will run out in June, according to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.
It's been increased, as a matter of course, dozens of times under both Democratic and Republican presidents over the past several decades.
Yet McCarthy and other hard-right Republicans in the House are looking to hold a debt-ceiling increase hostage, contingent on deep cuts to federal programs.
Biden and his team have made it clear, however, that they won't turn “the full faith and credit of the United States” over for bargaining.
And, despite the new speaker's clear desire to flex his right-wing muscles to exact concessions, the president and other Democratic leaders are holding firm.
Asked by a reporter Monday what he would tell McCarthy when McCarthy says that he wants to negotiate, Biden replied simply, “Show me your budget, I’ll show you mine.”
The president has said that he intends to safeguard federal spending which is working and proving popular with voters.
It fell to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) to shame McCarthy in a more elaborate way.
“We’ve seen in real time how dangerous it is for Speaker McCarthy to have empowered the most extreme elements of the GOP to set the agenda in the House,” Schumer said Monday in remarks on the Senate floor. “The MAGA wing of the GOP, which has set the rules on how the House should run, has left no doubt that under their watch, no form of funding, however necessary, is safe.
“Democrats, meanwhile, have been very clear about our position. When it comes to the debt ceiling, there can be no brinksmanship, no threats, no hostage-taking. This is simply too important. It has to get done,” Schumer added. “Republicans need to show their plan to the American people. The clock is ticking on the debt ceiling every day. We must make sure that a first ever default doesn’t occur, and yet, Republicans are making it more and more likely.”
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