A handful of hard-right Republican lawmakers said on Monday they might oppose a deal to lift the USA’ $31.4 trillion debt ceiling, in an indication that the bipartisan agreement could face a rocky path through Congress before the U.S. runs out of cash next week.
Although expected, the opposition illustrates the hurdles that Democratic President Joe Biden and top congressional Republican Kevin McCarthy may have to beat to see the Republican-controlled House of Representatives and Democratic-controlled Senate pass the package.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, a candidate for the Republican 2024 presidential nomination, said the deal doesn’t do enough to vary the fiscal trajectory. “After this deal, our country will still be careening toward bankruptcy,” he said on Fox News.
Still, backers predicted it might clear Congress before the USA runs out of cash to pay its bills, which the Treasury Department says will occur on June 5.
“This thing will absolutely pass. There isn’t any query about that,” said Republican Representative Dusty Johnson, who said he had talked to dozens of fellow lawmakers.
Biden said he had been working the phones, as well. “It feels good. We’ll see when the vote starts,” he told reporters.
The 99-page bill would suspend the debt limit through Jan. 1, 2025, allowing lawmakers to put aside the politically dangerous issue until after the November 2024 presidential election. It might also cap some government spending over the following two years.
An important first test will come on Tuesday, when the House Rules Committee takes up the bill, in a needed first step before a vote in the total House. Though the panel is generally closely aligned with House leadership, McCarthy was forced to incorporate some skeptical conservatives as a price for winning the speaker’s gavel.
Certainly one of those conservatives, Representative Chip Roy, said on Tuesday he didn’t support the bill.
“It isn’t deal. Some $4 trillion in debt for – at best – a two-year spending freeze and no serious substantive policy reforms,” Roy wrote on Twitter.
One other panel member, Ralph Norman, has already come out against the agreement.
McCarthy told reporters on Monday he was not nervous concerning the package’s prospects within the committee.
Within the Senate, Republican Mike Lee also got here out against the bill, which could point to a difficult vote there, where any member has the facility to delay motion for days. Democrats control the Senate by 51-49.
McCarthy has predicted it’s going to draw the support of most of his fellow Republicans, who control the House 222-213. House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries said he expects support from his side of the aisle — though many on his party’s left may vote “no” as well.
Representative Raul Grijalva, a progressive Democrat, wrote on Twitter that the bill’s changes to environmental rules were “disturbing and profoundly disappointing.”
Grijalva was referring to a component of the bill that may speed up the permitting process for some energy projects. The bill would also claw back unused COVID-19 funds, and stiffen work requirements for food aid programs for poor Americans.
It might shift some funding away from the tax-collecting Internal Revenue Service, though White House officials say that mustn’t undercut enforcement within the near term.
Initial response has been positive from financial markets, which could be thrown into chaos if the USA was unable to make payments on its securities, which form the bedrock of the worldwide economic system.
But some investors are wary that the spending cuts secured by McCarthy could weigh on U.S. growth. Investors are also bracing for potential volatility within the U.S. bond market.
Republicans have argued that steep spending cuts are needed to curb the expansion of the national debt, which at $31.4 trillion is roughly equal to the annual output of the economy.
Interest payments on that debt are projected to eat up a growing share of the budget within the a long time to come back as an aging population pushes up health and retirement costs, in accordance with government forecasts.
The deal wouldn’t do anything to rein in those fast-growing programs. A lot of the savings would come by capping spending on domestic programs like housing, border control, scientific research and other types of “discretionary” spending. Military spending could be allowed to extend over the following two years.
