Why Republicans are blocking Democrats from raising the debt ceiling
President Biden said Monday he can't guarantee that Congress will raise the debt ceiling before the U.S. defaults on its obligations, unleashing a pointless financial crisis, because "that's up to Mitch McConnell." Senate Minority Leader McConnell (R-Ky.) insists that Democrats increase the debt limit themselves, but the Senate GOP is filibustering their every attempt to do that.
"They need to stop playing Russian roulette with the U.S. economy," Biden said Monday. "Republicans just have to let us do our job. Just get out of the way." He called McConnell's strategy "hypocritical, dangerous, and disgraceful," noting that Democrats voted with Republicans to raise the debt limit three times under former President Donald Trump, even as his spending increases and GOP-only tax cuts incurred $8 trillion in new debt.
So why don't Republicans just not filibuster the bill and let Democrats pass it alone?
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) told reporters Monday that 45 Senate Republicans would probably be okay with that, but five or six would insist on a filibuster. Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) said some of her GOP colleagues would even vote to lift the debt ceiling if the Democrats abandoned their big omnibus package, the centerpiece of Biden's economic agenda.
Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) probably got closer to the mark, telling CNN's Manu Raju "there's no reason for us to help facilitate bad policy that we disagree with, and so they have to eat up little floor time passing the debt ceiling through reconciliation that's fine with me."
McConnell said Monday he gave Democrats "a roadmap and three months notice" to use the unwieldy budget reconciliation process to raise the debt ceiling with a filibuster-proof 50 votes, and "I suggest that our colleagues get moving." And Democrats can use the reconciliation process, probably, if they start soon enough and Republicans don't block it in the Senate Budget Committee, The Wall Street Journal explains. But it would take a lot of floor time and require Democrats to raise the debt limit by a specific amount, not suspend it until a specific time.
Democrats are loath to waste the time and spook financial markets, but Biden "wasn't ruling out options," White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki clarified Monday.
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
"Unsaid by all sides but worth pointing out," Politico notes: "Having a debt ceiling, which does nothing to accomplish its original goal of limiting government borrowing but which regularly causes American politicians to flirt with economic catastrophe, is dumb."
Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.
-
How Mike Johnson is rendering the House ‘irrelevant’Talking Points Speaker has put the House on indefinite hiatus
-
Lazarus: Harlan Coben’s ‘embarrassingly compelling’ thrillerThe Week Recommends Bill Nighy and Sam Claflin play father-and-son psychiatrists in this ‘precision-engineered’ crime drama
-
Dutch center-left rises in election as far-right fallsSpeed Read The country’s other parties have ruled against forming a coalition
-
Senate votes to kill Trump’s Brazil tariffSpeed Read Five Senate Republicans joined the Democrats in rebuking Trump’s import tax
-
Border Patrol gets scrutiny in court, gains power in ICESpeed Read Half of the new ICE directors are reportedly from DHS’s more aggressive Customs and Border Protection branch
-
Shutdown stalemate nears key pain pointsSpeed Read A federal employee union called for the Democrats to to stand down four weeks into the government standoff
-
Trump vows new tariffs on Canada over Reagan adspeed read The ad that offended the president has Ronald Reagan explaining why import taxes hurt the economy
-
NY attorney general asks public for ICE raid footageSpeed Read Rep. Dan Goldman claims ICE wrongly detained four US citizens in the Canal Street raid and held them for a whole day without charges
-
Trump’s huge ballroom to replace razed East WingSpeed Read The White House’s east wing is being torn down amid ballroom construction
-
Trump expands boat strikes to Pacific, killing 5 moreSpeed Read The US military destroyed two more alleged drug smuggling boats in international waters
-
Trump demands millions from his administrationSpeed Read The president has requested $230 million in compensation from the Justice Department for previous federal investigations
