President Joe Biden described Kevin McCarthy as a ‘decent man’ on Tuesday but criticized the ‘off the wall’ commitments he made to conservatives in order to become speaker of the House.
‘Look at what the present leader of the Republican Party – a decent man, I think – McCarthy. Look at what he had to do. He had to do to get commitments that are just absolutely off the wall for speaker of the House to make in terms of the being able to come in,’ Biden said at a Democratic fundraiser in New York City.
McCarthy was elected speaker on a historic post-midnight 15th ballot early on Jan. 7 but made side deals with conservatives in order to win their support.
Biden’s awkward defense – and criticism – of the speaker comes ahead of his meeting with McCarthy at the White House on Wednesday where the two men will have a showdown over how to raise the country’s $31.4 trillion debt limit. It is their first sit down since McCarthy was elected speaker.
President Joe Biden said Kevin McCarthy is a ‘decent man’ but said he made ‘off the wall’ promises to conservatives in exchange for their votes for speaker
Raising the nation’s borrowing limit marks the first major clash between Biden and Republicans since the GOP took control of the House. Both sides have made their case ahead of the sit-down.
And the White House doubled down on Tuesday, saying the president will ask McCarthy in their meeting to promise the that the U.S. would not default on its debt.
The White House also is putting a pressure campaign on McCarthy to be specific about what he wants to slash from federal spending.
In their sit-down, Biden will press McCarthy on when he will release his federal budget, top White House economic adviser Brian Deese and Budget director Shalanda Young wrote in a memo released on Tuesday.
Biden’s budget will be released on March 9th. Republicans have said their budget will be released in April.
But the president is trying to get the speaker to detail the specific cuts he wants to federal spending in exchange for raising the nation’s borrowing limit.
Speaker Kevin McCarthy will meet with President Biden at the White House on Wednesday
‘It is essential that Speaker McCarthy likewise commit to releasing a budget, so that the American people can see how House Republicans plan to reduce the deficit — whether through Social Security cuts; cuts to Medicare, Medicaid and Affordable Care Act health coverage; and/or cuts to research, education and public safety — as well as how much their budget will add to the deficit with tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans and large corporations,’ Deese and Young wrote.
McCarthy snapped back via Twitter, saying he wasn’t interested in ‘political games.’
‘Mr. President: I received your staff’s memo. I’m not interested in political games. I’m coming to negotiate for the American people,’ he wrote.
McCarthy has said government spending needs to be cut but hasn’t said what or how much.
He went on CBS’ Face the Nation on Sunday to say he wants to work with the White House on the matter.
‘I want to find a reasonable and responsible way that we can lift the debt ceiling but take control of this runaway spending,’ he said
Biden, for his part, has said his message to the speaker is simple: ‘Show me your budget.’
The president is flat out against any cuts in federal spending in exchange for raising the debt limit. He has made his position clear, saying he wants a ‘clean’ raise – meaning no conditions attached.
The country has never defaulted. Most economists believe such an event would lead to a stock market crash and world-wide recession.
Republicans are furious with all the post-pandemic programs Democrats approved when they controlled both chambers of Congress with many in the GOP arguing it led to the country’s record-high inflation.
The U.S. debt is now almost equal to the country’s gross domestic product, a measure of yearly economic output. It’s on track to be 225% of GDP by 2050, according to the Penn Wharton Budget Model.
The U.S. is expected a hit the ceiling on Thursday, forcing the Treasury Department to start using ‘extraordinary measures’ so the government can keep paying bills while Congress negotiates to try and avoid an economic meltdown
The federal debt ceiling was raised in December of 2021 by $2.5 trillion to $31.381 trillion, which is expected to hit on Thursday, January 18.
To stabilize the debt near current levels, the government would need to permanently slash all spending by 30%, raise tax revenues by 40% or some combination of both, Kent Smetters, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania and director of the Penn Wharton Budget Model, to the Associated Press.
McCarthy hasn’t given specifics to what he wants to slash but said cuts to Social Security and Medicare were ‘off the table.’
He also did not rule out cuts to defense spending, which some Republicans have resisted but funding the Pentagon makes up a huge portion of the federal budget.
But it’s unclear if the Speaker has enough votes among Republicans to raise the debt ceiling without Democratic help. He can only afford to lose four GOP votes.
The White House points out that Republicans in the past – including during Donald Trump’s presidency – voted to raise the debt limit without conditions, known as doing a ‘clean’ bump in the borrowing limit.
Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen warned earlier this month the country would hit its debt ceiling on January 19th.
But she also said she can keep the money flowing until June – a move known as ‘extraordinary measures’ – by moving pots of money around in the federal accounts.
Additionally, Yellen wants lawmakers to raise the limit past the November 2024 presidential election to remove it as an issue going through the campaign.
In the event of a default, ‘we’ll have a financial crisis,’ she told Axios. ‘And I believe we would have recession in the United States.’
The U.S. has never defaulted on its debt but it has come close.
In 2011, House Republicans, who held the majority, demanded then-President Barack Obama negotiate over deficit reduction in exchange for an increase in the debt ceiling.
The back-and-forth debate went down to the wire, with the debt ceiling being raised only two days before the US defaulted.
Just the brinkmanship sparked a major economic crisis for the country, resulting in one of the worst weeks for the markets since the 2008 financial crisis, sinking stock prices, and taking a toll on people’s retirement savings.
Mortgage rates spiked, hurting prospective home buyers.
The standoff also resulted in the US getting its credit rating downgraded and the economy took months to recover.
Source: | This article originally belongs to Dailymail.co.uk