President Joe Biden said Thursday that the United States would avoid a default as lawmakers entered a 10-day recess without reaching a national debt agreement deadline.
It was a week away from June 1, when the government could start running money to honor its debts and which could trigger an earthquake that would shake the markets of the world.
However, members of Congress are taking the long Memorial Day holiday and are not expected to return until the 4th of next month.
“There will be no default,” Biden said at the White House, adding that negotiations with the Republican Speaker of the House of Representatives, Kevin McCarthy, had been “productive.”
But the Democratic minority leader in that chamber, Hakeem Jeffries, was beaten by the Republicans. He accused them of abandoning his office in Washington and “sinking into a dangerous default in the crisis of his party.”
“And these Republicans are saying that Joe Biden didn’t want to sit down with them to negotiate,” he added. “False narrative.”
House Republicans are demanding public spending cuts of up to $130 billion in exchange for votes to raise the debt ceiling. They also want stricter requirements for granting applicants and recovering aid funds not spent during the covid pandemic.
Democrats reject the repeal and Republicans want to unconditionally support the debt ceiling issue, as they have done decades before.
military preparation
For months, economists have been predicting economic disaster if the United States defaults. This Thursday, who spoke, was a senior military commander of the Pentagon and announced that the default “will have a significant impact on the forces.”
“Preparation is obviously affected. So our large-scale exercises would be delayed or blocked in many cases,” Mark Milley, the chairman of the Chief of Staff, told reporters.
McCarthy indicated that lawmakers would urgently return to Vienna if the convention reached absentees and a decision would be made in the House.
The lawmaker said he views the idea of the Biden administration imposing tax hikes on corporations or the wealthy as an alternative to cuts to reduce the burden of the national debt, which exceeds $31 trillion.
McCarthy pointed to a CNN poll released this week in which 60% of those questioned said an increase in the debt ceiling should be accompanied by cuts, although 51% of those questioned in a University of Monmouth poll said they wanted to open two issues. .
“We know where our differences lie and we will remain at the table to resolve the issue,” said McCarthy.
‘The difference is made;’
White House chief of staff Jeff Zients has suggested that Republican protests over the administration’s spending are disingenuous. Zients pointed out that the Republican plan to extend the Donald Trump-era tax cuts, which Democrats say will add $3.5 trillion to the debt.
The debt ceiling is not reached by increasing the debt in the future. It alone allows the government to carry out the tasks already approved and implemented.
Assistant Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo told investors at a conference in Washington that the threat of default is a “crisis factor” that has already made borrowing money more expensive and more expensive for Americans.
If the process is not rushed, the convention would require at least 10 days to be approved by the House of Representatives and the Senate and reach Biden’s desk.
Some $25,000 million in Social Security payments scheduled for June 2 could be delayed.
