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House Set to Vote on Debt Limit Bill Amid Republican Resistance House Set to Pass Debt Limit Bill in Bipartisan Vote to Avert Default
(about 7 hours later)
Follow for live updates as the House prepares for a vote on the debt limit deal. The House on Wednesday was poised to push through legislation negotiated by President Biden and Speaker Kevin McCarthy to suspend the debt ceiling and set federal spending limits, as a bipartisan coalition lined up to cast a critical vote to pull the nation back from the brink of economic catastrophe.
Speaker Kevin McCarthy toiled on Wednesday to lock down the votes to pass his deal with President Biden to suspend the debt ceiling and set federal spending limits, as a stream of defections from hard-right lawmakers raised the stakes for a climactic set of votes on the package. The bill would defer the federal debt limit for two years — allowing the government to borrow unlimited sums as necessary to pay its obligations — while imposing two years of spending caps and a string of policy changes that Republicans demanded in exchange for allowing the country to avoid a disastrous default. The vote, expected Wednesday night, was coming days before the nation was projected to exhaust its borrowing power, and after a marathon set of talks between White House negotiators and top House Republicans.
With the nation’s first-ever default looming in days, the House was on track to begin consideration on Wednesday afternoon of a plan to defer the nation’s borrowing limit for two years — allowing the government to borrow unlimited sums as necessary to pay its obligations — in exchange for two years of spending caps and a string of policy concessions that Republicans demanded. With both far-right and hard-left lawmakers in revolt over the deal, congressional leaders cobbled together a coalition of Republicans and Democrats willing to drag the bill over the finish line, throwing their support behind the compromise in an effort to break the fiscal stalemate that has gripped Washington for weeks.
To muster a 218-vote majority to push the bill through the closely divided House, congressional leaders must cobble together a coalition of Republicans willing to back it and enough Democrats to make up for what was shaping up to be a substantial number of G.O.P. defections. Mr. McCarthy and his lieutenants predicted they would be able to do so and scheduled a final vote for Wednesday night, well after markets have closed. It nearly collapsed on its way to the House floor, when hard-right Republicans sought to block its consideration, and in a suspenseful scene, Democrats waited several minutes before swooping in to supply their votes for a procedural measure that allowed the plan to move ahead.
The deal would suspend the $31.4 trillion borrowing limit until January 2025. It would cut federal spending by $1.5 trillion over a decade, according to the Congressional Budget Office, by effectively freezing some funding that had been projected to increase next year and then limiting spending to 1 percent growth in 2025, which is considered a cut because it is a lower level than inflation. The legislation would also impose stricter work requirements for food stamps, claw back some funding for I.R.S. enforcement and unspent coronavirus relief money, speed the permitting of new energy projects and officially end Mr. Biden’s student loan repayment freeze. The deal would suspend the $31.4 trillion borrowing limit until January 2025. It would cut federal spending by $1.5 trillion over a decade, according to the Congressional Budget Office, by effectively freezing some funding that had been projected to increase next year and then limiting spending to 1 percent growth in 2025, which is considered a cut because it would be at a lower level than inflation. The legislation would also impose stricter work requirements for food stamps, claw back some funding for I.R.S. enforcement and unspent coronavirus relief money, speed the permitting of new energy projects and officially end Mr. Biden’s student loan repayment freeze.
Hard-right lawmakers are in open revolt over the compromise and have vowed to try to derail it, with some warning of dire consequences for Mr. McCarthy for shepherding it. Multiple right-wing lawmakers have savaged the bill, publicly using a profanity-laced description to compare it to a foul sandwich and arguing that it does nothing to secure the kind of deep spending cuts and rollbacks of Biden administration policies for which they have agitated. The compromise was structured with the aim of enticing votes from both parties, allowing Republicans to say that they succeeded in reducing some federal spending — even as funding for the military and veterans’ programs would continue to grow — while allowing Democrats to say they spared most domestic programs from significant cuts.
“Completely unacceptable,” said Representative Dan Bishop, Republican of North Carolina. “Trillions and trillions of dollars in debt, for crumbs. For a pittance.” Ahead of the series of votes on Wednesday, Mr. McCarthy urged his members to support the bill, framing it as a “small step putting us on the right track,” and promoting the spending cuts and work requirements Republicans won in the deal.
While Republican leaders have expressed confidence that they will have the votes to pass the legislation, it was not clear whether they would have to rely on support from Democrats in procedural votes to clear its way for passage — a remarkably rare occurrence that would be seen as a defeat. Mr. McCarthy, a California Republican, has repeatedly said that he would secure the support of a majority of his conference for the bill itself — an unwritten but virtually inviolable rule long adhered to by speakers of both parties for bringing up legislation.
Republican and Democratic leaders tried to rally their rank and file behind the compromise in the hours leading up to the votes. Mr. McCarthy framed the bill as a “small step putting us on the right track” and urged his members to be part of history, promoting the spending cuts and work requirements Republicans won in the deal.
“Everybody has a right to their own opinion,” he said. “But on history, I’d want to be here with this bill today.”“Everybody has a right to their own opinion,” he said. “But on history, I’d want to be here with this bill today.”
Representative Hakeem Jeffries of New York, the Democratic leader, gathered his lawmakers in the Capitol on Wednesday morning, along with top White House officials who had helped broker the deal. He urged them to back the compromise, arguing that Mr. Biden had successfully fended off the worst of Republicans’ demands. In the Senate, both Democratic and Republican leaders said they would quickly take up the legislation and push to get the package to Mr. Biden as swiftly as possible, with Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York and the majority leader, warning that lawmakers would need to approve the bill without changes to meet the June 5 deadline when the Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen has said the government would default without action by Congress.
“I cannot stress enough that we have no margin for error,” Mr. Schumer said. “Either we proceed quickly and send this bipartisan agreement to the president’s desk or the federal government will default for the first time ever.”
Passage of the deal would be a major victory for Mr. McCarthy, a California Republican who faced a massive challenge in shepherding a debt-ceiling increase through a narrowly divided chamber populated by Republicans who have long refused to raise the borrowing limit. Few had expected that Mr. McCarthy would be able to unite his fractious conference around any such measure, much less one negotiated with Mr. Biden, without prompting an attempt by his right flank to oust him.
As of Wednesday, no such effort had materialized, thought there still may be political consequences ahead for Mr. McCarthy. Representative Dan Bishop, Republican of North Carolina and a member of the ultraconservative Freedom Caucus, has publicly said that he considered the debt and spending deal grounds for removing Mr. McCarthy from his post. Another member of the group, Representative Ken Buck, Republican of Colorado, told CNN that its members would have “discussions about whether” to try to oust him.
“I’m not suggesting the votes are there to remove the speaker, but the speaker promised that we would operate at 2022 appropriations levels when he got the support to be speaker,” Mr. Buck said. “He’s now changed that to 2023 levels plus one percent. That’s a major change for a lot of people.”
Under the rules House Republicans adopted at the beginning of the year that helped Mr. McCarthy become speaker, any single lawmaker could call for a snap vote to depose him, a move that would require a majority of the House.
Hard-right lawmakers were nonetheless furious over the compromise, savaging the bill and Mr. McCarthy’s handling of the negotiations as a betrayal.
“No one sent us here to borrow an additional $4 trillion to get absolutely nothing in return,” said Representative Chip Roy, Republican of Texas, who promised “a reckoning about what just occurred.”
In a dramatic display of their displeasure, 29 conservative Republicans took the unusual step of breaking ranks on a procedural vote to take up the legislation, normally a formality that passes entirely along party lines.
In a dramatic tableau on the House floor, as the Republican defections piled up, imperiling the deal, Representative Hakeem Jeffries of New York, the minority leader, finally raised a green voting card in the air, signaling to fellow Democrats that it was time go ahead and bail Republicans out. A stream of centrist and veteran lawmakers — 52 in all — crowded into the well of the House and voted “yes,” rescuing the deal from collapse.
Mr. Jeffries had gathered Democrats in the Capitol on Wednesday morning, along with top White House officials who had helped broker the deal, and urged them to back the compromise. He argued that Mr. Biden had successfully fended off the worst of Republicans’ demands, and reiterated that allowing the nation to default was not an option.
“I made clear that I’m going to support legislation that is on the floor today,” Mr. Jeffries told reporters at a news conference after the meeting. “And I support it without hesitation or reservation or trepidation.”“I made clear that I’m going to support legislation that is on the floor today,” Mr. Jeffries told reporters at a news conference after the meeting. “And I support it without hesitation or reservation or trepidation.”
Still, progressive Democratics were openly agonizing about supporting the bill. But progressive Democratics bristled at the package, and said they could not support new work requirements for safety net programs or incentivize Republicans from weaponizing the debt ceiling as a political cudgel.
“This has been a hostage situation,” Representative Greg Casar of Texas said. “We’re going to get out of the hostage situation. I appreciate the president negotiating down the ransom payment for the hostage. But I think it’s appropriate for progressives to say we never want to be in this situation again.” “Republicans need to own this vote,” said Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Democrat of New York, who took particular aim at changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program and a measure to expedite production of a gas pipeline. “This was their deal, this was their negotiations. They’re the ones trying to come in and cut SNAP, cut environmental protections, trying to ram through an oil pipeline through a community that does not want it.”
Mr. McCarthy and his negotiators also sought to sell their conference on the compromise on Tuesday night, saying that Democrats had not scored any victories in the bipartisan talks and that his team had fought strenuously against the White House to prevent tax increases and secure new work requirements for social safety net programs, according to lawmakers who attended. “This has been a hostage situation,” Representative Greg Casar, Democrat of Texas, said. “We’re going to get out of the hostage situation. I appreciate the president negotiating down the ransom payment for the hostage. But I think it’s appropriate for progressives to say we never want to be in this situation again.”
“In a progressive-left administration and Democratic Senate, we will now have new work requirements,” Representative Patrick T. McHenry of North Carolina, one of the Republican negotiators, said at a news conference following the meeting. “We have conservative reforms that are included in this debt ceiling, and these things should help Republicans rally to the cause.” Adding to progressive discontent are provisions in the deal that claw back some unspent money from a previous pandemic relief bill, and reduce by $10 billion — to $70 billion from $80 billion — new enforcement funding for the I.R.S. to crack down on tax cheats. Other measures in the bill include a provision meant to speed the permitting of certain energy projects and a provision meant to force the president to find budget savings to offset the costs of a unilateral action, like forgiving student loans — though administration officials could circumvent that requirement.
But even as the meeting unfolded, the Congressional Budget Office reported that the changes in work requirements for food stamp eligibility — tightening them for some adults but loosening them for others, including veterans — would actually increase federal spending on the program by $2 billion. Overall, the budget office estimated the deal would make an additional 78,000 people eligible for nutrition assistance. The deal also includes measures meant to avert a government shutdown later this year.
As Republicans met in the basement of the Capitol, the Rules Committee voted to advance the bill to the House floor on a narrow vote, with two ultraconservative members of the panel bucking their party to oppose allowing the plan to be considered. Carl Hulse and Annie Karni contributed reporting.
With defections from House Republicans stacking up, it remained unclear how many votes Democrats would need to provide to pass the bill and send it to the Senate, where conservative opponents were threatening to slow its consideration. Mr. Jeffries said on Tuesday that Mr. McCarthy had not told him how many Democrats would need to vote for the bill to ensure its passage, but that Republicans had pledged to produce at least 150 votes for the measure. That would mean several dozen Democrats would have to vote yes to secure passage.
Only one hard-right Republican so far — Mr. Bishop — has publicly said that he considered the debt and spending deal grounds for ousting Mr. McCarthy from his post.
Under the rules House Republicans adopted at the beginning of the year that helped Mr. McCarthy become speaker, any single lawmaker could call for a snap vote to remove him from the speakership, a move that would take a majority of the House. But other hard-right conservatives were holding their fire, saying it was too early to consider the move.
Representative Ken Buck, Republican of Colorado, said on NBC’s “Meet the Press Now” that he had discussed the issue with the chairman of Freedom Caucus, Representative Scott Perry, Republican of Pennsylvania. “Let’s get through this battle and decide if we want another battle,” Mr. Buck said was the response.
Still, asked if there would be consequences for Mr. McCarthy if the bill passed with more Democratic votes than Republican ones, Representative Ralph Norman of South Carolina replied: “It’s going to be a problem.”