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      Joe Biden hails ‘big win’ as bipartisan debt ceiling bill reaches his desk

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      The bipartisan bill to solve the US debt ceiling crisis just days before a catastrophic and unprecedented default was on its way to Joe Biden’s desk on Friday as the US president prepared to address the nation and hailed “a big win for our economy and the American people”.The compromise package negotiated between Biden and the House speaker, Kevin McCarthy, passed the US Senate late on Thursday.Biden acknowledged that it leaves neither Republicans nor Democrats fully pleased with the outcome. But the result, after weeks of torturous negotiations, shelves the volatile debt ceiling issue until 2025, after the next presidential election.“No one gets everything they want in a negotiation, but make no mistake: this bipartisan agreement is a big win for our economy and the American people,” Biden tweeted after the Senate voted 63 to 36 to pass the deal agreed between Biden and McCarthy last weekend, which passed the House on Wednesday.The final Senate vote capped off a long day that ground into night, as lawmakers spent hours considering amendments to the legislation. All 11 of the proposed amendments failed to gain enough support to be added to the underlying bill.Several of the amendments were introduced by Senate Republicans who expressed concern that the debt ceiling bill passed by the House did too little to rein in government spending.“Tonight’s vote is a good outcome because Democrats did a very good job taking the worst parts of the Republican plan off the table,” the Senate majority leader, Democrat Chuck Schumer, said after the vote.As part of the negotiations over the bill, McCarthy successfully pushed for modest government spending cuts and changes to the work requirements for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance and the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families Programs. Those changes were deemed insufficient by 31 Republican senators, who echoed the criticism voiced by the 71 House Republicans who opposed the bill a day earlier.The Senate minority leader, Republican Mitch McConnell, supported the bill, even as he acknowledged that lawmakers must take further action to tackle the federal government’s debt of more than $31tn.Senate Democrats lobbied against certain provisions in the bill, namely the expedited approval of the controversial Mountain Valley natural gas pipeline. Senator Tim Kaine, a Democrat of Virginia, introduced an amendment to remove the pipeline provision from the underlying debt ceiling bill, but that measure failed alongside the 10 other proposed amendments.Refusing a once-routine vote to allow a the nation’s debt limit to be lifted without concessions, McCarthy brought Biden’s White House to the negotiating table to strike an agreement that forces spending cuts aimed at curbing the nation’s deficits.“The fact remains that the House majority never should have put us at risk of a disastrous, self-inflicted default in the first place,” said Senator Chris Coons, a Democrat. “We should prevent the debt ceiling from being used as a political hostage and stop allowing our country to be taken up to the edge of default.” More

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      ‘It left me with nothing’: the debt trap of payday loans

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      Meka Armstrong of Detroit, Michigan, has struggled in a cycle of debt from payday loans for years. She first took out a payday loan in 2010 to cover the costs of medication she needs as she is disabled and lives with lupus.“Worst decision I ever made,” said Armstrong. “The interest rate was 49% and I thought I would get my medications and pay the money back, but when I paid the money back, it left me with nothing. That’s how they get you. I, unfortunately, started the payday nightmare, and you can’t get out of the loop.”Armstrong is just one of the 12 million Americans who take out payday loans annually in the states where payday lending is not prohibited, shelling out up to $9.8bn in fees to payday lenders every year. The industry targets Black borrowers such as Armstrong, and Latinos, who are more likely to have lower credit scores and be unbanked compared with their white counterparts.A payday loan is a short-term, high-cost loan typically due on an individual’s next payday. But the payday industry thrives and depends on borrowers who take out numerous loans and face exorbitant fees and interest rates when they can’t keep up. Payday lenders collect 75% of their fees from borrowers who take out 10 or more loans a year, according to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.The average payday loan customer has an annual income of about $30,000 and four in five payday loans are rolled over or renewed. The average payday borrower stays in debt for five months, paying $520 in fees to borrow $375 on average. The majority of borrowers, seven out of 10, take out payday loans to pay rent, utilities or other basic expenses.It took Armstrong years to get out of the debt cycle, which she said was difficult because the payday lenders have borrowers’ bank account information, can sue them and even threaten them with jail time for nonpayment.During the Covid pandemic, Armstrong had to take out another payday loan, even though she had previously experienced the debt trap and the consequences of doing so, because she caught Covid in 2020 and was sick.“It’s embarrassing because I know how predatory they are, but I had Covid-19 for 98 days, almost died, my whole house was sick and we were behind on bills,” she added. “I’m still in the payday nightmare because of that desperation unfortunately.”The US has a poor record when it comes to regulating payday lenders. Currently 20 states and Washington DC have enacted rate caps of 36% annually or less to rein in the cycle of debt that traps consumers who take on payday loans, aligning these states with the federal Military Lending Act passed during the George W Bush administration that capped annual interest rates on consumer loans for active duty military at 36%.In states without caps, the average annual interest rate for payday loans is about 400% and as high as 664%.“The debt trap is very much by design and it’s how payday lenders’ business model works,” said Yasmin Farahi, deputy director of state policy and senior policy counsel at the Center for Responsible Lending. “They succeed by making sure their customers fail. They target low-income communities and communities of color, and it’s a model that’s based on their customers failing, essentially, for them to stay in business and generate fees.”In Minnesota, the state legislature recently passed a law to cap interest rates on payday loans to 36% annually, from average annual interest rates in the state of 220% in 2022.Opponents to the legislation claimed the cap would deter lenders from doing business in Minnesota, though advocates have countered that this has not been the case in states where similar legislation has already been enacted.“It’s meant to be a continuous cycle,” said a payday loan recipient in Minnesota who requested anonymity. “You end up having an emergency, and then you think that, OK, I can pay this off, it’ll be a one-time thing and that’ll be that, but then your next paycheck comes, and it comes out of your bank account automatically and then you’re essentially just back where you started. So then you have to take the same loan out, basically the same day that you pay it off. And it just keeps going and going and going every payday.”Anne Leland Clark, the executive director of Exodus Lending in Minnesota, supported the cap. The legislation was split across partisan lines with Democrats introducing and supporting the bill though polling across political lines showed 79% of Minnesotans supporting a 36% or lower interest rate cap.Prior to Democrats in Minnesota winning a trifecta majority in the state government in November 2022, efforts were made at the local level to enact interest rate caps.“No longer will people be turning and getting into debt traps, or balloon payments, where their ability to repay is not accounted for,” said Clark.She noted a provision was added to the legislation that would permit lenders to charge 50% annual interest rates as long as they report doing so, but Clark noted her organization will be monitoring to see how lenders utilize the provision.“When you crowd out the predators, people are going to turn to and find the more responsible lenders and the more responsible lenders are going to license in your state,” Clark added.Jason Ward, a bankruptcy lawyer in South Carolina, where payday lending is permitted and unregulated, said over half of his clients filing for bankruptcy have at least one payday loan.The average annual interest rate for a payday loan in South Carolina is 385 %.“The interest numbers are so high that I honestly don’t believe the payday loan companies even intend to get paid back,” said Ward.He said many of his clients take out the loans out of desperation to cover basic expenses and that desperation is taken advantage of by payday lenders who know many clients will accept loans with exorbitant terms because they are just focusing on trying to survive at the present.“When you weigh how desperate somebody can be with what’s being offered, you get the sense that it can be predatory,” Ward said. “I don’t think people understand the desperation of a lot of people’s situations.” More

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      US debt ceiling deal narrowly passes senate averting catastrophic federal default

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      The Senate narrowly passed a bill to suspend the debt ceiling on Thursday night, sending the legislation to Joe Biden’s desk and averting a federal default that could have wreaked havoc on the US economy and global markets.The final vote was 63 to 36, with 46 Democrats and 17 Republicans supporting the bill while five Democrats and 31 Republicans opposed the legislation. Sixty votes were needed to pass the bill.“Tonight’s vote is a good outcome because Democrats did a very good job taking the worst parts of the Republican plan off the table,” the Senate majority leader, Democrat Chuck Schumer, said after the vote. “And that’s why Dems voted overwhelmingly for this bill, while Republicans certainly in the Senate did not.”Biden applauded the Senate’s accomplishment and promised to sign the bill as soon as it reaches his desk, with just days to go before the 5 June default deadline.“Tonight, senators from both parties voted to protect the hard-earned economic progress we have made and prevent a first-ever default by the United States,” Biden said in a statement. “Our work is far from finished, but this agreement is a critical step forward, and a reminder of what’s possible when we act in the best interests of our country.”The Senate vote came one day after the House passed the debt ceiling bill in a resounding, bipartisan vote of 314 to 117. The bill – which was negotiated between Biden and the House Republican speaker, Kevin McCarthy of California – will suspend the government’s borrowing limit until January 2025, ensuring the issue will not resurface before the next presidential election.The final Senate vote on the bill capped off a long day in the upper chamber, where lawmakers spent hours considering amendments to the legislation. All 11 of the proposed amendments failed to gain enough support to be added to the underlying bill.Several of the amendments were introduced by Senate Republicans who expressed concern that the debt ceiling bill passed by the House did too little to rein in government spending.As part of the negotiations over the bill, McCarthy successfully pushed for modest government spending cuts and changes to the work requirements for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance and the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families Programs. Those changes were deemed insufficient by 31 Republican senators, who echoed the criticism voiced by the 71 House Republicans who opposed the bill a day earlier.“It doesn’t go far enough. It doesn’t do the basic things that it purports to do,” Senator Mike Lee, a Republican of Utah, told Fox News on Thursday morning. “In case after case, the cuts that it proposes won’t materialize.”The Senate minority leader, Republican Mitch McConnell, supported the bill, even as he acknowledged that lawmakers must take further action to tackle the federal government’s debt of more than $31tn.“The Fiscal Responsibility Act avoids the catastrophic consequences of a default on our nation’s debt,” McConnell said on the floor on Thursday morning. “The deal the House passed last night is a promising step toward fiscal sanity. But make no mistake: there is much more work to be done. The fight to reel in wasteful government spending is far from over.”As some of their colleagues lamented the state of America’s debt, defense hawks in the Senate Republican conference warned that the legislation does not sufficiently fund the Pentagon, leaving the US military vulnerable in the face of foreign threats.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionSchumer and McConnell attempted to allay those concerns by entering a statement into the record reaffirming that America stands ready to “respond to ongoing and growing national security threats”.“This debt ceiling deal does nothing to limit the Senate’s ability to appropriate emergency supplemental funds to ensure our military capabilities are sufficient to deter China, Russia and our other adversaries,” the joint statement read. “The Senate is not about to ignore our national needs, nor abandon our friends and allies who face urgent threats from America’s most dangerous adversaries.”The Senate leaders released a second statement aimed at reassuring colleagues who expressed alarm over a provision stipulating that an across-the-board spending cut will be enacted if Congress does not pass all 12 appropriations bills for fiscal year 2024. The measure was designed to incentivize Congress members to pass a full budget, which has proven to be a difficult task in recent years, but lawmakers fear the policy will lead to more spending cuts.“We share the concern of many of our colleagues about the potential impact of sequestration and we will work in a bipartisan, collaborative way to avoid this outcome,” Schumer and McConnell said. “The leaders look forward to bills being reported out of committee with strong bipartisan support.”Senate Democrats also lobbied against certain provisions in the bill, namely the expedited approval of the controversial Mountain Valley natural gas pipeline. Senator Tim Kaine, a Democrat of Virginia, introduced an amendment to remove the pipeline provision from the underlying debt ceiling bill, but that measure failed alongside the 10 other proposed amendments.Despite their personal concerns about the details of the bill, most Senate Democrats, including Kaine, supported the legislation to get it to Biden’s desk and avoid a devastating default that economists warned could result in millions of lost jobs. With the immediate crisis averted, Democrats reiterated their demands to eliminate the debt ceiling and remove any future threat of default.“The fact remains that the House majority never should have put us at risk of a disastrous, self-inflicted default in the first place,” said Senator Chris Coons, a Democrat. “We should prevent the debt ceiling from being used as a political hostage and stop allowing our country to be taken up to the edge of default.” More

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      Apostle of bipartisanship: why US debt ceiling deal was a victory for Joe Biden

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      Sometimes presidencies are about things that don’t happen. Joe Biden will be breathing a mighty sigh of relief that the economic asteroid hurtling towards planet Earth turned into a near miss: America is apparently not going to default on his watch.As a bipartisan deal to suspend the $31.4tn debt ceiling passed the House of Representatives on Thursday, Biden could also claim vindication for the underlying theory of his presidency: that in the age of polarisation it takes an apostle of bipartisanship and a 36-year veteran of the Senate to reach across the aisle and make deals with his opponents.Only Biden, the argument goes, can bridge divides that seem unbridgeable in the age of Donald Trump.Such deals come at a price, of course. Not even the White House claimed that the hard-won budget agreement is a cornucopia of delights for the Democratic base. But it was notable that more Democrats than Republicans voted for the 99-page bill, an unofficial scorecard of who got more of what they wanted, and even progressives who opposed it reserved their contempt for its contents rather than their president.For sure, there will be plenty of time to debate how Biden and Democrats could have played this episode better. They could have raised or abolished the debt limit when they had control of the White House and both chambers of Congress. Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia told the Politico website that if he could “do one thing different, it would have been raising the debt limit late last year”.The president may have also been lulled into a false sense of security by the shenanigans around Kevin McCarthy’s election as House speaker in January. It took 15 ballots and implied a Republican majority mired in division and dysfunction. But Democrats underestimate Republicans’ ability to fall into line at their peril.McCarthy managed to steer his unwieldy coalition into passing a debt limit bill stuffed with conservative priorities and spending cuts. If Biden hoped that moderate Republicans would bow to logic – the debt limit is about spending that Congress has already authorised, not future appropriations – and break ranks, rather than embrace the apocalyptic prospect of default, he had to think again.The president duly cancelled a trip to Australia and Papua New Guinea to hold talks with McCarthy. He deployed a negotiating team that included Shalanda Young, director of the Office of Management and Budget, working such long hours that she admitted to reporters she had run out of clean clothes.What emerged was a deal that protected Biden’s legislative accomplishments including the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and Inflation Reduction Act, fending off Republicans attempts to repeal the latter’s green energy incentives. The White House also swept aside Republican proposals to slash funding for education, healthcare, law enforcement and social security.The argument that “it could have been worse” is hardly an inspiring re-election slogan but the White House would contend that it is realistic in divided government. If anyone channels Biden’s bipartisan spirit it is Young, a former staff director of the House appropriations committee who speaks his language of compromise, flexibility and give and take.She insisted: “Look, the House is not very different from when I was there. You have to have some faith in the governing majority, which I do, because I have a lot of respect for members on both sides of the aisle to do what’s best for the American people. And that is not some pollyannish thing. I know them. And I’ve always thought we could get here if we let the extreme go away.”Letting the extreme go away, as Young puts it, has typically been a doomed enterprise since Trump’s descent on an escalator at Trump Tower in 2015 signalled the descent of the Republican party into a personality cult. The far-right Freedom caucus unleashed sound and fury against the deal, inadvertently complimenting Biden on having outfoxed McCarthy (quite an achievement for a man they also insist is senile).skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionOn the left, there was opposition from Pramila Jayapal, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and other progressives. They condemned work requirements for food aid programmes for some poor Americans, reduced funding for the Internal Revenue Service that could make life easier for wealthy tax cheats, and the speeding up of the permitting process for a natural gas pipeline in West Virginia (home of the conservative Democratic senator Joe Manchin).This could chip away at Biden’s long-term support, fuelling a perception that he is pivoting to the centre as 2024 approaches. But again, it could have been worse.There was no mass revolt against him. Progressives understood that “Maga Republicans” had taken the economy hostage and left Biden with no choice but to negotiate the ransom. Congressman Jamie Raskin said: “We need to make sure this kind of legislative extortion never happens again.” The president constantly benefits from the “Don’t judge me against the Almighty, judge me against the alternative,” dynamic.The bill now heads to the Senate after a House vote that, as a purple blend of Democrats and Republicans, could hardly have been more Bidenesque in hitting the sweet spot between left and right. It was his predecessor who wrote a book entitled The Art of the Deal. But it is Biden who continues to exceed low expectations by finding common ground in the disappearing middle. More

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      The debt ceiling fight was never about debt. It was about Republican power | Mark Weisbrot

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      The debt ceiling drama seems to be nearing its end, as the US House of Representatives passed legislation that would lift the debt ceiling in accordance with a deal reached last weekend between Joe Biden, the president, and Kevin McCarthy, the Republican speaker of the House. The Republicans have been fighting to force cuts in spending and/or eligibility for food stamps (Snap), Medicaid, childcare and pre-schools, education and grants for higher education.By linking these and other provisions to the lifting of the debt ceiling, the Republicans tried to use the threat of default on the public debt to force Democrats to accept them. The legislation, which now goes to the Senate where it is expected to pass, did not satisfy most of their desires.The worst abuse that Republicans managed to include will be suffered by the hundreds of thousands of poor people who will likely lose access to food assistance under the Snap program. Many are in poor health and will not be able to complete the work requirements that Republicans have insisted on imposing for people of age 50-54; others will lose benefits due to additional red tape.There was also damage done by the fictitious narrative that Republicans were able to successfully promote about the “ticking time bomb” of the public debt. There is no bomb and if there were, it would not be ticking.The relevant measure of our debt burden is how much we pay annually in net interest on the debt, as a share of our national income (or roughly, GDP). That number was 1.9% for 2022. That is not big, by any comparison. We averaged about 3% in the 1990s, while experiencing America’s then longest-running economic expansion.The constant repetition of the “threat” posed by our national debt was a big win for Republicans, who are always looking to cut spending on social needs and safety nets; and more strategically important, to cut spending that could aid recovery from an economic downturn when Democrats are in power.In the Great Recession (December 2007 to June 2009), Republicans fought against measures to stimulate an economic recovery, which were already too small as proposed by Democrats. By October 2010, unemployment was still at 9.4%. In the election a month later, Republicans gained 63 seats to take the House and six Senate seats.The debt ceiling was used to threaten the Biden administration with a default on the public debt if they did not agree to Republican demands, mostly for spending cuts. The ceiling itself doesn’t affect new spending; it’s just holding up a chunk of the spending that our government is already obligated by law to carry out. In a democracy, this type of extortion should not be permitted.But Republican power isn’t based on democracy; on the contrary, it’s become highly dependent on institutions and practices that most people, including experts, would consider undemocratic or anti-democratic. Republicans benefit enormously from the fact that 80% of senators are elected by about 50% of voters. And if that’s not slanted enough, there is the filibuster, which effectively requires a 60-vote majority to win almost any pro-democracy reforms. This includes changes that are needed even for the Senate as presently constituted: eg representation for Washington DC, which has more population than a couple of states. We are the only democracy in the world where people who live in our national capital city don’t have full voting rights.Then there is voter suppression and gerrymandering, for both state and federal elections. These two methods of influencing election outcomes have gone hand-in-hand. Of course swing states are prime targets: recall that Republican presidents who ruled for 12 of the past 22 years came to power while losing the popular vote.When Republicans win, they then use their power to stack the cards further in their favor. This includes packing the judiciary, where Republican judges advance their agenda.Their decades-long struggle to control the judiciary reached its pinnacle with a 6-3 majority of the US supreme court, with five justices appointed by presidents who lost the popular vote.The current Republican majority now “substitutes a rule by judges for the rule of law”, the dissenting justices wrote when that majority revoked the right to abortion last year.Dozens of senators have described the supreme court as “captured” by “dark money” from Republican donors, including “rightwing billionaires”, and it is currently facing lost credibility as well as accusations of corruption.If the Republicans had gotten all that they had included in their legislation to lift the debt limit, it would have reduced the public debt by less than one half of 1% next year.This makes it even clearer that the debt ceiling fight was never really about debt reduction. It’s part of a vicious cycle in which political power is abused in order to consolidate a system that is increasingly undemocratic; and then further abused. The debt ceiling is just one part of that cycle, and should not have been negotiated; it needs to be abolished.
      Mark Weisbrot is co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research in Washington DC and the author of Failed: What the “Experts” Got Wrong About the Global Economy More

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      Debt ceiling bill: key takeaways from the vote

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      The US House of Representatives passed the much-debated debt ceiling bill on Wednesday evening, moving the country closer to avoiding a potentially catastrophic default. Next up in line is the Senate, the Democrat majority chamber, which would push the bill to Joe Biden’s desk.But the vote on Wednesday revealed the divided lines, not only between Republicans and Democrats, but within the parties. Here are some key takeaways from this vote on the Fiscal Responsibility Act:Kevin McCarthy’s party faced significant internal resistanceMore Democrats (165) than Republicans (149) supported the measure – something the right wing may use as evidence that the bill was a bad deal for their side. Indeed, the Republican opposition to the bill is much louder than that of progressive Democrats, who are concerned about the cuts to benefits programs and the impact on climate.Key Democratic programs and priorities will feel the effectsAn estimated 750,000 could lose food stamp benefits due to the new work requirements, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a progressive thinktank. And in another blow to progressives, the bill gives special treatment to the Mountain Valley pipeline.A quarter of the $80bn of newly allotted funding to refurbish the IRS will also be cut from Biden’s key legislation, the Inflation Reduction ActBut it preserves health plans, Social Security and other programsThe bill will not impact Medicaid benefits, the main government health program for low income Americans, or social security, even though McCarthy tried to keep the debate open on such programs just hours ahead of Wednesday’s vote. Republicans attempted to cut these plans to curb government spending. However the bill will avoid more increases to the bloated US defense budget.And the agreement will fully fund medical care for veterans at the levels included in Biden’s proposed 2024 budget blueprint.Both Biden and McCarthy are counting this as a winWhile critics say the president could have avoided making multiple concessions, the president touted his ability to bring the deal together under heated circumstances, and the bipartisanship he has famously campaigned on.“This budget agreement is a bipartisan compromise,” the president said in a statement reacting to the news. “Neither side got everything it wanted. That’s the responsibility of governing. I want to thank speaker McCarthy and his team for negotiating in good faith, as well as leader Jeffries for his leadership. This agreement is good news for the American people and the American economy.”McCarthy, meanwhile, claimed the bill would herald the “largest savings in American history” during the floor debate, though this is not quite accurate.“I have been thinking about this day before my vote for speaker because I knew the debt ceiling was coming. And I wanted to make history. I wanted to do something no other Congress has done,” McCarthy told reporters after the vote. “Tonight, we all made history.”The Senate is already making moves to move the bill forwardChuck Schumer, the Senate majority leader has already put the debt limit bill on the Senate calendar to start the process on Thursday. There is likely to be some resistance there as well, as progressives such as Bernie Sanders have already signaled their concerns, but the bill is expected to pass. More

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      US House passes bill to raise debt ceiling just days before default

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      The House passed a bill to raise the debt ceiling on Wednesday, clearing a major legislative hurdle with just days left before the US is expected to default.The final House vote was 314 to 117, with 149 Republicans and 165 Democrats supporting the measure. In a potentially worrisome sign for the House Republican speaker, Kevin McCarthy, 71 members of his conference opposed the deal that he brokered with President Joe Biden.Taking a victory lap after the bill’s passage, McCarthy downplayed concerns over divisions within the House Republican conference and celebrated the policy concessions he secured in his negotiations with Biden.“I have been thinking about this day before my vote for speaker because I knew the debt ceiling was coming. And I wanted to make history. I wanted to do something no other Congress has done,” McCarthy told reporters after the vote. “Tonight, we all made history.”Biden applauded the House passage of the legislation, calling on the Senate to quickly take up the legislation to avoid a default. The treasury secretary, Janet Yellen, has warned that the federal government will be unable to pay its bills starting 5 June unless the debt ceiling is raised.“This budget agreement is a bipartisan compromise. Neither side got everything it wanted,” Biden said in a statement. “I have been clear that the only path forward is a bipartisan compromise that can earn the support of both parties. This agreement meets that test.”The debt ceiling bill passed by the House would raise the government’s borrowing limit until January 2025, ensuring the issue will not resurface before the next presidential election. As part of his negotiations with Biden, McCarthy successfully pushed for government spending cuts and changes to the work requirements for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.However, the concessions that McCarthy won fell far short for members of the freedom caucus, who had pushed for steeper spending cuts and much stricter work requirements for benefits programs. They belittled the debt ceiling compromise as a paltry effort to tackle the nation’s debt, which stands at more than $31tn.Representative Scott Perry of Pennsylvania, chair of the freedom caucus, said on Twitter before the vote, “President Biden is happily sending Americans over yet another fiscal cliff, with far too many swampy Republicans behind the wheel of a ‘deal’ that fails miserably to address the real reason for our debt crisis: SPENDING.”House freedom caucus members staged one last attempt to block the debt ceiling bill from advancing on Wednesday afternoon, when they opposed a procedural motion prior to the final vote. With 29 Republicans voting against the motion, McCarthy had to rely on Democratic assistance to advance the debt ceiling proposal. In the end, 52 Democrats voted for the motion, setting up the final vote and virtually ensuring the bill’s passage.The House Democratic leader, representative Hakeem Jeffries of New York, mocked McCarthy’s failure to unify his party, arguing the procedural vote proved the speaker has “lost control of the floor”.“It’s an extraordinary act that indicates just the nature of the extremism that is out of control on the other side of the aisle,” Jeffries said during the floor debate before the final vote. “Extreme Maga Republicans attempted to take control of the House floor. Democrats took it back for the American people.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionDespite his sharp criticism of McCarthy and his Republican colleagues, Jeffries and the majority of the House Democratic caucus supported the debt ceiling bill. Although they lamented the spending cuts included in the bill, those Democrats argued the crucial importance of avoiding a default outweighed their personal concerns about the legislation.“Our constitution makes perfectly clear the validity of the public debt of the United States shall not be questioned,” said California representative Nancy Pelosi, the former Democratic House speaker. “While I find this legislation objectionable, it will avert an unprecedented default, which would bring devastation to America’s families.”But dozens of progressive lawmakers opposed the bill, attacking the spending cuts and new work requirements procured by McCarthy as an affront to the voters who elected them.“Republicans never cared about reducing the deficit, only about forcing through their anti-working family policy priorities under the threat of a catastrophic default,” said Pramila Jayapal, chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. “The deal they passed tonight proves that point, and I could not be part of their extortion scheme.”Progressives in the Senate, including Senator Bernie Sanders, have echoed that criticism and indicated they plan to oppose the debt ceiling proposal, but the bill still appears likely to become law. The Senate Democratic majority leader, Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, has pledged to act swiftly to take up the bill once it has passed the House. The Senate Republican minority leader, Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, has already indicated he plans to support the proposal as well.“Any needless delay, any last-minute brinksmanship at this point would be an unacceptable risk,” Schumer said in a floor speech Wednesday morning. “Moving quickly, working together to avoid default is the responsible and necessary thing to do.” More

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      Debt ceiling bill clears first House hurdle as 5 June deadline inches closer – live

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      From 3h agoThe House of Representatives has started its debate ahead of the chamber’s final vote on the debt ceiling bill.We will be bringing you all the latest details.Transport secretary Pete Buttigieg has weighed in on the debate surrounding the debt ceiling deal, saying that “no one’s going to get everything they want when you have a negotiation like this.”During an interview with NBC host Chuck Todd on Meet The Press, Todd asked Buttigieg what responsibility he believes Democrats have to pass the bill for president Joe Biden.Buttigieg replied:
      “Obviously, we all would have loved to see a clean bill that separated the budget conversation from the default conversation but also we’re in a moment of divided government where no one side, no one party is going to get everything that they want…
      No one’s going to get everything they want when you have a negotiation like this, but this is one that we believe in that we think is the right way forward that also allows us to move on to the next conversation, putting the terrible and unacceptable specter default behind us.”
      When asked whether Congress and the Biden administration are “mainstreaming” using debt ceiling as a budget negotiation tool, Buttigieg replied:
      “Obviously, we didn’t ask for this situation that some of the more extreme voices in the House GOP put this country into … most reasonable people could agree, the best way to handle the budget negotiations is through the regular order process that the law and the Constitution set out.”
      Donald Trump has promised to strip away birthright US citizenship if he gets elected into office again.In a video posted onto social media yesterday, Trump said if he becomes president, he will sign an executive order that will make sure children of undocumented migrants “will not receive automatic US citizenship.”He added that his order “will “choke off a major incentive for continued illegal immigration, deter more migrants from coming and encourage many of the aliens Joe Biden has unlawfully let into our country to go.”Trump’s reiteration of birthright removal comes 125 years after the supreme court settled the issue.During his first presidential run he condemned the right by inaccurately saying, “We’re the only country in the world where a person comes in and has a baby, and the baby is essentially a citizen of the United States … with all of those benefits. It’s ridiculous. It’s ridiculous. And it has to end,” as over 30 countries currently offer birthright citizenship.Martin Pengelly has more:The House is now in recess subject to the call of the chair.The House will reconvene again at 7:15pm for one hour of debate that will be evenly divided between Republicans and Democrats before voting on the bill.The special counsel investigating former president Donald Trump’s attempt to overturn the 2020 presidential election results is looking into Trump’s firing of a cybersecurity official whose office called the election “the most secure in American history,” according to the New York Times.Reuters reports:The US special counsel investigating Donald Trump’s attempt to overturn his 2020 election defeat is examining his firing of a cybersecurity official whose office said the vote was secure, the New York Times said.Jack Smith, who is also investigating Trump’s handling of classified documents, has subpoenaed former Trump White House staffers as well as Christopher Krebs, who oversaw the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (Cisa) under Trump, the Times said, citing unnamed sources.Trump fired Krebs in November 2020, days after Cisa issued a statement calling the 3 November election “the most secure in American history”, as the then-president made his unsupported accusations that the vote was rigged.Cisa, part of the Department of Homeland Security, works to protect US elections. Krebs told associates at the time he expected to be fired.Representatives for Smith declined to comment on the Times report. Representatives for Krebs and Trump could not be reached for comment.For more, click here:The debt ceiling bill has passed the first procedural hurdle in the House, with 52 Democrats bailing out the Republican lawmakers.In addition to 52 Democrats voting yes for the rule governing debate in the chamber, 189 Republicans voted yes. Voting no were 158 Democrats and 29 Republicans.One more hour of debate is left before the final voting round commences later tonight.Donald Trump was captured on tape acknowledging that he kept a classified Pentagon document regarding a potential attack on Iran, CNN reports.According to report, federal prosecutors obtained the recording which was made during a meeting in summer 2021 at Trump’s golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey.Sources familiar with the matter told CNN that Trump made comments that suggested that he would like to share the information but that he was aware of his post-presidency limitations surrounding classified records.The report also cited sources saying that the meeting attendees did not have security clearance. Attendees included two people working on the autobiography of Mark Meadows, Trump’s former chief of staff, in addition to former Trump aides including communications specialist Margo Martin.According to sources, the recording is an “important” piece of evidence in a potential case against Trump over his handling over classified documents following his presidency.Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell echoed similar sentiments alongside Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer, saying that he will support the debt ceiling bill once it reaches the Senate chamber.“House Republicans’ unity gave them the upper hand, they used it to secure a much needed step in the right direction. When this agreement reaches the Senate, I’ll be proud to support it without delay,” said McConnell.Texas governor Greg Abbott has declared John Scott as the state’s temporary attorney general following the state House’s vote to impeach Republican attorney general Ken Paxton.The decision to impeach Paxton comes as a result of years of allegations including corruption, bribery, unfitness for office and abuse of public trust.According to the Texas Tribune, investigators testified at the state House general investigating committee, saying that they believed Paxton wrongly used official funds and abused his authority to assist a friend and financial backer.In response to the impeachment, Paxton said it was an attempt to “overthrow the will of the people and disenfranchise the voters of our state” and that the charges are based on “hearsay and gossip, parroting long-disproven claims,” the Associated Press reports.Meanwhile, Abbott, who has largely been silent during the whole ordeal, said in a statement, “John Scott has the background and experience needed to step in as a short-term interim Attorney General during the time the Attorney General has been suspended from duty,” the Associated Press added.New York Republican representative Marcus Molinaro hailed the tentative bill, calling it “an agreement [that] will move this nation forward.”
      “The Fiscal Responsibility Act takes important action, not at all to punish our most vulnerable. In fact, it takes real steps to ensure those most vulnerable among us are protected and served and have access to the support that they deserve, and by the way, find their way to work.
      This bill hold states like New York and others accountable for waving restrictions, expanding access, not to help the most vulnerable, but to bloat and to grow and to increase state government. Because of action states have taken, the most vulnerable are left to fend for themselves…
      States like New York increased their infrastructure, their government and leveraged federal taxpayer dollars, not to benefit those who need the help the most but to benefit state government. And this bill starts a very important step of holding states accountable…
      We have an opportunity here to make a measurable difference in the lives of those who struggle the most. And this is an effort to ensure that that happens.”
      Texas Republican representative Chip Roy lashed out against Democrats over the tentative bill during the House debate, saying:
      “I don’t wanna hear a whole hell of a lot about what we’re doing to devastate American families with rampant inflation, because we keep spending money we don’t have.
      To my colleagues on this side of the aisle, my beef isn’t that I don’t understand the struggle with the negotiators against that kind of reasoning. My beef is that you cut a deal that shouldn’t have been cut…”
      The House of Representatives has started its debate ahead of the chamber’s final vote on the debt ceiling bill.We will be bringing you all the latest details. More