The House of Representatives has narrowly approved a Republican plan to raise the debt ceiling in a legislative victory for Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy that will do little to break the stalemate with the White House.
Amid fears the stand-off between Republicans and Democrats will plunge the US government into default as soon as June, the House voted 217-215 on Wednesday evening to approve a bill that would raise the debt ceiling by $1.5tn and punt the risk until next year.
But the Limit, Save, Grow Act also included a laundry list of Republican policy priorities, including rolling back initiatives from Joe Biden’s administration, such as the cancellation of student loan debt.
The bill is almost certain to fail in the US Senate, which is narrowly controlled by Democrats, and Biden has already vowed to veto the measure if it lands on his desk.
But McCarthy pressed ahead with the vote on Wednesday as part of an effort to force the president and congressional Democrats to come to the negotiating table.
“He is putting the American economy in jeopardy by his lack of action,” McCarthy said of Biden after Wednesday’s vote. “Now we should sit down and negotiate.”
Biden has called on congressional Republicans to raise the debt ceiling without condition, and has refused to negotiate. McCarthy and Republicans, meanwhile, have sought to tie raising the debt ceiling to steep budget cuts.
Katherine Clark, the Democratic whip, said she was “disgusted” by the Republicans’ actions on Wednesday, accusing the party of “taking our economy hostage”.
Karine Jean-Pierre, White House press secretary, said after the bill’s passage on Wednesday that it had “no chance of becoming law” and accused Republicans of “forc[ing] middle class and working families to bear the burden of tax cuts for the wealthiest”. She called on House Republicans to “act immediately and without conditions to avoid default”.
The Treasury earlier this year began taking “extraordinary measures” to meet its financial obligations after breaching the debt ceiling. Treasury secretary Janet Yellen and Federal Reserve chair Jay Powell, among others, have called on Congress to lift the debt ceiling imminently or risk an unprecedented default that could wreak havoc on the US economy.
While it remains unclear when exactly the extraordinary measures will run out, economists say the so-called X-date is likely to come this summer.
Economists are watching closely tax revenue data as they fine-tune their expectations for that date. Those at Goldman Sachs on Wednesday said an influx of tax receipts on April 25 has affirmed the bank’s base case that the debt limit deadline will be in late July.
The Republican bill passed the House by the narrowest of margins on Wednesday, in a vote that underscored the fragility of McCarthy’s majority.
Four hardline Republicans — Andy Biggs of Arizona, Ken Buck of Colorado, Tim Burchett of Tennessee and Matt Gaetz of Florida — voted against the measure. Democrats, who gave dubbed the bill the “Default on America Act” were unanimous in their opposition.
However, the vote was nevertheless seen as a success for McCarthy, who has for months been at pains to unite his fractious conference after it took 15 rounds of voting for him to be elected Speaker of the House.