President Biden and congressional leaders met at the White House to discuss a solution to the debt ceiling impasse. Time is running out, as America may not have the money it needs to pay its debts as early as June 1.
When House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., left the meeting, he told reporters they didn’t make any progress.
“Everybody in this meeting reiterated the positions they were at. I didn’t see any new movement,” Speaker McCarthy said. “But I was very clear with the president. We have now just two weeks to go. If Chuck Schumer could pass something we’d go to conference right away and solve that. But I don’t think Chuck Schumer can pass anything. They haven’t dealt with it.”
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said the president and Democrats must negotiate. He also tried to instill confidence in the economy. But McConnell said elections have consequences, and the 2020 election created a divided government with Republicans and Democrats both controlling chambers of Congress.
“The United States is not going to default. It never has and it never will,” McConnell said. “There is no sentiment in the Senate, certainly not 60 votes, for a clean debt ceiling. So there must be an agreement and the sooner the president and the speaker can reach an agreement, the sooner we can solve the problem.”
Sen. Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., also said there are many differences between parties.
“The bad news, we explicitly asked speaker McCarthy – would he take default off the table? He refused,” Schumer said. “And that is a shame because that makes things more complicated.”
Democrats struck back at Republican accusations that they have wasted time on negotiations. Democrats said President Biden released a budget proposal that should be a starting point for negotiations.
“We saw no Republican plan, no Republican budget, and then on April 26th, they passed one that was extreme,” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., said.