On Monday, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy gave a speech marking his 100th day in office — and announced that he’d scored a huge win over President Joe Biden.
In front of the New York Stock Exchange, McCarthy outlined his budget plan, expressed optimism about the plan’s ability to pass the House, and called for Biden to negotiate at the conference table.
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The House speaker promised to pass legislation to raise the nation’s debt ceiling… but only on the condition of capping future federal spending increases at 1%.
And he said he had the votes secured.
Speaker McCarthy tells @CNN he has 218 votes on his plan to raise debt ceiling for 1 yr w a slew of cuts+revenue raisers
"I think we got 218 to raise the debt ceiling" McCarthy said
"We've got a lot of consensus within the conference. We'll get together and work through it"
— Haley Talbot (@haleytalbotcnn) April 17, 2023
McCarthy’s Wall Street address came with Washington heading toward a potential fiscal crisis over the need to raise the nation’s debt limit, now at $31 trillion, and avert a federal default. The Treasury Department has said it is taking “extraordinary measures” to continue paying its bills, but money will run short this summer.
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McCarthy said the nation’s debt load is a “ticking time bomb” and Biden is “missing in action” as the deadline nears to raise the debt limit.
“For 75 days, the president has ignored the debt ceiling,” McCarthy said. “As Speaker of the House, I have a responsibility to tell the nation that this has got to stop. This isn’t something to be played with, this isn’t something to play a political game with. I want a responsible and honest debt ceiling.”
“Defaulting on our debt is not an option,” McCarthy vowed. He also refused to cut Social Security and Medicare, despite false claims from the Biden administration.
The plan he outlined would raise the nation’s debt limit into next year — putting the issue squarely in the 2024 presidential election — coupled with a plan to roll back federal spending to fiscal 2022 levels, recoup unspent COVID-19 funds and cap future spending increases at no more than 1% a year over the next decade.
Republicans, he said, also want to attach policy priorities, including imposing work requirements to recipients of government welfare.
And McCarthy said the House Republicans also want to tack on H.R. 1, an expansive energy bill that would favor oil, gas and coal production — and ease permitting regulations — undoing many of Biden’s anti-energy initiatives.
McCarthy was both upbeat and defiant as he vowed to pass a bill through the House “in coming weeks.” Lawmakers were briefed on a weekend conference call and said they expected a vote by the end of April.
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Take a look —
House Speaker Kevin McCarthy said the US debt is a “ticking time bomb" during a speech at the NYSE.
He also said the House will vote in coming weeks on a plan to lift the nation’s borrowing limit, but not without new curbs on spending https://t.co/BDlrdRAN98 pic.twitter.com/7uIxy9wDiQ
— Bloomberg (@business) April 17, 2023
Late Monday, House Republicans rallied around the speaker as he returned to Capitol Hill, with preparations underway for a vote on the package as soon as next week — a rapid turnaround. McCarthy is expected to brief House Republicans privately early Tuesday morning on the details.
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McCarthy commands only a 222-213 majority in the House, and he’s been unable to rally his Republican troops around a budget-cutting proposal that he could offer the White House as a starting point in negotiations. The Biden administration has remained almost completely silent.
McCarthy is working furiously to unite the “five families” — the various caucuses including the Freedom Caucus, Republican Study Committee and others within the House Republican majority — around a plan that could be presented to Biden to kickstart negotiations.
The House plan would need to pass the Democrat-controlled Senate before heading to Biden’s desk, where it would face serious challenges. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said that McCarthy “continues to bumble our country toward a catastrophic default.”
McCarthy is seeking to shift blame for the standoff and draw the White House back into talks.
“The longer President Biden waits to be sensible to find an agreement, the more likely it becomes that this administration will bumble into the first default in our nation’s history,” McCarthy said. “Let me be clear, A no strings attached debt limit increase will not pass. But since the president continues to hide, House Republicans will take action.”
House approval could serve to pressure Biden to negotiate. The sweeping proposal from McCarthy will likely be too expansive for the White House to consider, but serves as a political lever to push Biden back to the negotiating table.
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McCarthy elicited a response from Biden.
After McCarthy’s speech, the White House hit back quickly. It accused McCarthy of “dangerous economic hostage taking” simply for trying to negotiate.
Meanwhile, administration officials re-upped Biden’s pressure on the Republican leader to approve a debt ceiling increase with no strings attached.
White House deputy press secretary Andrew Bates called McCarthy’s conditions a “MAGA wish list that will increase costs for hard-working families,” a reference to former President Donald Trump’s Make America Great Again slogan.
“A speech isn’t a plan, but it did showcase House Republicans’ priorities,” said Bates.
The White House has said the ball is in McCarthy’s court, saying he has promised to produced a budget plan but has thus far failed to deliver. Senior Biden advisers doubt McCarthy’s ability to hold his Republican majority together to pass anything, and see little need to even express openness to concessions to a leader they doubt can deliver.
Schumer said, “President Biden and I are happy to meet with the speaker when he has something to talk about.”
The Horn editorial team and the Associated Press contributed to this article.