Two House Democrats are urging President Joe Biden to negotiate with Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) on the debt ceiling following the passage of the House GOP-led bill to raise the cap this past week.
Rep. Jared Golden (D-ME), who represents a swing Maine district, and Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-FL), a first-term congressman who won with under 52 percent of the vote, are saying that Biden should negotiate with McCarthy on the debt ceiling.
Golden told CNN on Friday the president needs to sit down and talk to McCarthy about making a debt ceiling compromise now that the Republicans passed a bill, “You’ve been asking them to pass something – so it’s time to sit down and talk.”
“We got one camp that they want to talk about spending — and they want to do that before they agree to raise the debt ceiling,” Golden added.”We have got another camp that says they are willing to sit down and talk about spending after we deal with a debt limit. It’s semantics.”
Moskowitz also told CNN on Friday that Biden must negotiate with the Speaker.
“Yeah, and that’s been my position from the beginning. I always think that the president of the United States and the Speaker should always be talking,” Moskowitz said when pressed about the White House’s position to not negotiate with McCarthy being unsustainable.
“Joe Biden has shown his entire career — it’s why he’s president — that he is someone that will also negotiate, he’ll always talk. So listen, I have faith that Joe Biden and the Speaker will sit down and will talk,” he also said. “In D.C., we should always be talking. We should never say…we’re not going to speak to folks across the aisle.”
“We should never say we’re not going to speak to folks across the aisle. I don’t think that’s a sustainable position.”
—Democrat Rep. Jared Moskowitz says President Biden must negotiate with @SpeakerMcCarthy pic.twitter.com/y57Jx018A1
— Chad Gilmartin (@ChadGilmartinCA) April 28, 2023
The Democrat’s statements come after House Republicans passed legislation — the Limit, Save, Grow Act of 2023 — to raise the debt ceiling on Wednesday without any Democrat support. The legislation would raise the debt ceiling by $1.5 trillion while tackling America’s national deficit by saving the government an estimated $4.8 trillion over the next ten years.
While the U.S. is expected to reach its debt limit as early as this summer, Biden has refused to meet with McCarthy to discuss the plan from the House Republicans. Biden’s Treasury Secretary, Janet Yellen, has warned of “economic catastrophe” if Biden and Congress cannot move to increase the limit in time.
On Monday, the White House released a Statement of Administration Policy, calling the Republican-led legislation “a reckless attempt to extract extreme concessions as a condition for the United States simply paying the bills it has already incurred” and vowed to veto the measure if it makes it to Biden’s desk.
Then, on Thursday night, Politico reported that Biden was caught off guard by McCarthy’s success in getting a debt ceiling bill passed through the House and that White House officials “remain nervous about how and when the standoff will end.”
This past week, Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV), who is up for reelection in a red state, also urged Biden to meet with McCarthy after the House GOP passed legislation to lift the debt ceiling through early next year.
“The clock is ticking on this debt ceiling crisis, and the American people will pay the economic price if President Biden continues to refuse to sit down and negotiate a commonsense compromise that would prevent a historic default,” Manchin said.
Jacob Bliss is a reporter for Breitbart News. Write to him at jbliss@breitbart.com or follow him on Twitter @JacobMBliss.
