Good morning. It's Saturday, May the 27th. I'm Ali Velshi. The full faith and credit of the United

States is in jeopardy this hour. But President Biden says he's hopeful and optimistic about ongoing

debt-sealing negotiations. The Speaker of the House, Kevin McCarthy, echoed Biden's hopeful tone telling reporters

yesterday morning that progress has been made this week and that he wants to keep that momentum

going. Patrick McHenry, the Republican Congressman from North Carolina, who's been a key figure

in these talks, also said yesterday, quote, the deal is within reach, but there are serious sticking points that remain.

When asked if Republicans will drop their demand for work requirements for social safety

net programs like food assistance, Republican Congressman Garrett Graves, also one of the lead

negotiators, said, quote, hell no. Meanwhile, the Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen announced yesterday that the

so-called X date, the projected deadline to raise the debt ceiling after which the government

will not be able to pay its bills is June the 5th. The time is ticking for Congress to take

action because it's Congress that has an actual constitutional responsibility here.

They swore an oath to support and defend the Constitution, and the 14th Amendment of that

Constitution says the validity of the public debt of the United States shall not be questioned,

which presumably means you need to pay the debt. June 5th is only nine days from now.

The House of Representatives has adjourned

for the long Memorial Day weekend. Republican leadership said they will provide 24 hours notice

before scheduling voting days and addressing the potential default. While some Republicans might

just be hoping to extract greater cuts to the social safety net in exchange for not crashing the

American economy. With others, the motivation is less clear. Take, for example, the chaos caucus,

a group of the most disruptive members of the Republican caucus right now. The chaos caucus,

many of whom are members of the Freedom Caucus, succeeded in complicating and stalling Kevin

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