Playing chicken with the debt ceiling
Post Reports
The Washington Post
4.4 • 5.1K Ratings
🗓️ 2 May 2023
⏱️ 20 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Congress and President Biden have five weeks to strike a deal on raising the debt ceiling, according to a new projection from the Treasury Department. Otherwise, the country will need to brace for an economic catastrophe. The problem? Neither side is willing to compromise.
President Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy have agreed to meet next week, but both have also insisted they are unwilling to negotiate, stoking fears that the government may miss this critical deadline.
Tony Romm joins “Post Reports” to explain.
Read more:
- Biden seeks debt ceiling talks, as U.S. faces possible June 1 default
- Here’s what’s in the House GOP bill to raise debt limit, cut spending
- With debt bill adopted, far-right House Republicans ready for fiscal war
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | There is a stress stream I've had over and over. |
| 0:06.1 | You may have had one like this too. |
| 0:08.0 | So I'm back in school and I discover that the big exam, the one that I thought I had |
| 0:13.7 | months to prepare for, is tomorrow. |
| 0:17.2 | And I am not prepared. |
| 0:23.0 | My colleague, Tony Rom says, this is kind of what lawmakers in Washington are going through |
| 0:27.8 | right now. |
| 0:29.6 | They thought they had a few more months to raise the debt ceiling, a very important |
| 0:33.4 | cap on what the government can borrow. |
| 0:36.0 | But it turns out they might only have a few weeks. |
| 0:39.2 | Yeah, these things have a way of sneaking up on you, don't they? |
| 0:42.7 | On Monday, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen sent an urgent message to Congress. |
| 0:47.9 | Raise the debt limit soon. |
| 0:50.2 | Or the government could default on its debt. |
| 0:53.0 | Yes, that was the word from the Treasury Department just yesterday, that this debt-sealing |
| 0:57.8 | deadline, which we in Washington call the X-state, which sounds very ominous, by the way, |
| 1:02.9 | could fall on June 1st, which is earlier than we thought it could be. |
| 1:08.2 | But still, everything is very uncertain. |
| 1:09.8 | It could still be later. |
| 1:10.8 | We could find out that actually lawmakers have a few weeks, but suffice to say the Biden |
| 1:14.8 | administration has pointed to this new updated deadline as a recent for urgency. |
| 1:21.4 | From the Newsroom of the Washington Post, this is Post Reports. |
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