House Republicans on Wednesday showed themselves to be unserious about resolving the debt ceiling crisis, and now they’re offering up two plans, both of which risk plunging the global economy into catastrophe, MSNBC Opinion Writer/Editor Hayes Brown writes.
Brown notes that the budget House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R) pushed across the finish line Wednesday by the narrowest of margins calls for a $1.5 trillion debt ceiling raise that wouldn’t even pay the nation’s bills for a full year, meaning lawmakers would be relitigating the same problem that they are today.
But the budget plan Republicans passed is all but certainly going nowhere with Democrats in control of the Senate and the White House. Brown believes that Congress should eliminate the debt ceiling.
“Instead,” Brown writes, “the GOP seems to be pursuing one of two strategies these days, neither of them sensible.”
The first strategy is to play a game of political chicken, hoping Democrats capitulate and accept the terms of the Republican budget plan.
“No, these antics won’t balance the budget or anything, but if this current hostage-taking works, it will set a precedent for further spending cuts next year once the ceiling is hit again,” Brown writes.
“This is a gamble, to say the least, given that there’s little chance that Republicans stay united should the contents of Wednesday’s bill be changed during negotiations.”
The other option, which Brown describes as “even more bonkers,” is to allow the debt ceiling to be breached, an approach former Trump official Rush Vought advocates for.
Proponents of this plan think breaching the debt ceiling wouldn’t be as consequential as most experts believe.
“And besides, say the economists advocating for Republicans to hold firm, the effect of more debt and spending will be significantly worse than the U.S. not making honoring its debts,” Brown writes.
“That stance also assumes that the most important payments will be prioritized, despite officials saying that it’d be almost impossible to sort through all the payments that the government makes each day. It also assumes that the global economy wouldn’t nosedive at the sight of America struggling to pay its debtors.”
