Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) put negotiations with the White House to avert a debt limit on pause Saturday, saying talks will only continue once President Joe Biden returns from the G7 on Sunday.
McCarthy told reporters while leaving the Capitol with Rep. Garret Graves (R-LA), the chief GOP negotiator, and Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-NC), who chairs the House Financial Services Committee, that the trio lacks confidence with the current direction of negotiations with the president’s team.
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“The White House moved backwards,” McCarthy told reporters. “I think the Bernie Sanders and the socialist wing of their party has had real effect on the president, especially with him being out of the country. I don’t think we’re going to be able to move forward till the president can get back in the country.”
McHenry said there are “no plans” to meet with the White House negotiators on Sunday.
Biden left on Wednesday to attend the G7 Summit in Japan and is scheduled to return to the country on Sunday.
Since he left, a group of Democratic Senators, led by Sen. Sanders (I-VT) and 66 members of the House’s Congressional Progressive Caucus, have urged the president to utilize the 14th Amendment of the Constitution to go around Congress to raise the debt ceiling.
McCarthy said that in negotiations, the team of White House negotiators has expressed they want to “spend more money than we spent this year,” and that is something he can’t agree to.
“We wanted something that could be responsible, sensible,” the Speaker said. “For 97 days, he ignored us, and now, just from the last day till now, they’ve moved backwards.”
When asked if he felt any more confident after spending the day talking among themselves, Graves said, “no.”
“They’re not being realistic,” he added of the White House.
On Friday morning, negotiations were put on pause between Graves and Biden’s negotiating team of Shalanda Young, director of the Office of Management and Budget, and Steve Ricchetti, senior advisor to the president. Young and Ricchettii came back to the Capitol Friday evening to have a “candid discussion” with Graves and McHenry. But after the meeting, the Speaker’s negotiators expressed they were at an impasse and hadn’t been able to come to an agreement.
None of the men would say if they planned to meet one another again on Sunday.
The deadline for the debt ceiling to be raised is June 1, according to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen. This gives the White House and McCarthy less than two weeks to come to an agreement on how to raise the debt ceiling. The Senate is out on recess all of next week.
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In late April, the House passed a bill to raise the debt ceiling while also making spending cuts and caps. This bill has not been considered in the Democratic-controlled Senate, where it would have little chance of passing. Biden, meanwhile, has said he would veto the legislation if it came to his desk.
On Thursday, the conservative House Freedom Caucus released its official position on the debt ceiling, saying “there should be no further discussion until the Senate passes” the House’s debt ceiling bill.
