President Joe Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) will speak by phone on Sunday morning amid a stalemate in debt limit negotiations, the White House said Saturday.
McCarthy put negotiations with the White House to avert a debt default on pause Saturday, saying talks will only continue once Biden returns from the G7 on Sunday. The House speaker accused Biden’s negotiators of moving “backwards,” while the White House called the GOP team’s latest offer of being a “big step back” that would not reasonably pass the Senate. McCarthy requested a call with the president late Saturday for Sunday morning, which the White House confirmed would be set up for after Biden’s morning G7 meetings.
WHITE HOUSE STILL ‘WORKING HARD’ AS DEBT LIMIT NEGOTIATIONS WITH GOP BREAK DOWN
“President Biden has continued to closely track negotiations on a bipartisan budget framework and the pressing need for Congress to act to avert default,” a White House statement released late Saturday evening read. “He received an update from his team both last night and this morning on the status of negotiations.”
The president is currently convening with world leaders at the Group of Seven meeting in Japan. He canceled planned visits to Australia Papua New Guinea, scheduled for after the G7, so he could return to address the debt ceiling matter.
The debt ceiling, or the top amount the federal government can borrow, will either need to be raised or abolished sometime next month to avert a default. Economists have long warned that such a default would wreak havoc on the economy. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen says the United States will be unable to pay its bills by June 1.
Biden and top administration officials have expressed confidence throughout their five days in Hiroshima that negotiators will be able to hash out a deal to avert a debt default. That hasn’t stopped the issue from being a significant distraction during the summit.
“It is definitely a subject of interest here at the G7,” National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan admitted Saturday of the debt ceiling negotiations in Washington.
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McCarthy was able to hold enough of the House Republican Conference together to pass his debt ceiling budget proposal late last month. Backed up by Senate Democrats, Biden stood firm in his refusal to negotiate over the debt limit for months. The White House has decried the GOP bill as an attempt at political “hostage-taking” and vowed that Biden would veto it if it reached his desk, though the likelihood of such legislation passing the Democratically-controlled Senate is slim.
Negotiations picked up in recent weeks as the deadline approached, though no deal has been reached. Both sides continue to argue over spending caps that Democrats call too severe and Republicans argue don’t go far enough.
