As the White House and Congress drag out negotiations over how to address the debt ceiling crisis, voters are split on whether lawmakers should raise the debt limit as the threat of a possible default looms.
Just over half of voters (52%) said they support raising the debt ceiling to avoid defaulting on loans, compared to 46% who opposed such a move, according to a recent NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll. Support for raising the debt ceiling has significantly increased from when only 24% of voters said lawmakers should do so in 2011, which was the last time Congress faced a similar crisis.
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The increase in support was seen across the political spectrum, the poll showed. About 79% of Democrats said they’d support raising the debt ceiling compared to just 36% in 2011, and 26% of Republicans said the same compared to 16% a decade ago.
Support among independents also increased over the last 12 years, with 47% saying they’d support a debt limit raise compared to just 22% in 2011, according to the poll.
The United States hit its debt ceiling on Jan. 19, raising fears of a default. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said her agency would take “extraordinary measures” to prevent the U.S. from defaulting on its obligations, but the department will only have a few months before those measures are exhausted.
House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) first met with President Joe Biden last month to begin negotiations on the debt ceiling. However, that meeting ended without a binding agreement as the White House remains adamant it will not discuss federal spending until the borrowing limit is lifted.
Meanwhile, McCarthy has drawn his own line, that spending cuts are required, but beyond that, his party is split over which programs to ax or pare back. The stalled negotiations put McCarthy in a difficult position, giving him his first major leadership test since taking the helm of speaker in January.
A majority of voters (70%) said members of both parties should come together to find a compromise on the debt ceiling crisis, compared to just 28% who said the opposite, according to the poll.
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However, voters are split on whether Congress should cut programs to address the crisis (50%) or raise taxes to help cover the cost (47%), the poll showed. McCarthy has vowed not to raise taxes as part of his solution, but the speaker has also become wary of proposing program cuts to avoid opening his party up to attacks in the 2024 election cycle.
The NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll surveyed 1,352 registered voters between Feb. 13-16 and has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.3 percentage points.
