Kevin McCarthy, Joe Biden to Clash over Looming Debt Ceiling Deadline

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) urged Democrats on Tuesday to negotiate on a deal that would clear the debt ceiling and slash spending.

“I would like to sit down with all the leaders and especially the president and start having discussions,” McCarthy said.

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said that the debt ceiling would edge towards the debt ceiling on Thursday; however, Yellen said she would take “extraordinary measures” to extend the deadline to June.

McCarthy called for negotiations to start before the federal government gets too close to the June deadline.

The House leader said, “Who wants to put the nation through some type of threat at the last minute with the debt ceiling? Nobody wants to do that.”

President Joe Biden called Republicans “fiscally demented” and the White House has said that they have no plans to negotiate on the debt ceiling, urging Congress to raise the debt ceiling without spending cuts.

“As President Biden has made clear, Congress must deal with the debt limit and must do so without conditions,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said during a press conference on Tuesday.

She added, “But congressional Republicans are threatening to hold the nation’s full faith and credit, a mandate of the Constitution, hostage to their demands to cut Social Security, to cut Medicare and to cut Medicaid — brinksmanship that threatens the global economy.”

McCarthy called for change to “set a budget, set a path to get to a balanced budget and let’s start paying this debt off.”

Speaker McCarthy said that a potential debt ceiling deal could reform entitlement programs such as Social Security and Medicare and discretionary spending.

“Let’s sit down and find a place where we can protect Medicare and Social Security for the future generations, let’s put our house in order in how we are going to spend,” McCarthy explained.