Biden says he thinks debt limit deal will get done, McCarthy says both sides ‘still far apart’
Clock ticks down to default in 17 DAYS: Biden hints he’s open to tougher labor conditions, while Kevin McCarthy says president doesn’t want to close debt limit ahead of tight White House talks
- “I really think there is a desire on their part as well as us to come to an agreement, and I think we will be able to do that,” an optimistic Biden said on Sunday.
- McCarthy had a different view: ‘I don’t think they want a deal yet’
- “It seems like they want to look like they’re in a meeting, but they’re not talking anything serious”
Just 17 days before June 1, President Biden and Speaker Kevin McCarthy disagree on how they think debt ceiling negotiations are progressing.
“I really think there’s a desire on both their part and ours to get to an agreement, and I think we’re going to be able to do that,” an optimistic Biden told reporters in Delaware on Sunday.
“I stay optimistic because I’m an innate optimist.”
Biden declined to provide details on the status of the talks. “I learned a long time ago, and you know as well as I do, it’s never good to characterize a negotiation in the middle of a negotiation,” he said.
McCarthy characterized the talks as “still far apart.”
“It doesn’t seem like they want a deal yet, it just seems like they want to look like they’re in a meeting, but they’re not talking anything serious,” he told reporters Monday morning.
“I really think there’s a desire on both their part and ours to come to an agreement, and I think we’re going to be able to do that,” an optimistic Biden told reporters in Delaware on Sunday.
“It doesn’t seem to me that they want a deal yet, it just seems like they want to look like they’re in a meeting, but they’re not talking about anything serious,” McCarthy told reporters Monday morning.
“It looks like they would rather have a default than a deal,” the speaker said, adding that they need a deal before “this weekend” to have “a timeline to pass it in both houses.”
Biden and congressional leaders were scheduled to sit down again on Tuesday, after their staff led negotiations over the past week. They were originally supposed to meet on Friday, but those talks were canceled because negotiations at the staff level had not made enough progress.
In a surprising development, Biden showed openness to stricter job requirements for welfare programs, a top priority in the House GOP’s debt limit bill.
Biden said he had voted for the “tougher job requirements” in the past as a senator, but “it’s a different story for Medicaid, so I’ll wait and see what their proposal is exactly.”
The House Republicans’ debt limit bill, the Limit, Save Grow Act, included stricter work requirements for Medicaid, SNAP, and TANF.
Biden also said he planned to attend the G-7 in Japan later this week — a trip he previously said he could participate virtually if debt limit talks force him to stay in Washington.
McCarthy said the president “didn’t take it seriously,” but stopped criticizing him for leaving the country during the negotiations.
The federal government reached its limit of $31.4 trillion in January, prompting the Treasury to take “extraordinary measures” to move money around and buy more time for Congress to work out a deal.
The Treasury now says the country may run out of money to pay its bills by June 1, though the exact date is unknown.
Biden has long pushed for Congress to present him with a “clean” debt ceiling bill and talk about spending cuts after the cap is raised. McCarthy has long maintained that he will not – use the debt ceiling as leverage to demand cuts to the federal budget.
Conversations between staff continued throughout the weekend and Treasury Sec. Janet Yellen said she thought the two sides could reach an agreement.
The president, meanwhile, spent the weekend at his home in Rehoboth and will spend Monday attending his granddaughter Maisy’s graduation from the University of Pennsylvania.