Ahead of a looming deadline, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell on Wednesday offered to raise the debt ceiling temporarily to avoid a default.
In a statement, McConnell said he would support extending the debt limit into December to allow Democrats more time to use a budgetary tactic that would enable them to raise the debt limit without a single GOP vote.
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“The unified Democratic government had two and a half months to address the debt limit through reconciliation,” McConnell wrote. “Instead, they drifted to the doorstep of yet another self-created Democrat crisis. Whether through miscalculation or a deliberate effort to bully their own members into wrecking the Senate, top Democrats have risked adding a default crisis to the inflation crisis, border crisis, and Afghanistan crisis they have already created.”
Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen recently informed Congress it must raise the debt limit by Oct. 18, or the United States would default on its debt for the first time — leading to severe economic consequences.
McConnell and Senate Republicans previously blocked Democratic efforts to raise the debt ceiling, arguing Democrats should do so unilaterally. They cited GOP objections to a sweeping social spending bill still under negotiation among Democrats that makes up a key portion of President Joe Biden’s agenda.
Senate Majority leader Chuck Schumer and Senate Democrats argued that a dip in revenue was caused by tax cuts under former President Donald Trump and that avoiding a debt default should be a bipartisan effort.
Democrats could pass a debt ceiling increase through reconciliation, which would allow them to bypass the 60-vote filibuster threshold. However, they say there is not sufficient time to do so before the looming deadline.
McConnell said Republicans would support either expediting the reconciliation process “for standalone debt limit legislation” or “allow Democrats to use normal procedures to pass an emergency debt limit extension at a fixed dollar amount to cover current spending levels into December.”
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“This will moot Democrats’ excuses about the time crunch they created and give the unified Democratic government more than enough time to pass standalone debt limit legislation through reconciliation,” McConnell said. “Alternatively, if Democrats abandon their efforts to ram through another historically reckless taxing and spending spree that will hurt families and help China, a more traditional bipartisan governing conversation could be possible.”
It was not immediately clear if Senate Democrats would accept either of the options offered by McConnell.
