Biden Signs Temporary Debt Ceiling Hike, Averting Crisis

On Thursday night, President Joe Biden signed a bill to increase the debt limit until December, temporarily preventing a default. 

The bill passed 219-206 the U.S. House on Tuesday. 

“The measure would authorize the Treasury Department to continue paying loans for the country’s $28 trillion in debt,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said on the House floor Tuesday. “The debt ceiling is expected to last until about Dec. 3.”

“Addressing the debt limit is not about future spending, as some have tried to represent. This is about meeting obligations that the government has already incurred, including from the bipartisan COVID relief legislation passed last year. Only three percent of the current debt that we are addressing here has been incurred during the Biden years. Under President Biden: three percent of what we are talking about here,” Pelosi added.

Last week, the bill to temporarily suspend the U.S. debt limit until December passed the Senate 50-48 vote.

The debt crisis surfaced as Biden’s ambitious spending bill faced a deadlocked Congress. By refusing to increase the debt limit, Republicans hoped to stop the Biden administration from passing the $3.5 trillion bill.

Sens. Joe Manchin (D-West Virginia) and Kyrsten Sinema (D-Arizona), two Senate Democratic centrists, now hold keys to the Democratic’s most ambitious bill in generations.

In a 50-50 Senate, the Democrats can’t lose a single vote from their side if they want to pass a bill through budget reconciliation.

Article by Dongyoon Shin