While President Joe Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy reached a debt-ceiling deal over the holiday weekend, that doesn’t mean it’s now all smooth sailing.
Congress still must give its OK, starting with the Republican-run House of Representatives. Here’s what’s next, as the Treasury Department has called for action by this coming Monday in order to avoid a market-shaking default.
House Rules Committee: The 13-member House Rules Committee plays a key role in the process of approving bills, so all eyes were on its hearing Tuesday afternoon on the bipartisan debt-limit package, called the Fiscal Responsibility Act.
But a key Republican member of the committee, Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky, said during the hearing that he anticipated voting in favor of advancing the debt-limit bill, suggesting that at least seven Republicans would back the measure — enough to move it forward to a full House vote.
UPDATE: The committee approved the bill Tuesday night, on a 7-6 vote.
In explaining his support, Massie said the bill’s “one redeeming portion” is a provision that requires Congress to approve 12 annual spending bills or face a 1% cut.
Massie is one of three Republican lawmakers from the conservative House Freedom Caucus who sit on the rules panel, with McCarthy agreeing to this arrangement in January as he made deals to become the chamber’s leader. Two of those GOP lawmakers had indicated strong opposition to the debt-limit agreement — Rep. Ralph Norman of South Carolina and Rep. Chip Roy of Texas — so Massie’s view was crucial.
The House Rules Committee’s four Democrats also could have voted in favor of advancing it, but a Wall Street Journal report noted that the minority party traditionally doesn’t provide supporting votes in this committee, so needing that would damage McCarthy’s standing.
Roy tweeted on Monday that McCarthy or his deputies promised during his push to become speaker “that nothing would pass Rules Committee without AT LEAST 7 GOP votes — AND that the Committee would not allow reporting out rules without unanimous Republican votes.”
In another sign of the flak that McCarthy is drawing from the Freedom Caucus, another member of the group — Rep. Dan Bishop of North Carolina — indicated during a news conference Tuesday that he would support removing the speaker from his post, though he wouldn’t commit to filing a motion for that.
Vote by full House: A vote by the entire House is expected on Wednesday, as McCarthy has fulfilled his promise to post any bill for 72 hours before lawmakers must record their “yeas” and “nays.”
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, a New York Democrat, told CBS on Sunday that House Republicans are committed to producing at least 150 votes for the Fiscal Responsibility Act. Jeffries also said there will be Democratic support in the House but declined to predict the exact number of votes. If there are 150 GOP votes for the measure, it would need 68 Democratic votes to pass the 435-member House.
The leadership team for the New Democrat Coalition, which has nearly 100 members and ranks as one of the largest Democratic groups in the House, has expressed support for the bill and pledged to “remain in close consultation with our partners in the administration to ensure that this bill gets to President Biden’s desk without unnecessary delay.”
Senate hurdles: Several senators have indicated they don’t plan to let the Fiscal Responsibility Act sail through their Democratic-run chamber.
The office of Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia said in a statement that he plans to push for an amendment that would remove a provision that allows for completion of the Mountain Valley Pipeline, describing that provision as “harmful” and “completely unrelated” to the debt ceiling. The project has been championed by West Virginia Sens. Shelley Moore Capito, a Republican, and Joe Manchin, a Democrat.
Related: Pipeline company’s stock soars 35% on debt-ceiling deal
Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina tweeted Monday that the debt-limit deal is a “disaster for defense,” so he will work to “have amendment votes to undo this catastrophe.”
GOP Sen. Mike Lee of Utah tweeted last Thursday that he will use every procedural tool to “impede a debt-ceiling deal that doesn’t contain substantial spending and budgetary reforms,” adding that he feared “things are moving in that direction.”
But the debt-ceiling bill is still expected to get the Senate’s OK even if it takes days. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, a New York Democrat, and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, have offered praise for the agreement and taken part in negotiations.
“Due to the time it may take to process the legislation in the Senate without cooperation, senators should prepare for potential Friday and weekend votes,” Schumer said in a letter on Sunday.
Meanwhile, McConnell said in a statement: “The Senate must act swiftly and pass this agreement without unnecessary delay.”
U.S. stocks closed mostly higher Tuesday, boosted in part by the debt-limit agreement. The S&P 500 SPX, +0.00% was just fractionally higher, the Nasdaq COMP, +0.32% gained 0.3%, and the Dow DJIA, -0.15% lost 0.2%.
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