Democrats are taking a victory lap after the Republican-controlled House of Representatives passed a poorly negotiated bill on Wednesday raising the U.S. debt ceiling into early 2025.
Negotiated behind closed doors by House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., and the Biden administration, the wrongly-named “Fiscal Responsibility Act” would permit the federal government “to take on unlimited debt through January 1, 2025,” according to The Daily Caller. Wednesday’s final House vote was 314-117, with more Democrats supporting the measure (165) than Republicans (149). Members of the House Freedom Caucus were among those to overwhelmingly oppose the bill.
Republicans who opposed the measure, such as Texas Rep. Chip Roy, have estimated the bill will allow the federal government to take on roughly $4 trillion in debt by the January 2025 deadline. Meanwhile, the “Limit, Save, Grow Act,” which was passed by House Republicans in April, sought to raise the debt ceiling by an estimated $1.5 trillion through March 2024.
The small cuts to federal spending in the Fiscal Responsibility Act include a clawback of $28 billion in unspent Covid funds and a $1.4 billion reduction in the IRS’s $80 billion funding provided by Democrats’ dishonestly-named “Inflation Reduction Act.” While not included in the bill, McCarthy and President Joe Biden purportedly agreed to a deal that would repurpose $20 billion in IRS funding over the next two years. Notably, the debt ceiling bill does not include any provisions related to U.S. border security.
While McCarthy has been marketing the legislation as the greatest thing since sliced bread, Democrats’ reaction to it shows the measure isn’t the win McCarthy and House GOP leadership are making it out to be. Before the bill even passed, left-wing propaganda outlets like The Daily Beast were running articles cautioning Democrats to “restrain themselves from gloating about the debt limit deal. At least not until [it] actually passes.”
“Don’t gloat. Don’t brand the compromise legislation as a win. Don’t brag about the spending cuts and policy changes Republicans failed to squeeze in,” Beast writers Ursula Perano and Sam Brodey advised with bated breath.
Bharat Ramamurti, who serves as Biden’s economic adviser, also championed the “bipartisan” deal during a recent CNN interview, saying the proposed bill “helps preserve … an incredibly strong set of progressive accomplishments over the last two and a half years.”
Meanwhile, Rep. Brad Sherman, D-Calif., perfectly summarized how Democrats feel about the measure, reportedly remarking after its passage Wednesday, “Now we are allowed to say it: we rolled them.”
