Willie R. Tubbs, FISM News
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Sunday, both Republican and Democrat leadership claimed victory in the compromise deal between President Joe Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.).
The deal, which was announced Saturday evening, is set to be voted on by the House on Wednesday. If passed it will come five days before the June 5 deadline that Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen forecast as the earliest day the United States could default on its debts.
“Speaker McCarthy and I reached a bipartisan budget agreement that will prevent the worst possible crisis – a default for the first time in our nation’s history,” Biden tweeted Sunday. “This deal is good news for the American people. I strongly urge Congress to pass the agreement right away.”
The emerging bill will raise the debt ceiling sufficiently to allow the United States to avoid default for the coming two years with built-in spending caps over the same time.
Veterans’ medical care will be funded at the rate Biden requested, and the president’s student debt forgiveness plan was left to the Supreme Court to decide.
Republicans had previously angled to defund the loan forgiveness program but negotiated instead an end to the repayment pause that has been in effect since 2020. Repayment will begin 60 days after Biden signs the deal into law.
“The Fiscal Responsibility Act does what is responsible for our kids, what is possible in divided government, & what is required by our principles,” McCarthy tweeted. “Republican resolve achieved this transformative change to how Washington works.”
The Fiscal Responsibility Act does what is responsible for our kids, what is possible in divided government, & what is required by our principles. Republican resolve achieved this transformative change to how Washington works.
Full bill text is available.https://t.co/trw8wSBqnH
— Kevin McCarthy (@SpeakerMcCarthy) May 28, 2023
Conservatives were able to get additional work requirements attached to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), which was the national replacement for food stamps. The bill would also raise the work requirement age cutoff from 49 to 54, a change that will be in effect through 2030.
Limited energy project permit reform also made the bill as did a provision to recoup unspent COVID funds.
Republicans relented on work requirements for some recipients of Medicaid and, to the chagrin of many hardline conservatives, did not repeal any green energy elements of the Inflation Reduction Act.
The conservative effort to prevent the expansion of the IRS was a mixed result.
Biden agreed to shift $10 billion in funding away from the IRS in both 2024 and 2025, and McCarthy bragged to Fox News on Sunday that the deal would cancel the entirety of a $1.8 billion IRS funding increase in 2023.
However, Biden planned for the IRS to receive some $80 billion combined over 2024 and 2025, so the tax-collection agency still figures to have $60 billion in new money to utilize in the coming two years.
CRITICS LINE UP ON THE RIGHT
It remains unlikely that enough conservative resistance exists to prevent McCarthy and a coalition of Republicans and Democrats from advancing the deal to the Senate, but many on the right have lashed out at the Speaker for agreeing to a deal that does not, strictly speaking, slow the wanton expansion of America’s debt.
Some critics argue McCarthy has agreed to a deal that effectively gives Biden his every wish; that it only delays the administration’s liberal agenda rather than giving them the satisfaction of enacting it immediately.
“The deal adds $4 trillion to the debt, hands away all leverage to the Biden admin for [the] rest of his term, in exchange for freezing/then growing the current woke & weaponized regime, with only 2 yrs of caps designed to fail. Conservatives should fight it with all their might,” Russ Vought, president of the Center for Renewing America, tweeted.
The deal adds $4 trillion to the debt, hands away all leverage to the Biden admin for rest of his term, in exchange for freezing/then growing the current woke & weaponized regime, with only 2 yrs of caps designed to fail. Conservatives should fight it with all their might.
— Russ Vought (@russvought) May 28, 2023
Rep. Dan Bishop (R-N.C.) has referred to the deal as an “utter capitulation” while Rep. Andrew Clyde (R-Ga.) tweeted “Hard pass. Hold the line” on the Limit, Save, Grow Act.
The “Hold the Line” motto was Clyde’s way of showing solidarity with Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas), who on Saturday tweeted the same phrase along with “No swamp deals.”