Bipartisan senators work on spending plans while debt ceiling fight plays out in the House
Ryan King
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A bipartisan duo in the Senate is quietly working on spending negotiations while a fight over addressing the debt ceiling plays out in the House.
Senate Appropriations Committee Chairwoman Patty Murray (D-WA) and Vice Chairwoman Susan Collins (R-ME) have been hammering out technical details on spending for the next fiscal year, laying the foundation for an agreement needed to avert a government shutdown in the fall.
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“Chair Murray has been working closely with Vice Chair Collins to return the Senate Appropriations process to regular order: that means hearings, markups, and passing appropriations bills — she has said as much at nearly every Senate Appropriations hearing,” a Murray aide told the Washington Examiner.
Regular order generally refers to the disciplined process of carrying out appropriations bills at the start of each fiscal year via committee work. However, in the past, Congress has been forced to lean on “continuing resolutions,” which preserve the status quo to buy time, due to the heated politics of government spending.
Overshadowing their behind-the-scenes deliberations is the protracted debt ceiling standoff between House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) and President Joe Biden. Neither Murray nor Collins appears eager to wade into that skirmish or take action that could undermine their party’s positions.
“The White House’s refusal to negotiate with the House on the debt limit is delaying work on critical fiscal matters. Now that the House has passed its plan, there is no excuse for the President not to negotiate with Speaker McCarthy. Those discussions should begin without delay,” Collins said in a statement. “In the meantime, the Senate Appropriations Subcommittees continues its aggressive schedule.”
“Sen. Murray believes that Speaker McCarthy should work with Democrats to avoid a catastrophic default and pay our country’s bills as we did three times under Trump,” the Murray aide added. “Both chambers can and should negotiate spending for FY24 as lawmakers do every year.”
Budget negotiations notoriously tend to go down to the last minute and, in the past, have even devolved into government shutdown standoffs.
Last year, McCarthy was frustrated that an omnibus spending package was allowed to clear the Senate as he had hoped to use that as leverage to win spending concessions from Democrats. With that option gone, McCarthy has opted to use the debt ceiling as leverage.
Spending cuts have been a red line for Biden and a mandate for McCarthy. Neither side appears willing to blink, with Biden demanding a clean bill and McCarthy vowing not to advance legislation without spending cuts. The United States hit its $31.4 trillion limit on its borrowing authority back in January.
After months of sparring in public with the president but not releasing a plan of his own, McCarthy revealed the requirements Republicans were asking for if they were to agree to raise the debt ceiling.
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On Wednesday, the House passed the McCarthy-championed “Limit, Save, Grow” plan to lift the debt ceiling by $1.5 trillion or until March 31, 2024, whichever comes first. One iteration of the plan was estimated to slash the national deficit by $4.8 trillion over the next decade.
The Treasury Department has been deploying “extraordinary measures,” but that is expected to run out between June and August, according to various estimates. Should those measures run dry without an agreement, the United States could run the risk of default.