McConnell’s Option Offers Lawmakers A Punt Position

A procedural move could give lawmakers and the president a way to get the nation’s debt ceiling increased without having to agree to much.
McConnell’s Option Offers Lawmakers A Punt Position
Andrea Hayley
7/18/2011
Updated:
10/1/2015

<a><img src="https://www.theepochtimes.com/assets/uploads/2015/09/119051125_Mitch_McConnel.jpg" alt="DEBT CEILING NEGOTIATING: Senate Minority Leader Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky) (C) walks with Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) (R) as he leaves the Capitol for a meeting at the White House July 14.  (Alex Wong/Getty Images)" title="DEBT CEILING NEGOTIATING: Senate Minority Leader Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky) (C) walks with Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) (R) as he leaves the Capitol for a meeting at the White House July 14.  (Alex Wong/Getty Images)" width="320" class="size-medium wp-image-1800725"/></a>
DEBT CEILING NEGOTIATING: Senate Minority Leader Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky) (C) walks with Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) (R) as he leaves the Capitol for a meeting at the White House July 14.  (Alex Wong/Getty Images)
A procedural move could give lawmakers and the president a way to get the nation’s debt ceiling increased without having to agree to much.

First introduced by Senate leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) last Tuesday, and dismissed as Plan B, the proposal may become the most viable Plan A option available.

At the very least, it will be pursued by the White House and negotiators as a bottom-line or “fail safe” measure that can offer a way for the government to avoid a default on the nation’s debt obligations.

Negotiations have been ongoing for months, and have reached their last leg, with an Aug. 2 deadline looming. Still, legislators have yet to reach agreement on a plan to reduce the deficit, terms agreed to by all parties months ago in exchange for supporting a lift of the debt ceiling.

The current limit of $14.3 trillion will be breached when payments owed to debtors—which include both foreign banks and obligations to citizens for social security checks—exceed what the federal Treasury is authorized by Congress to spend.

McConnell’s measure will result in a transfer of authority from Congress to the president, for handling debt payments. A complicated set of votes would need to get passed—or not passed—in the correct order, for the measure to work.

Starting from the Senate, the president would first get an immediate $100 billion dollar increase to cover the debts. Congress would then have 15 days to block the increase on a simple majority vote—which they would likely do as it gives each lawmaker a chance to go on record against raising the debt limit.

The president would then veto the congressional vote, retaining the right to raise the ceiling. It would then require a two-thirds vote in both chambers to override the veto, which is highly unlikely. The president is then left with full responsibility for the debt ceiling increases.

Under a new legal structure, the president would have the authority to ask for up to $2.5 trillion before his term ends, with $700 billion available in the first few weeks. He can then make another request for $900 billion this fall, and another next year.

The president would also be required to commit to enacting spending cuts equal to each requested increase.

When McConnell presented his plan to the public, he said the procedure was likely to work, but it would make the president look bad.

So far there is little evidence of this, as top Democrats, as well as the White House have responded positively to the proposal.

Senator Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) is working with McConnell on the stop-gap measure. Discussions, phone calls and meetings over the weekend have focused on how to get a deal that all parties could agree to, said White House Press Secretary Jay Carney, in a press briefing Monday.

The president wants to do as much as possible to get a “significant” debt reduction package done, said Carney, but the administration is also “mindful that we are less than two weeks from the need to raise the debt ceiling.”

“We do not have the luxury to pursue one [option] only. We must be sure that there is a mechanism in place to be sure that no matter what happens, the United States would not default,” said Carney.

Steve Bell, senior director with the Economic Policy Project at the Bipartisan Policy Center, said “McConnell is trying to get the Republicans out of a big deep pool that they have dug themselves into.”

In an exceptionally partisan political “mess,” McConnell is really doing something that can be passed by Congress, and that “can impose on Congress right now, real spending restrictions,” Bell said.

“I think it is a very clever maneuver on his part,” said Scott Lilly, senior fellow with the Center for American Progress, a left-leaning institution.

According to Lilly, the Republicans have backed themselves into a corner, with Speaker Boehner unable to gain support of his House for a compromise, while his second-in-command, Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.), rallies newly elected members of Congress to remain resistant.

“Cantor is the spokesperson for a significant group of Republicans who refuse to follow the lead of their speaker,” Lilly said.

When McConnell first offered the procedural move, he suggested it be done as a clean vote, one that would raise the debt ceiling without deficit reduction.

The president said last Friday that Sen. McConnell’s plan solves the problem of the debt ceiling, but fails to reduce the deficit. Since then, discussions have focused on how to craft the fail-safe measure in a way that would include both goals.

Such a solution would begin to reduce the deficit while passing the crucial debt ceiling vote.

Lilly said that since “Congress has demonstrated that until 2012, it cannot be relied on to govern the country, I think that what McConnell is offering is a way to get through that period.”

Reporting on the business of food, food tech, and Silicon Alley, I studied the Humanities as an undergraduate, and obtained a Master of Arts in business journalism from Columbia University. I love covering the people, and the passion, that animates innovation in America. Email me at andrea dot hayley at epochtimes.com
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