In introducing a bill to temporarily suspend the debt ceiling, House Republican leaders are showing great confidence that a majority of their 233 members will back it.
A failure to do so would be extremely embarrassing for the leadership, which failed to garner a majority of its conference for the fiscal-cliff bill earlier this month.
The debt limit bill would suspend the $16.4 trillion ceiling until May 19. That level already has been reached, and the Treasury Department has said it may run out of ways to keep paying some of its bills by mid-February.
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The proposal requires both chambers of Congress to pass a budget by April 15. If they don’t, congressmen don’t get paid. To be sure, that part of the bill may be unconstitutional, Lou Fisher, a retired constitutional law expert, told The Wall Street Journal. That’s because the Constitution prohibits Congress from "varying" its own pay – to prevent congressmen from giving themselves raises.
As for the bill as a whole, the White House supports it. President Barack Obama’s press secretary Jay Carney called it “significant” and “certainly something we welcome.”
The idea of the legislation is to allow three months for the White House and Congress to agree on fiscal policy, avoiding the dreaded automatic spending cuts (sequestration) that are set for March.
The bill has the support of all three top House leaders – speaker John Boehner, Majority Leader Eric Cantor, and Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy – and some of the GOP’s most conservative House members.
The fact that the bill merely suspends the debt limit rather than permanently increasing it may be crucial to attracting conservative support. “House Republicans seem to think that a vote to suspend the debt limit is less toxic to conservatives than a vote to raise the limit,” Sarah Binder, a George Washington University political scientist, told The Washington Post.
A suspension also means congressmen don’t have to a commit to a specific dollar increase, as they would with a permanent hike.
To California GOP Rep. Darrell Issa, chairman of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee, the bill is a matter of financial obligation. “I think it’s always been a good idea to realize that when we write a check, we should cover it,” he told Politico. “And we write a check when we pass a budget. We write a check when we appropriate.”
House Democrats have indicated they won’t support the bill.
“Frankly, I think one of the things the Republicans are looking at now, and one of the reasons they’ve moved on the debt (not very far) . . . is that they are hearing the American public say we don’t like the opposition for opposition’s sake,” House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer told Politico. “I think it’s a tactical change, not a substantive change. . . . We need to get to compromise.”
The legislation will likely pass the Democratic-controlled Senate if the House approves it without any further conditions, a Senate Democratic leadership aide told The Journal.
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As for conservative interest groups, their strategy is mixed on the bill. “The Club for Growth will not oppose tomorrow’s vote on the debt ceiling,” Club President Chris Chocola said in a statement. Note that he didn’t offer support either.
FreedomWorks does oppose the measure. “Once again, Republican leadership is negotiating with itself to temporarily bail the big spenders out by lifting the U.S. debt limit for four months, with no immediate accompanying budget reforms or spending reductions,” the group’s legislative counsel Dean Clancy said in a statement.
Rep. David Schweikert, R-Ariz., says House GOP leaders will now have to prove the wisdom of their strategy. “In many ways, in 90 days this is going to be the ultimate test of the relevancy of those we entrust with those leadership positions,” he told The Hill. “I believe there’d be hell to pay if they squander this.” Schweikert is leaning in favor of the bill.
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