President Joe Biden signed a bill into law on Saturday to avoid a default on the federal government’s debt by raising the debt ceiling.
The bill, known as the Fiscal Responsibility Act, will suspend the debt limit until January 2025 and implement restraints on spending that the Congressional Budget Office estimated would reduce budget deficits by $1.5 trillion over the next decade.
“I just signed into law a bipartisan budget agreement that prevents a first-ever default while reducing the deficit, safeguarding Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, and fulfilling our [sacred] obligation to our veterans,” Biden said on Twitter. “Now, we continue the work of building the strongest economy in the world.”
I just signed into law a bipartisan budget agreement that prevents a first-ever default while reducing the deficit, safeguarding Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, and fulfilling our scared obligation to our veterans.
Now, we continue the work of building the strongest… pic.twitter.com/42HIFBy8Y9— President Biden (@POTUS) June 3, 2023
The bill was hashed out through a deal between House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) and Biden. It passed both the House and the Senate with more Democrat votes in favor than Republican, with some conservative lawmakers saying that it didn’t cut down on spending enough.
In the House, 149 Republicans joined 165 Democrats in voting for the bill, while in the Senate 17 Republicans joined 46 Democrats in supporting the measure.
The bill was supported by leadership in both parties, including Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and McCarthy in the House.
“We prevented a catastrophic default that would have decimated our economy and [inflicted] immense pain on families,” Schumer tweeted. “We preserved the lion’s share of the historic investments we made. We took off the table the worst parts of the MAGA Republican plan that would have hurt families.”
The bill was strongly opposed by many Republican senators, including Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) and Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY).
“I think the Biden-McCarthy debt deal is a disaster for the country. It does not significantly change the trajectory of the debt. Each year we’ll spend more money and the debt will grow $4 trillion in two years. It’s not very conservative,” Paul told reporters this week.
In the House, the bill was opposed by many in the House Freedom Caucus, who took issue with many aspects of the deal, including the provision that punts the debt ceiling into 2025.
McCarthy declared the deal a win for conservatives. “Maybe it doesn’t do everything for everyone, but this is a step in the right direction that no one thought that we would be able to today,” McCarthy said. “I’ll debate this bill with anybody. Is it everything I wanted? No, because we don’t control all of it. But it is the biggest rescission in history. It is the biggest cut Congress has ever voted for in that process.”
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