Did McConnell Blink? Dems Claim Victory on Debt Limit

DC: Senate Republican’s policy luncheon press conference
CNP
By Yuval Rosenberg

Democrats Say They’ll Take McConnell’s Debt Limit Offer

Senate Democrats on Wednesday said they were prepared to accept
an offer from Republican Leader Mitch McConnell of a short-term
increase in the debt ceiling. The deal would delay — but not
completely defuse — a showdown over nation’s borrowing limit,
pushing the deadline for a longer-term increase from the middle of
this month into December.

Democrats portrayed the agreement as a win, if likely a fleeting
one. “In terms of a temporary lifting of the debt ceiling, we view
that as a victory, a temporary victory with more work to do,” Sen.
Tammy Baldwin (D-WI) told CNN.

“Mitch McConnell blinked and it allows us to spend from here
until November focused on finalizing the Build Back Better plan,”
Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE) told CNN. “So I think that's progress.”

“McConnell caved,” said Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), according
to
The Hill. “And now we’re going to spend our time
doing child care, health care and fighting climate change.”

Yet even as Democrats said they were prepared to take
McConnell’s offer, they indicated that the debt limit clashes may
be far from over.

In a
statement released Wednesday afternoon, McConnell made
clear that, while he was offering to raise the debt limit by a
fixed amount to cover spending into December, he still expects
Democrats to go it alone from there. “This will moot Democrats’
excuses about the time crunch they created and give the unified
Democratic government more than enough time to pass standalone debt
limit legislation through reconciliation,” he said.

Democrats continued to insist that they won’t take that path,
which they have rejected as too time-consuming and risky.

Setting up another fiscal cliff: By pushing the debt
limit deadline into December, the deal sets up another major fiscal
cliff, given that an extension of government funding just passed by
Congress is set to expire on December 3.

The politics at play: McConnell’s offer may have been
prompted, at least in part, by Democrats’ talk of carving out

an exception to the filibuster rule for raising
the debt ceiling, allowing an increase with a simple majority vote
rather than requiring 60 votes. President Biden late Tuesday called
that
“a real possibility.”

Biden has sought to put pressure on McConnell over his refusal
to raise the debt limit, and the president met with a group of top
business leaders Wednesday to continue that campaign.

McConnell’s offer requires Democrats to put a number on how much
the debt limit is lifted rather than suspending the limit for a
period of time, as Congress has done recently. Democrats have
preferred a suspension since the fixed number could make its way
into political attack ads.

The bottom line: With the clock ticking toward an October
18 deadline to lift the debt ceiling and avoid a potentially
calamitous default, the tentative deal coming together Wednesday
could represent a breakthrough that keeps the Treasury Department
from running out of money. But disagreements about the details of
the deal and whether Democrats will use reconciliation reportedly
could still scuttle the whole thing — and even if lawmakers
finalize a temporary debt limit increase, they could be back to
brinksmanship within weeks.

Sanders to Manchin, Sinema: What Do You Want?

Senate Budget Committee Chairman Bernie Sanders (I-VT) on
Wednesday had some tough words for two colleagues who are
complicating negotiations over the size and scope of President Joe
Biden’s domestic agenda.

Publicly addressing Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV), who has said he
wants to reduce the plan’s spending total while avoiding any
provisions that would create an "entitlement" society, Sanders told
reporters that it’s time for the West Virginia lawmaker to be more
specific about what he wants.

“Senator Manchin has been extremely critical of the $3.5
trillion proposal that many of us support,” Sanders said. “The time
is long overdue for him to tell us with specificity — not
generalities, but beyond generalities, with specificity — what he
wants and what he does not want, and to explain that to the people
of West Virginia and America.”

Sanders also had words for Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ), who
reportedly opposes some tax increases included in the Biden plan,
but who has avoided publicly stating her concerns and
preferences.

“Sen. Sinema’s position is that she does not negotiate
publicly,” Sanders said. “I don’t know what that means … Don’t know
where she’s coming from.”

For both senators, Sanders said he had a simple request: “Tell
us what you want.”

Manchin affirms limit: Although Manchin recently signaled
that he’s willing to go above his previously stated upper limit for
the size of the plan of $1.5 trillion over 10 years, on Wednesday
he sounded more firmly wed to that cap. “My number has been $1.5.
I've been very clear,” he told reporters.

Manchin also repeated his concerns about the government proving
too many goods and services. “I've been very clear when it comes to
who we are as a society, who we are as a nation. ... I don't
believe that we should turn our society into an entitlement
society. I think we should still be a compassionate, rewarding
society," he said, explaining that the government should focus on
taking care of those who can’t take care of themselves.

Sanders addressed Manchin’s concerns at his press conference,
asking, “Is protecting working families and cutting childhood
poverty an entitlement?” Referring to Democrats’ effort to include
dental, vision and hearing benefits in Medicare, Sanders asked,
“Does Sen. Manchin really believe that seniors are not entitled to
digest their food, and they're not entitled to hear and see
properly? Is that really too much to ask?”

Number of the Day: $1 Billion

The Biden administration announced Wednesday that it would spend
$1 billion on at-home rapid coronavirus tests, with the goal of
quadrupling their availability. Jeffrey Zients, the White House’s
Covid-19 coordinator, said 200 million rapid tests would be
available on a monthly basis by the end of the year.

“The changes reflect the administration’s growing emphasis on
at-home testing as a tool for slowing the spread of Covid-19,” The
New York Times’ Noah Weiland
reports.

Chart of the Day: How the U.S. Lags on Toddler Care

The United States provides far less financial support for
toddler care than other developed nations, writes Claire Cain
Miller at The New York Times:

“The U.S. spends
0.2 percent of its G.D.P. on child care for
children 2 and under — which amounts to about $200 a year for most
families, in the form of a once-a-year tax credit for parents who
pay for care.
“The other wealthy countries in the Organization for
Economic Cooperation and Development spend an average of
0.7 percent of G.D.P. on toddlers, mainly through

heavily subsidized child care.”

On the other hand, Cain Miller notes, the United States
spends more than any OECD country except Luxembourg on elementary
school through college. “We as a society, with public funding,
spend so much less on children before kindergarten than once they
reach kindergarten,” Elizabeth Davis, an economist studying child
care at the University of Minnesota, tells Cain Miller. “And yet
the science of child development shows how very important
investment in the youngest ages are, and we get societal benefits
from those investments.”

The pandemic has highlighted the importance — and economic
value — of child care, and Democrats are looking to provide more
support for younger children as part of their bill to expand the
social safety net, but the details of that bill, and options to cut
costs, are still being negotiated.


Read the full article at The New York Times.

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