Biden, McCarthy speak out to reach debt ceiling deal

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The White House and congressional Republicans raced to seal a deal to avert a U.S. debt default on Saturday as high-stakes negotiations over a bipartisan fiscal pact dragged on into the weekend.

US President Joe Biden and Republican House Speaker Kevin McCarthy spoke by phone on Saturday evening to try to resolve the remaining sticking points, a person familiar with the talks said, after no agreement was reached by the negotiators during the day.

Earlier, McCarthy told reporters that negotiators had made progress in resolving their differences.

“We made progress, we worked well early this morning, and we are there now. Some things we just have to finish,” McCarthy said. “We have to make sure we get a good deal for the American people.”

He nodded that the deal with Biden would involve tough compromises.

“Not everyone will like the end of the deal. . . on both sides,” he said. “Is that all I wanted? No, it has to go through the Senate and be signed by the president. But I strongly believe that people if they sit down and watch this, all over America, they’ll be like, ‘You know what? it is a much better product.

Biden expressed optimism about the talks on Friday evening before departing for Camp David, Maryland’s presidential retreat, where he is following the home stretch of negotiations.

Although the two sides are coalescing around a deal that would raise the debt ceiling for two years and limit government spending over the same period, a person familiar with the talks said Republican demands to attach new demands poverty programs remained a sticking point.

The White House and Congress have until June 5 to enact legislation to raise the country’s debt ceiling to $31.4 billion or the United States will run out of money to pay all its bills, according to the latest estimate from Janet Yellen, the US Treasury Secretary, which was released on Friday.

If no deal is reached, the United States would face a damaging default on its public debt, which could rattle global financial markets, trigger a sharp economic downturn and hurt America’s creditworthiness.

House Republicans pledged to give their lawmakers at least 72 hours to consider the debt ceiling legislation before a vote, after which it would move to the Senate for final passage in Congress.

Republican and Democratic leaders will need to limit the number of defections from their ranks to ensure any deal is approved, with extremists in both parties likely to reject the emerging compromise.

But many lawmakers and the White House will likely see the pact as necessary to avert a much broader, self-inflicted economic and financial meltdown with less than 18 months until the next presidential election.

Shalanda Young, the White House budget director, and Steve Ricchetti, a senior Biden aide, led the talks on behalf of the president, while Patrick McHenry, the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, and Garret Graves , a Louisiana lawmaker, did the same for McCarthy.

The speaker was huddled with McCarthy and Graves at the United States Capitol on Saturday, although they briefly left to buy Mexican Chipotle takeout for lunch.