Biden Delivers First Oval Office Speech, Praises Debt Ceiling Victory

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By Webdesk


The US president is about to sign a bipartisan agreement to lift the government’s borrowing limit to avert a ‘crisis’.

US President Joe Biden has devoted his first public speech from the Oval Office to celebrating the bipartisan passage of the country’s debt ceiling law, announcing a “crisis averted” from his desk in the White House.

“When I ran for president, I was told that the days of bipartisanship are over and that Democrats and Republicans can no longer work together,” Biden said in his speech on Friday. “But I refused to believe that.”

The speech was a victory lap for Democratic Biden, who last month teamed up with Kevin McCarthy — the Republican speaker of the House of Representatives and his vocal critic — to rig the debt ceiling bill.

The passage of the bill by the Senate on Thursday almost guarantees that the US will not default on its loans. The country was fast approaching a June 5 deadline set by the U.S. Treasury, at which point the federal government would likely run out of money to pay off its debts.

The bill was passed by the House of Representatives earlier Wednesday by a margin of 314 to 117.

“It was critical to get this budget deal approved. The stakes could not have been higher,” Biden explained in his speech.

If we didn’t agree on the budget, extreme voices threatened to make America default on our national debt for the first time in our 247-year history. Nothing, nothing would be more irresponsible. Nothing would have been catastrophic.”

If the US hit the $31.4 trillion debt ceiling — the limit on the federal government’s borrowing powers — experts predicted the economic fallout could trigger a recession.

The US would likely have seen its credit rating fall and interest rates rise, and businesses and individuals dependent on government money could have seen their payments suspended. The White House estimated that a default could have cost 8 million Americans their jobs.

Still, the road to Thursday’s 63-36 Senate vote was fraught with controversy. Far-right Republicans rejected the bill for not imposing strong enough cuts in government discretionary spending — and for failing to sufficiently boost defense funds.

Meanwhile, Democratic party members bemoaned spending caps that are expected to affect Social Safety Net initiatives, as well as increased work requirements for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF).

“Nobody got everything they wanted. But the American people got what they needed,” Biden said Friday, addressing the criticism. “We have averted an economic crisis and economic collapse.”

For his part, McCarthy has called Congressional passage of the debt ceiling bill a “vote for the greatest austerity in American history.” The provisions included conditions to recover funding from the Internal Revenue Service, the U.S. tax collection agency, as well as unused COVID relief money.

The 99-page bill will suspend the debt ceiling until 2025, allowing the government to spend what it needs to cover its costs until then.

Biden announced he plans to sign the bill into law Saturday, two days before the June 5 deadline.



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