If a deal isn’t reached, the president will be the biggest loser
With less than two weeks until the United States government essentially runs out of money to pay its bills, a new ABC/WaPo poll finds President Joe Biden with a dismal 36% approval rating, and trailing former President Donald Trump by 6 points in the 2024 race for the White House.
For months, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and his GOP allies have demanded spending cuts in exchange for voting to raise the federal debt ceiling. Biden and congressional Democrats have refused to acquiesce, citing the bipartisan tradition of lifting the country’s borrowing limit without preconditions.
To be sure, Biden’s argument prevails in a vacuum: both parties accrue debt, and thus are equally responsible for ensuring the full faith and credit of the U.S. government. It is regrettable – and dangerous – that House Republicans are using the debt ceiling as a political football, and there is merit to Biden’s claim that McCarthy is “holding the economy hostage.”
That being said, with just days until default, it is simply not feasible for Biden – whose approval rating hit a record-low just after he announced his reelection campaign – to continue digging his heels in. Not only is striking a deal to reduce spending good politics, as most voters actually support many of the House GOP’s proposals; it also makes practical sense, given how high both inflation and interest rates currently are, and the fact that the U.S. is over $31 trillion in debt.
This showdown comes at a time when half (48%) of the country has “almost no confidence” in Biden on the economy, per a Gallup survey, and the majority (60%) also believe the federal government spends too much money, according to AP-NORC polling.
Accordingly, the electorate supports several of the budget cuts Republicans have proposed, as well as McCarthy’s plan to roll these policies into one bill in exchange for raising the debt limit, per the April 2023 Harvard CAPS Harris poll.
