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House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and President Biden are expected to meet Monday afternoon for a face to face meeting on addressing the debt limit — with less than two weeks for lawmakers to pass a bill to avoid an unprecedented default.
The designated negotiators for the two leaders had a series of stops and starts to their talks on Friday through the weekend — all while Biden was attending the G-7 summit in Japan. The president cut the second half of the trip short so he could be back in D.C. for continued negotiations with congressional leaders.
McCarthy said he had a « productive » phone call with Biden on Sunday and that the pair agreed to an in-person meeting the day after Biden returns to D.C. The White House has confirmed the plan for Monday’s meeting.
« I think we can solve some of these problems if he understands what we’re looking at, but I’ve been very clear to him from the very beginning — we have to spend less money than we spent last year, » McCarthy told reporters.
The Biden administration and House Republicans have each doubled down on their own red lines while simultaneously blaming the other side for stymied progress and stressing the need to avoid defaulting on the nation’s debt.
