Majority Leader Schumer Floor Remarks Calling On House Republicans To Show The American People Their Plan And Stop Their Debt Ceiling Brinkmanship
Washington, D.C. – Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) spoke on the Senate floor today on House Republicans still not producing a plan on the debt ceiling after months of brinkmanship. Below are Senator Schumer’s remarks, which can also be viewed here:
House Republicans are starting to see why, they themselves are starting to see why their attempts to threaten default to secure spending cuts was a terrible idea from the start: it’s not only reckless, it’s not only dangerous, it turns out they can’t even follow through on it.
This week, the Chairman of the House Financial Services admitted that he doesn’t “even see a path” to an agreement for lifting the debt ceiling. And at least 16 Republicans have never voted to raise the debt ceiling at all, even under President Trump. That’s true.
But the problem here isn’t that there isn’t a path. Of course there is a path. It’s staring Republicans in the face!
The solution is what we Democrats have said from the start: instead of threatening default, instead of brinkmanship, Republicans should work with us on a clean extension of the debt ceiling. We did it three times under Donald Trump, we have already done it under President Biden, and we should do it again.
If Republicans want to push a separate discussion on the budget, that is their prerogative, and in fact it has been done many times by both parties in the past.
But Republicans would be reckless to take the full faith and credit of the United States hostage in order to force a conversation on the budget, particularly when there's an alternative tried-and-true path that has been used before. Separate debt ceiling and raising the ability of us to pay our debts and discussions on the budget, on taxes and spending, which we always do. It's tying the two together that's reckless.
And so, it is becoming clearer and clearer to Republicans themselves, even those in the House, that the only legitimate path forward is this: let’s have a bipartisan and clean extension of the debt ceiling, as we’ve done many times before, and then Republicans can push a separate discussion on the budget.
Americans have listened to us. A month and a half ago, I started telling the Republican Speaker, show us your plan. President Biden, Hakeem Jeffries, and many others joined in on that call. And it’s resonating from one end of America to the other. Of course, you can’t sit down and discuss something if you don’t have a plan. Speaker McCarthy just says let’s meet. But what are they going to do, discuss the weather? The rearrangement of the furniture? Come on, do it the right way.
You’re beginning to see what we’ve said all along, that the best way to do this is no hostage-taking, no brinkmanship on the debt ceiling. And a strong, avid, and passionate discussion on the spending issues, one separate from the other.
The House Republicans cannot show us their plan, and as we said, they are going to have to.
I predicted, two months ago, a month and a half ago, it’s going to be very hard for them to get 218 votes on any plan. Come on, look in the mirror, see what’s going on, and do it the right way.
Speaker McCarthy, today is March 30th. It has been long enough. You still haven’t come up with a single specific cut that makes any difference in debt that you want to do.
Show us your plan, drop the brinkmanship, and join democrats on a clean extension of the debt ceiling.
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