The Biden administration managed to negotiate a deal with House Republicans that prevented a catastrophic government default on the national debt. The negotiations involved trading proposals on federal spending caps and deep cuts in order to raise the $31.4 trillion borrowing limit. To win substance, the Biden team designed a plan to penalize Republicans’ cherished spending programs if they failed to follow the agreement and forced them to include it in the legislative text codifying the deal. Despite the many side-deals and accounting tricks, the Biden team estimates that the actual cuts could total as little as $136 billion over the two years of the spending caps. While Democrats and progressive groups criticized Biden for negotiating over the debt limit and fueling the Republicans’ ability to ransom it whenever a Democrat is in the White House, Republicans sold the deal as a game-changing blow to Biden’s spending ambitions. Nonetheless, the president was pleased with the vote share in the House and Senate, which surpassed the number of Republicans supporting the deal. Personalities and different opinions marked the negotiations, which occasionally grew profane.
