In a last gasp of their fading 60-vote majority, Senate Democrats on Thursday pushed through a record $1.9 trillion increase in the federal debt ceiling, all but assuring Congress won’t face the painful issue again until after November’s elections.
The House is poised to follow quickly next week, and the deal was sealed when Senate Democrats included a statutory pay-go amendment that has been a major priority for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Blue Dog fiscal moderates in her caucus.
Sen. Judd Gregg, the ranking Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, ridiculed the process as “Swiss cheese-go,” given the billions in tax and spending provisions still exempt from the deficit rules. And the New Hampshire Republican angrily accused Democrats of taking the debt issue “off the table” rather than learning from their defeat in last week’s Massachusetts special Senate election.
“The people of this country have a right to know whether or not this Congress is going to do something about controlling the rate of growth in the debt — before the next election,” Gregg said. “The American people don’t believe it ought to be off the table; that’s what Massachusetts was all about. They’re worried about this debt.”
Indeed, Thursday’s power play will be impossible for Democrats to duplicate once Republican Sen.-elect Scott Brown, the Massachusetts victor, takes his seat in early February. With time running out, the White House played a major role in bringing fiscal moderates together around the package. - Politico Story
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