White House Says It Won’t Negotiate on Debt Ceiling

Playbook: “It’s a posture rooted in hard-won lessons for Democrats. Brinkmanship during Barack Obama’s presidency upended the financial markets and only encouraged more hostage-taking, the thinking goes. But many Republicans took the opposite lesson — the brinkmanship, after all, resulted in significant curbs on federal spending, even though future Congress voted repeatedly to undermine them.”

“With the debt standoff likely to underpin most every interbranch interaction in the coming months, the question we’re pondering is: How do you hammer out a deal when the two sides can’t even agree on whether there will be any hammering?”

Politico: “Concessions over the debt ceiling were a vital part of the deal that McCarthy negotiated with his 20 conservative holdouts to finally attain the speakership. He agreed that the GOP House wouldn’t move to lift the debt ceiling unless Congress slashes at least $130 billion in federal spending next fiscal year or addresses broader fiscal reforms that tackle the ballooning debt, as many Republicans argue it threatens the nation’s economic security and future.”