While many families in the U.S. were relaxing over the Memorial Day weekend, top negotiators for President Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy were working late into the night to finalize the details of a measure that, if passed, would avoid a historic government default and raise the nation’s debt ceiling.
McCarthy released the outcome of those efforts, 99 pages of legislative text, on Sunday evening, giving House lawmakers 72 hours to review the bill before a planned vote in that chamber. Both Biden and McCarthy say the bill includes necessary trade-offs.
“The agreement prevents the worst possible crisis: a default for the first time in our nation’s history, an economic recession, retirement accounts devastated, millions of jobs lost,” President Biden told reporters Sunday evening, arguing that the compromise preserves a series of Democratic priorities.
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