Debt ceiling deadline looms as stalemate continues in Washington | US news

[ad_1]

3.59pm BST15:59

The Senate will hold the vote scheduled for Wednesday on suspending the debt ceiling

With Republican Leader Mitch McConnell insisting on using stalling to cripple Democrats, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said the Senate will go ahead with Wednesday’s scheduled vote to suspend the debt ceiling.

Tony Romm

Schumer says the Senate plans to hold a scheduled Wednesday vote on suspending the debt ceiling, giving Republican lawmakers a choice to end the “republican-made debt ceiling crisis quickly” or the country could head toward default.

October 5, 2021 Tony Romm (@TonyRomm)

Schumer: “It’s hard to believe that one of America’s two major parties would be willing to threaten our entire economy…just because they don’t like the party that won the election to pursue its agenda to help American families.”

October 5, 2021

3.41 PM GMT 15:41

Joe Biden spent yesterday in virtual meetings with Democratic Progressives, talking about a $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill. White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki has been blunt that the package will be “smaller than originally proposed,” with centrists Joe Manchin and Kirsten Sinema strongly behind the idea that the package was too big, and that meetings would be to prioritize and lower. lines.

Meetings continue today before his trip to Michigan:

Scott Wong (@scottwongDC)

. @POTUS on Zoom Call now with front-line House members after meeting yesterday with progressives on his local agenda.

Biden heads to Michigan later today to sell Build Back Better

October 5, 2021

Updated at 3.43pm GMT

3.23pm BST15:23

The Facebook whistleblower hearing is underway in front of the Senate and our West Coast tech correspondent Carrie Paul will be blogging the proceedings live.

Frances Hogan, a 37-year-old former Facebook employee, came forward on Sunday to accuse the social media giant of putting profits over safety.

Follow here:

3.10 PM GMT 15:10

Stephanie Grisham, former White House press secretary to Donald Trump. Today, CNN admitted that it “may not have been” truthful during its interviews with Fox News and lied on at least one occasion about former White House chief of staff John Kelly, a retired four-star Marine Corps general.

Ali Hedges mother (@AllisonLHedges)

Stephanie Grisham admits lying about John Kelly, calling it one of her “biggest regrets”.

She also says that she “may not have been” honest during her interviews with Fox News. pic.twitter.com/Es1h3a1eod

October 5, 2021

In 2019, Grisham said, “I worked with John Kelly and he was completely unqualified to deal with the genius of our great president.”

Grisham, who is currently on a publicity tour for her tell-all book, I’ll Take Your Questions Now, said Trump told her to say it after Kelly disparaged Trump in some way. “I don’t talk that way,” she said. “He dictated it to me, word for word.”

“At the time, I felt like I was his spokesperson,” Grisham said. “He told me to do it. I knew he might have been sitting there, watching TV, waiting for him. And so I took him out. It’s one of my biggest regrets. I apologized to General Kelly and Mrs. Kelly in the book about it.”

2.54 PM GMT 14:54

Former Vice President Mike Pence went on Fox News to say that the media’s focus on the January 6 attack on the US Capitol – in which a pro-Trump mob chanted “hang Mike Pence” – all distracts from Joe Biden and his attempts to pass his domestic agenda.

“I think all of our focus today should be on the future,” Pence said.

2.45 PM GMT 14:45

Biden travels to Michigan as impasse continues in Washington

Ahoy there, live blog readers. Happy tuesday.

Joe Biden is heading to Michigan today to talk about…yes, what else, the bipartisan infrastructure bill and the Reconciliation bill (aka the Rebuild Better Act).

The $1 trillion infrastructure bill that looks to improve roads, bridges, public transportation and broadband, and the $3.5 trillion settlement bill focusing on “human infrastructure” for social services and environmental measures are the hot topics this week, with the October 18 deadline approaching. . Debt Limit Republicans point to these two bills as evidence that spending by Democrats is out of control.

Republicans have said since July that they will not vote to raise the debt ceiling and that Democrats will have to do it themselves. Stalling, which requires 60 votes to break, is again being used by Republicans, and it has twice impeded Democrats’ efforts to raise the debt limit. They are expected to hamper their efforts on Wednesday as well.

Democrats can raise the ceiling by 51 votes, but they’re already trying to do that with the spending bill and they don’t want to complicate things. They also noted that they voted with Republicans to raise the bar when the Republicans and the Trump administration were expending themselves heavily.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell sent a direct message to Biden yesterday, bypassing Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, repeating how seriously he takes Democrats to do it themselves.

Meanwhile, Democrats continue to dig into the ins and outs of the reconciliation bill, with centrist Senators Joe Manchin and Kirsten Senema pushing to make the package smaller, and progressives struggling to vote on it as they do along with the infrastructure bill so it has a better chance of being voted. transient.

There is much to come, of course.

.

[ad_2]