McCarthy races to sell debt deal amid rumblings of far-right rebellion

Republican congressional leaders and the White House are sprinting to finalize the text of their two-year bipartisan budget deal as they race to sell their parties on the details before an expected vote in the House this week.

Negotiators and staff worked through the night on the legislative text of the agreement, set to be released this afternoon, which would lift the $31.4 trillion debt ceiling through the 2024 election and limit federal spending for the same amount of time. The House is expected to vote Wednesday after members have had 72 hours to review the legislation, teeing up passage in the lower chamber just days before the U.S. could breach its borrowing cap.

Asked about the already simmering discontent among conservatives for the bipartisan deal, Speaker Kevin McCarthy said Sunday that “over 95 percent” of the Republican conference is “overwhelmingly excited about what they see.”

“This is a good strong bill that a majority of Republicans will vote for,” the California Republican told reporters during a briefing outside of his office.

McCarthy and President Joe Biden are set to talk early Sunday afternoon, after which bill text will be released, according to Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries. McCarthy said he also plans to brief Senate Republicans on Sunday. At 5 p.m., administration officials will brief House Democrats.

The two-year budget accord comes eight days before Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen warned that the U.S. will likely run out of cash to pay its bills. Congressional leaders must now embark on a monumental whipping effort to sell their parties on the deal ahead of the June 5 deadline.

Biden will likely need a substantial number of Democrats to back the bill. Several conservatives are decrying the deal as a betrayal of the Republican debt package passed by the House last month.

Both sides were busy selling the framework of the deal on Sunday, putting their spin on its provisions ahead of the text release.

The budget agreement would hike the debt limit through January 2025, teeing up another potential standoff over the nation’s borrowing cap in the months after the presidential election. The deal would keep non-defense funding roughly flat for the fiscal year that begins on Oct. 1 and slightly increase funding for those programs by 1 percent in 2025, a source familiar with the framework said.

McCarthy and his allies contend that non-defense funding would be much closer to the fiscal 2022 levels Republicans had originally sought for the coming fiscal year, however. Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-N.C.), a lead GOP negotiator, said funding for domestic programs would be set at $704 billion for the coming fiscal year, not including funding for veterans, which will see an increase, McHenry said.

Republicans initially demanded $130 billion in cuts to government funding in fiscal 2024, in addition to a decade of strict budget caps. The budget bargain struck by Biden and McCarthy would limit spending for two years, then set non-enforceable funding targets after 2025, according to a source familiar with the deal.

Rep. Garret Graves (R-La.), another top Republican negotiator, and McHenry argued that the budget accord includes six years of enforceable funding limits, however. That includes two years of caps that will constrain funding for the remainder of the 118th Congress and four years of additional restraints that could be undone by future spending agreements.

“For us to draw them down and actually have spending restraints year over year, and within a Congress, is truly transformational and different than what we’ve experienced in recent years in Congress,” McHenry said.

“This is the most conservative spending package in my service in Congress, and this is my tenth term,” he said.

The deal would also cap military funding at Biden’s budget request, at $886 billion, about a 3.5 percent increase. Veterans’ medical care would also match the president’s request, at $121 billion in fiscal 2024.

The Pentagon spending level isn’t sitting well with Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), a Republican appropriator who sits on the Senate defense spending panel.

“I know you can’t get [an agreement that’s] perfect. But what I will not do is adopt the Biden defense budget and call it a success,” Graham said on Fox News Sunday. “Kevin said that the defense is fully funded. If we adopt the Biden defense budget, it increases defense spending below inflation.”

There were rumblings of a revolt against the agreement by House Freedom Caucus members shortly after it was released on Saturday night. While conservatives likely can’t kill the agreement on their own, they can make McCarthy’s life miserable depending on how far they take their displeasure.

“No one claiming to be a conservative could justify a YES vote,” Rep. Bob Good (R-Va.) tweeted Saturday night.

Conservative lawmakers, however, didn’t all come out in opposition. Ohio GOP Reps. Jim Jordan and Warren Davidson, both Freedom Caucus members, liked what they saw of the deal.

The White House will likely struggle to sell Democrats on new work requirements for SNAP, formerly known as food stamps, and federal aid through the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program. In a win for the administration, the budget agreement includes no new work requirements for Medicaid, preserves clean energy tax incentives included in Democrats’ signature climate law last year and won’t touch Biden’s plan to cancel up to $20,000 of student debt for tens of millions of Americans.

The deal does, however, codify Biden’s plan to end the ongoing freeze on monthly student loan payments and interest at the end of the summer, while clawing back a portion of Democrats’ new IRS funding and yanking back billions of dollars in unspent Covid relief.

Jordain Carney and Jennifer Scholtes contributed to this report.