WASHINGTON – Should Republicans get their way in debt limit negotiations, about 17,000 elderly Louisiana residents would lose food stamps, the Biden White House estimated this week.
Another 12,800 Louisiana families would lose rental assistance. More than 111,000 of the state’s veterans, meanwhile, would lose access to outpatient doctor’s visits. Five Air Traffic Control towers would close, and the state’s public schools would lose out $86 million.
That’s the real-world impact, the White House claimed, of a Republican proposal to cut federal spending by $4.8 trillion over the next decade. If Biden backs that plan – which is unlikely – Republicans would agree to raise the $31 trillion debt limit by $1.5 trillion through March 2024, they have said.
The White House released the figures a day before GOP leaders were set to meet with the president to discuss the debt limit crisis. Biden, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif.; Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Kentucky; Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.; and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., all met in the White House Tuesday afternoon.
The clock is quickly counting down to the point the nation will be unable to pay the bills Congress already has agreed to incur, which could come as early as June 1. If Congress fails to raise the amount of money the Treasury Department can borrow, the nation will default on its debt for the first time in history, plunging the world into recession.
McCarthy has said the GOP bill is more about getting President Joe Biden to negotiate. Biden wants Congress to raise the debt ceiling without conditions before he debates spending, but Republicans contend spending, inflation, interest rates, and debt are all linked.
The GOP bill also would leave Internal Revenue Service vacancies unfilled; eliminate some clean energy tax credits; negate the loan forgiveness program for college students; require more work from Medicaid recipients; and make other unspecified spending cuts.
House Majority Leader Steve Scalise pushed back Tuesday on the idea that Republicans were out to cut major programs.
“Nowhere in the bill does it have funding cuts to veterans’ benefits, teachers in classrooms, or SNAP benefits to the elderly,” Scalise said Tuesday. “Even if President Biden tries to cut veterans’ benefits as part of a debt ceiling agreement, as Majority Leader I won’t bring that bill to the House floor.”
The House Appropriations Committee decides how and where federal money is to be spent. Only after such spending plans are approved in both chambers and signed into law by the president would the cuts described by the administration take place.
U.S. Rep. Garret Graves, the Baton Rouge Republican who led the team that put together the House legislation, said it appears the White House sifted through programs and found ones most likely to gin up public outrage. He said the legislation carefully pointed to facets that have bipartisan support.
Graves described the White House estimates as political theater on the eve of the first negotiations on the debt ceiling since February. So too, did U.S. Rep. Mike Johnson slam the White House’s release as a “masterclass in misinformation.”
“Rather than engage in good faith negotiations with House Republicans – as he did multiple times as a US Senator and Vice President – President Biden has shamelessly and inaccurately used our veterans and seniors as pawns in an effort to distort the debate,” said Johnson, the Benton Republican who ranks fifth on the House leadership chart.
The White House, meanwhile, said it identified the 29 largest federal grant programs most likely to be impacted by a roughly 22% reduction for non-defense discretionary accounts that is the percentage of spending Republicans recommend be removed from the budget.
It’s unclear just how much Republicans, who hold a bare House majority of 222-213, are willing to bend in the negotiations. If McCarthy considers a solution that seems too moderate to the House’s hardline conservatives, it could lead to his ouster from the top spot.
Rep. Troy Carter, the only Democrat in the state’s congressional delegation points out that Congress has worked to prevent default 78 times since 1960.
“House Republicans are threatening to wreck our economy unless they can force cruel cuts that hurt families in LA-02,” Carter said, referring to his district that stretches up the Mississippi River from New Orleans East to north Baton Rouge. “Democrats are ready to act now to prevent a default on our debt, continue our historic deficit reduction, and responsibly invest in America to lower costs and create better paying jobs.”
Republican Rep. Julia Letlow, of Start, said Tuesday: “It is crucial that we put aside partisan differences and work together in the best interest of the American people. Future generations are depending on it.”
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