White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki would not rule out that President Biden could get behind Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell's proposal for a short-term debt ceiling extension.
"We’ll see what the next best options look like," Psaki said when asked if the White House could get behind McConnell's offer for a short-term deal to stave off a U.S. default on its debt.
But Psaki also made clear that the preference of the White House is not a short-term solution.
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"We don't need to kick the can. We don't need to go through a cumbersome process that everyday bring additional risk," Psaki said. "We're at this point because Republicans in Congress blocked efforts by Democrats to raise the debt limit and protect the full faith and credit of the United States despite having voted for it three times during the Trump administration."
The comments come after McConnell on Wednesday offered to suspend the U.S. debt ceiling temporarily until a more permanent solutions could be reached.
"To protect the American people from a near-term Democrat-created crisis, we will also allow Democrats to use normal procedures to pass an emergency debt limit extension at a fixed dollar amount to cover current spending levels into December," McConnell said in a statement on Twitter.
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"This will moot Democrats’ excuses about the time crunch they created and give the unified Democratic government more than enough time to pass standalone debt limit legislation through reconciliation," he added.
The temporary deal could take pressure off of lawmakers who are currently racing against the clock to raise the limit before Oct. 18 deadline, the date the Treasury Department says the U.S. will likely exhaust its ability to pay the government's bills.
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