It’s been more than two weeks since the Republican-run House of Representatives passed a bill that would raise the debt ceiling, and still President Biden has not managed to adapt to that news. Here’s Biden yesterday afternoon:
Reminder: Under the previous president, Republicans voted to increase the debt limit three times.
Three times.
— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) May 10, 2023
As a rhetorical ploy, this makes no sense. On April 26 — while Joe Biden was president — Republicans did exactly what Biden is implying that they are refusing to do. Here’s CNN on that topic:
The House voted Wednesday to pass a bill raising the nation’s debt ceiling, after days of wrangling Republican lawmakers to unify behind the package, which would bolster House Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s position at the negotiating table with the White House.
The final vote was 217-215, with four Republicans – Ken Buck of Colorado, Andy Biggs of Arizona, Tim Burchett of Tennessee and Matt Gaetz of Florida – voting against the bill. McCarthy could only lose four votes and prevail on the vote.
The measure is dead on arrival in the Democratic-led Senate, but is primarily aimed at boosting Republicans’ efforts to negotiate with Democrats as the country approaches its default deadline as soon as this summer.
As CNN notes, it is the Democratic-run Senate that has neither passed its own bill nor agreed to the one the Republicans passed in the House. The Republicans have done their bit. If the Senate and the president were to accept the Republicans’ bill as is, the debt limit would be raised.
What Biden mean is that he doesn’t like the Republicans’ bill because it does all sorts of other things that he opposes. In and of itself, that is fine. But, if that’s Biden’s objection, he should say so. It is simply not true that the Republicans have not voted to raise the debt limit. They have. And Biden, who didn’t expect them to, is proving unable to adjust to that fact.