Two Democrats want McConnell’s 2011 debt-ceiling fix proposal to be adopted

Two Democratic senators called on Congress to adopt a proposal that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) made in 2011 to address a standoff over raising the debt ceiling, which would grant the president the authority to raise the limit on their own. 

Sens. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) and Tim Kaine (D-Va.) said in an op-ed in The Washington Post on Wednesday that McConnell’s plan is simple and took the “weaponization of the debt ceiling off the table” during a battle over raising the debt limit more than a decade ago. 

The plan was included in the Budget Control Act of 2011, which ended an impasse between a Republican-led House with a Democratic-led Senate and then-President Obama. 

“While the broader Budget Control Act had numerous flaws, the McConnell plan itself was a good solution then, and it remains a good solution today,” Merkley and Kaine said. 

They said McConnell’s plan allowed Obama to raise the debt ceiling on his own while allowing Congress to pass a joint resolution to override that action if two-thirds of lawmakers wished to. They said this allowed Congress to continue to have oversight over raising the debt ceiling but prevented it from being used as a political tool. 

Merkley and Kaine said their Protect Our Credit Act of 2023, which they introduced this month along with Sens. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and Chris Coons (D-Del.), would make McConnell’s plan from 2011 permanent. 

Under the legislation, Congress would only be allowed to prevent the president from raising the debt ceiling if two-thirds of members of the House and Senate, a veto-proof majority, opposed it. 

“McConnell had it right in 2011,” Merkley and Kaine said. “A dozen years later, the clock is ticking to protect jobs; interest rates for mortgages, car loans and student loans; and our broader economy from unnecessary and self-inflicted disaster.” 

The Treasury Department began enacting “extraordinary measures” last month to prevent the federal government from defaulting on the national debt, but the limit must be raised by this summer to avoid a default. 

Congressional Republicans have pushed for the Biden administration and Democrats to agree to spending cuts in exchange for voting to raise the debt ceiling. 

The ceiling does not allow the federal government to borrow more money but rather pay for debt it has already incurred. 

Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) has said spending cuts to Social Security and Medicare are “off the table,” but spending for all other programs could be considered. The House GOP has faced pressure to release their official demands for spending cuts in exchange for raising the debt limit. 

Republicans from the House Budget Committee released a list of possible areas that the party could focus on last week, but some other Republicans expressed skepticism over the plan. 

Merkley and Kaine quoted McConnell from 2011 in saying that the country must reassure markets, Social Security recipients and the families of military veterans that default is not a possibility. 

“We could finally end this episodic crisis by putting a stop to using the debt ceiling as a tool for political blackmail,” they said.