Fund the military, avoid default and government paralysis: US parliamentarians are back in Washington before the holidays with a hectic agenda, which promises epic political battles on Capitol Hill.
Congress has by Friday to agree on a new budget if it wants to avoid the paralysis of federal services, dubbed “shutdown”.
If the elected officials do not come to an agreement before this date, the funding of the federal state will suddenly be cut.
Ministries but also national parks, certain museums and a multitude of organizations would be affected, forcing hundreds of thousands of employees on technical unemployment.
Anxious not to spoil the holidays for all these Americans, parliamentarians could decide to vote in the middle of the week a temporary law of a few days in order to extend the deadline for a broad agreement on the 2022 Budget.
It’s urgent.
– Political pressure –
Because at the same time, another equally crucial mission falls to the elected representatives of Congress: they must raise the debt capacity of the United States by December 15 if they want to avoid the first sovereign default of the world’s largest economic power. .
If the debt ceiling is not suspended or raised by that date, the United States could run out of money, a situation with potentially catastrophic consequences that Wall Street and the rest of the global economy are watching. from close.
The United States, which like almost all major economies have been living on credit for decades in terms of public spending, have already repeatedly raised this famous “ceiling”.
But the Republicans began during the Obama presidency to use this routine legislative procedure as an instrument of political pressure.
This time they refuse to give the green light to a suspension of the debt limit, which they believe would amount to writing a blank check to Joe Biden.
And urge Democrats to approve it alone, through laborious parliamentary maneuver, accusing Democrats of contributing to record inflation that Americans are very sensitive to during Christmas shopping.
– No gift –
Democrats are refusing for the moment to rush into this breach, but time is running out. Because in addition to these projects, elected officials must also agree on a separate budget on defense. Here again, the Republicans do not intend to give the Democrats a freebie.
If parliamentarians manage to tick all the boxes of these bulky specifications in time, the Senate will finally be able to look at the gigantic social and ecological aspect of Joe Biden, which the White House is impatiently awaiting.
She is counting on this bill of 1.750 billion dollars, which notably provides for nursery school for all and a profound improvement in health coverage, to give new impetus to the presidency of the septuagenarian.
Joe Biden, whose popularity is plummeting, hopes to savor this gift just in time for the holidays.
–
