House Republicans threaten to vote against McCarthy’s ‘unacceptable’ debt-ceiling deal with Biden

Many congressional Republicans have slammed the tentative debt ceiling deal House Speaker Kevin McCarthy reached with President Biden — saying they will vote “no” on the measure despite fears of a catastrophic economic collapse.

While McCarthy boasted Sunday that 95% of his fellow GOP members support the deal – which he promised carried a historic amount of spending cut – many conservatives took to Twitter to bash the compromises the California Republican and Biden made as “unacceptable.”

Rep. Ralph Norman, of South Carolina, described the deal as “insanity,” writing: “A $4T debt ceiling increase with virtually no cuts is not what we agreed to. Not gonna vote to bankrupt our country. The American people deserve better.”

Fellow congressman Bob Good, of Virginia, also slammed the proposed $4 trillion increase to the debt limit, tweeting, “IF that is true, I don’t need to hear anything else. No one claiming to be a conservative could justify a YES vote.”

Rep. Ken Buck, of Colorado, said McCarthy’s tentative deal with Biden on Saturday night ultimately gave up what the GOP was looking for in the negotiations.

“I listened to Speaker McCarthy earlier tonight outline the deal with President Biden and I am appalled by the debt ceiling surrender,” he said. “The bottom line is that the U.S. will have $35 trillion of debt in January, 2025. That is completely unacceptable.”

Fellow Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert echoed the outrage, agreeing that she would join Buck and others in voting “no” over the debt ceiling as it stands.  

“Our base didn’t volunteer, door knock and fight so hard to get us the majority for this kind of compromise deal with Joe Biden,” she said. “Our voters deserve better than this. We work for them. You can count me as a NO on this deal. We can do better.”

Over in the Senate, Lindsey Graham, the prominent South Carolina Republican, warned that adopting the budget would be a “joke” given its defense spending.

“I want to raise the debt ceiling, it would be irresponsible not to do it,” Graham told Fox News Sunday. “I want to control spending, I’d like to have a smaller IRS, I’d like to clawback the unused COVID money.

“And I know you can’t get to perfect, but what I will not do is adopt the Biden defense budget and call it a success,” Graham said.

The senator claimed the real winners of the proposed defense budget would be China and Russia, adding that he would not be “intimated,” by the June 5 deadline Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen set to avoid a national default.

“So the Biden defense budget was a joke before and if we adopted it as Republicans will be doing a great disservice to the party of Ronald Reagan,” Graham said. “We should raise the debt ceiling but we should not cripple the military’s ability to defend the nation as a trade off, spending below inflation is not fully funding the military.”

While full details are still under wraps, the deal would raise the debt limit for two years — extending it beyond the 2024 presidential election — in exchange for cutting government spending during the same period.

The agreement would also halt federal spending flat for 2024 and increase it by 1% for 2025.

Congress is expected to have the full bill to review by Wednesday.