Yellen Says ‘We Have to Default’ on Something If Congress Fails
- Treasury chief says the focus now is on talks with Congress
- Yellen refrains from pledging to maintain debt servicing
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Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said that the federal government will have to renege on some payments if Congress doesn’t raise the debt limit, though no plan on how the department would proceed has yet been presented to President Joe Biden.
“If Congress fails to do that, it really impairs our credit rating. We have to default on some obligation, whether it’s Treasuries or payments to Social Security recipients,” Yellen said Friday in an interview with Bloomberg Television. “That’s something America hasn’t done since 1789. And we shouldn’t start now. So we’ve not discussed what to do.”