All the Debt Ceiling Needs Is a Deal
The two parties should be able to strike a compromise on policy matters, but there is no guarantee Speaker McCarthy would keep his job.
Can’t they just make a deal?
Photographer: Drew Angerer/Getty Images
The odd thing about the debt limit negotiations is that it isn’t hard to imagine a compromise on the big issues separating the two parties.
As part of a deal to raise the borrowing limit, Democrats could offer to accept some Republican cuts in federal spending, coupled with a few other GOP priorities such as changes to the permitting process for energy projects and a deal to rescind unspent Covid relief funds. Republicans wouldn’t get all they want; spending would be trimmed, not slashed, and the big Democratic legislative achievement passed last year, the health-and-climate measure officially known as the Inflation Reduction Act, wouldn’t be repealed.