Speaker McCarthy held an all-GOP Member conference call earlier this afternoon to preview his speech on a “Responsible Debt Ceiling Increase” tomorrow morning at the New York Stock Exchange.
House Republican Leadership is expected to go into more granular detail on a potential debt limit proposal with their Members at Tuesday’s 9am GOP Conference meeting.
The Leadership debt limit proposal is in draft form, but is likely to consist of the following (with unresolved items TBD):
- FY24 non-Defense discretionary spending returned to FY22 level and growth capped at 1% per year for next 10 years
- Rescind unspent COVID relief funds
- Work requirements for able-bodied Medicaid recipients aged 60 or under without dependent children
- Regulatory reform (e.g., REINS Act)
- Enact H.R. 1, the Lower Energy Costs Act
- TBD: Reverse Biden student loan forgiveness program
- TBD: Strengthened work requirements for SNAP recipients
- TBD: Repeal Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) green energy tax credits
- TBD: Duration or dollar amount increase (likely one year)
Leadership’s proposal-in-progress is the result of over two months’ worth of internal House Republican Member meetings led by the Speaker’s designee, Rep. Garret Graves. The proposal notably includes nearly all items that have been put forward by the “five families” of House Republicans (i.e., House Freedom Caucus, Main Street, Problem Solvers Caucus, Republican Governance Group, and Republican Study Committee).
What form the final proposal ends up taking depends on Leadership’s ability to get to 218 votes. As previewed in our Legislative Update last Thursday, House Republicans will be spending much of the upcoming two week work period seeking internal consensus on a path forward with the hopes of having a bill ready for the floor in May.