In a move that has stunned Washington, President-elect Donald Trump is now urging Congress to eliminate the debt ceiling, dramatically shaking up talks among lawmakers, who are at an impasse over federal spending and government funding, which is scheduled to lapse this weekend.
While some on Capitol Hill have balked at Trump’s latest demand, the president-elect was unwavering on Thursday. He said he is determined to hold his position that lawmakers should both oppose any sweeping spending measure that includes “traps” from Democrats and abolish the debt limit before he takes office next year.
“Number one, the debt ceiling should be thrown out entirely,” Trump said in a phone interview. “Number two, a lot of the different things they thought they’d receive [in a recently proposed spending deal] are now going to be thrown out, 100%. And we’ll see what happens. We’ll see whether or not we have a closure during the Biden administration. But if it’s going to take place, it’s going to take place during Biden, not during Trump.”
Trump’s comments, which have sent negotiators in both parties back to the drawing board ahead of the expiration of government funding at 12:01 a.m. on Saturday, came a day after he called a bipartisan spending deal “ridiculous and extraordinarily expensive” and said that any legislation to extend the federal government’s funding should also include plans for “terminating or extending” the debt limit.
Still, Trump, who built a decades-long business career as a negotiator and dealmaker, appeared to leave room for House Speaker Mike Johnson and other top Republicans to find consensus on new options that he would find sufficient.
When asked how he would like to see this standoff end, Trump replied, “It’s going to end in a number of ways that would be very good.”
Trump said the discussions are ongoing and it is too soon for him to spell out more details on what the contours of a final agreement should be.
“We’ll see,” Trump said. “It’s too early.”
But Trump said he will continue to closely track how Democrats might seek to influence any revised deal and voiced displeasure at how the initial bipartisan deal had Democratic provisions.
“We caught them trying to lay traps. And I wasn’t going to stand for it,” he said. “There are not going to be any traps by the radical left, crazy Democrats.”
Tesla CEO Elon Musk, a billionaire who spent almost $300 million to back Trump and other Republican candidates in the November elections, also opposed the initial bipartisan spending deal, which he called “terrible.” When Johnson scrapped it, Musk wrote on X, “The voice of the people has triumphed!”
Trump’s focus on the debt ceiling, which caps the federal government’s borrowing authority, comes as he faces a showdown over the issue during the first year of his upcoming term. That prospect, several people close to Trump say, has drawn his attention because he wants to spend his time and political capital next year on other issues and would prefer Congress addresses it now.
While the current cap on federal borrowing is suspended until Jan. 1, 2025, the Treasury Department would be able to take steps to avoid default for a few months into next year. Nevertheless, the government could face an economically fraught default sometime early next year should the debt ceiling not be extended or addressed by Congress.
When asked Thursday about Trump’s call to address the debt limit, Rep. Hakeem Jeffries of New York, the House Democratic leader, said, “the debt-limit issue and discussion is premature at best.”
