Biden Administration ‘Nervous’ About McCarthy’s Debt Ceiling Success

Officials within the Biden administration are reportedly “nervous” about Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy’s success in passing a debt ceiling bill through the House after President Joe Biden repeatedly refused to negotiate with the Republican speaker.

On Wednesday, McCarthy succeeded in passing the Limit, Save, Grow Act through the House with zero Democrats supporting it.

While Biden and the Democrats want to raise the debt ceiling much higher and refuse to agree to any spending cuts, the Republican bill would lift the debt ceiling through early 2024 while also saving the federal government roughly $4.8 trillion over the next ten years.

Meanwhile, Politico reports that Biden was caught off guard and White House officials are “nervous” about the success.

While Democrats have claimed in several public statements that they are winning the messaging war over increasing the debt ceiling, Politico reports that they have “private concerns over how this all ultimately ends — and what damage the standoff may do to a fragile, recovering economy that’s critical to Biden’s case for re-election.”

“In the aftermath of the vote, Biden allies and advisers privately acknowledged that there’s no clear endgame to the debt ceiling standoff — and that McCarthy’s victory makes it more difficult to convince moderate Republicans to back a clean debt ceiling increase for fear of economic disaster,” the report continued.

White House officials “remain nervous about how and when the standoff will end,” Politico added.

Of course, the pro-Biden outlet later changed its headline to shine more favorably on the president, rewording it by removing mention of the White House being surprised by McCarthy’s victory.

McCarthy’s communications director Mark Bednar pointed out the headline change in a tweet, sharing screenshots of the new, favorable edit.

Politico first ran its story with the following headline: “White House regroups after McCarthy’s debt ceiling success stuns them.”

The headline was later changed to: “White House regroups after McCarthy’s debt ceiling success.”

“When Politico removes ‘stuns them’ from their headline about House Republicans’ debt limit bill because no one can know the Biden White House would ever be caught off guard,” Bednar commented.