Initial $5.9B aid package to be paired with debt-ceiling hike
Initial $5.9B help package expected to do double duty.
The White House asked Congress on Friday for a $5.9 billion down payment for initial Harvey recovery efforts, and Republican leaders were making plans to use the aid package certain to be overwhelmingly popular to win speedy approval of a contentious increase in the federal borrowing limit.
A senior House Republican, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the deliberations were private, disclosed the approach. It ignores objections from House conservatives who are insisting that disaster money for Harvey should not be paired with the debt limit increase.
Other senior GOP aides cautioned that no final decision had been made, and Democrats, whose votes would be needed in the Senate, have not signed off on the approach.
For GOP lawmakers who support a straightforward increase in the debt limit, pairing it with Harvey money makes the unpopular vote easier to cast. Congress must act by Sept. 29 to increase the United States’ $19.9 trillion debt limit in order to permit the government to continue borrowing money to pay bills like Social Security and interest payments. Failing to raise the debt limit would risk a market-shattering, first-ever U.S. default.
“Look, some members are going to vote against the debt ceiling under any circumstances and they want their ‘no’ vote to be as easy as possible,” said Rep. Charlie Dent, R-Pa. “The issue is not making the debt ceiling vote easier for the ‘no’ votes. The issue is making it easier for the ‘yes’ votes.”
The government’s cash reserves are running low because the nation’s debt limit has actually already been reached, and the Treasury Department is using various accounting measures to cover expenses. Billions of dollars in Harvey aid are an unexpected cost that at least raises the potential that Congress will have to act earlier than expected to increase the government’s borrowing authority.
The initial package of Harvey aid would replenish Federal Emergency Management Agency disaster coffers through Sept. 30. A senior congressional aide said Friday that the request includes $5.5 billion for the disaster relief fund and $450 million for the Small Business Administration Disaster Loan Program.
The initial aid money would be a down payment for immediate recovery efforts, to be followed by larger packages later.
An additional $5 billion to $8 billion for Harvey could be tucked into a catch-all spending bill Congress must pass in the coming weeks to fund the government past Sept. 30, according to the senior House Republican.
House Speaker Paul Ryan said nothing will stop a Harvey aid bill from getting through Congress and that he didn’t foresee any problems with it passing.
“It’s going to take us time until we know the full scope of it,” Ryan said of Harvey’s toll. He said a storm the size of Harvey is unprecedented, and because of that it “deserves and requires federal response.”