Right now, the Senate racing
to pass a crucial debt ceiling bill.
That bipartisan deal cleared the House
last night.
That, of course, after months
of infighting and often bitter
negotiation is the final tally, though.
Look at this. 314 to 117.
149 Republicans and 165 Democrats
voted yes in favor.
71 Republicans
and 46 Democrats voted against.
Senators must follow suit by Monday,
or the Treasury Department says
America could start defaulting
on some of its bills.
The Senate majority
leader, Chuck Schumer
then telling the chamber
this morning, buckle up.
Time is a luxury.
The Senate does not have any needless
delay or any last minute hold ups.
Would be an unnecessary
and even dangerous risk.
And any change to this bill
that forces us to send it
back to the House
would be entirely unacceptable.
It would almost guarantee default.
Here in studio to share their reporting
and their insights.
CNN's Melanie Sloan,
already part of The Washington Post.
And Margaret Talev of Axios.
So walk us through this.
Explain to America
how Washington and the Senate works.
Senator Schumer,
Senator McConnell have an agreement.
Some senators will get
to propose amendments
as long as they can kill them,
long as they make sure they lose
so that they don't change the House bill
and have to send it back.
So in the Senate,
any single member can slow things down,
hold it up.
They need the cooperation
of every single senator
in order to move quickly on this.
So what the leadership is doing
is going to offer them
amendment votes in exchange
for their cooperation.
These amendment votes will fail.
Everyone knows that,
because if it were to pass,
that would completely upset things.
This is a very delicately
negotiated deal.
It would have to go back to the House.
But they're in the process
of working that out
It is just a matter of when,
not if they pass this in the Senate.
We're hearing
it might be sometime
today, might be tomorrow,
but it's going to get done
hopefully before the weekend.
So they'll have the amendments to do.
You write an interesting post,
The Washington Post
in the piece in The Washington Post
saying we have Democratic president,
we have a Republican speaker,
and yet they negotiate a deal
and they're both in some ways, winners.
Now, there are some Nixon
both of them from this process.
But I want to read in the piece
the comments reflecting an emboldened
mood on the part of both men,
an octogenarian Democrat
who is faced
questions about his age
and ability to shepherd
a vibrant, diverse party
and a California Republican
who has been viewed
as a weak leader, beholden
to his conference's
conservative firebrands.
It is true, right?
Yes.
They both have some questions
going forward.
From this,
but they can both rightfully say, I win.
And they are.
There are
I've already started
to sort of brag about this deal, say
this is how Washington
is supposed to work.
You have to remember that
President Biden
has faced questions about his age,
about his ability,
about whether or not
he should be running for reelection
in this
divided government
period as a test of whether or not he's
going to be able to carry on
through the next election.
And for McCarthy,
he faced challenges over
whether or not he should be speaker.
He's been speaker for a few months.
And there's this sort of sword
hanging over his head over
whether or not
he will be able to remain in his post
because of
some of the things that he's doing
that are not supported
by folks on the far right,
but because he was able to get this deal
and there aren't any real
major calls yet for his ouster.
He can claim victory over this.
And so there will be some out there.
And it's your job
to rain on their parade.
Who would say, okay, well,
you just did this, right?
You just did this. Liberals are unhappy.
Conservatives aren't happy,
but you just came together
in the broad middle of Washington,
just did something very important.
So why can't we have a conversation
about immigration?
Why can't we have a conversation
about whether they're big health care
questions, entitlements,
child tax credits?
Not going to happen, right?
Because the global economy
is not going
to collapse in tens of thousands,
if not more of Americans
are going to lose their jobs.
The U.S.
says they're going to be permanently
knocked off of its
leadership post
in terms
of how the rest of the world
of using the currency
as the primary currency is
is not going to be shaken
by any of those other things.
The default has a singular capacity
to have
national and international shockwaves
that will be both immediate
and permanent to some degree.
And Kevin
McCarthy knows that, and so does
most of the Republican caucus.
I do think that
this is a win for both men,
but in different ways.
For Biden,
there was nowhere to go
but down for the president.
If it had been a default,
it would have been a disaster.
For the country, but also,
you know, for him.
But it doesn't boost his his ratings
or his standing
that he managed to stave it off.
I don't think for McCarthy
this is really a window to to reset
both his own caucus and Americans
impression of his leadership skills
and of what kind of a speaker
he's going to be.
I don't know how far he can take that
with a razor
thin majority
that just at least
temporarily got one smaller.
But but it is a moment
for for the for his caucus
and for the political establishment
and Americans to say
there might be more here
than we thought there was.
There are some still to McCarthy's right
who are
he had to fight to get their votes
to be speaker what?
15 ballots back in January.
There are some
who are unhappy and say
they will consider using their power
as part of the deal
with any one member can move to vote
but vacate the chair.
Listen to one of them Ken Buck
the discussion about the motion to vacate
is going to happen
in the next week or two.
What would your reaction be
if Democrats were to step in
and save McCarthy?
Oh, motion to vacate Vincente Gonzales
just told us he's open.
It's like a date with a unique
collaborator.
Yeah,
he does not have much power
when when he relies on Democrats
to keep him as speaker.
Is that real
meaning there will be a real challenge
to McCarthy's leadership.
I assume he would survive it,
but it would still be a dent
or is that just venting?
We'll have to see.
I mean, they have the power,
a single member to be able
to at least call the vote.
It would take five Republicans
to actually succeed,
assuming all Democrats
vote against McCarthy.
In that scenario,
Kevin McCarthy is not taking it lightly.
He has to take that seriously.
But he's also not sweating it.
And it's because, John, as you mentioned,
he has beaten back
the conservative revolt
before it took him
15 ugly rounds of voting
but he eventually got there.
I think what we're really determining
is what members here, when they go back
to their districts, right.
If they are hearing conservatives
who are furious back
home, they might get fired up
and come back
and want to proceed with this.
But the fact that they are not right now
committing to follow through with it,
I think is probably a good sign.
That's an interesting point.
You make about when they go home
because the leading Republican candidates
for president now, Trump was late to it.
He waited and waited and waited.
But on I radio, I say he said no
is a safe place
for if you're appealing to the Republican
base is to be no.
So we'll see if some of that
when they go home,
if they come back to Washington,
if that happens.
Manu, what are you hearing about
how swiftly
this bill could wind up
on President Biden's desk?
Well, this is actually the subject
of intense negotiations
that are happening right now
on the Senate floor.
I just on my way over here
to talk to the number two Republican,
John Thune,
who is deep in these negotiations
to try to get this bill passed.
As soon as tonight.
He is having discussions
with some members on the Senate floor,
including Senator
Lindsey Graham
and others
who are demanding certain certain things.
One thing that Lindsey Graham wants
is he wants some sort of insurance
from Democratic leaders
and Republican leaders
that they will move on to
Ukraine a funding package
sometime later this year.
There's also some concerns
about defense funding
and the level of defense
funding in this plan, a deal
that was cut between Mick McCarthy
and the White House
to essentially level out
funding, provide
the funding
that was under the Biden
proposal,
the Biden administration's defense
spending proposal.
That is not far enough
for a number of these
hawks on the Republican side of the aisle
who believe
that it needs to be much further
believe it has not kept up
with the pace of inflation.
And all these concerns are significant
because one
senators, single senators
can delay matters until past a Monday,
the fall deadline.
They need to get all to agree
to actually schedule the vote
and the moment
they don't have that agreement.
Now, this all comes
as senators are raising concerns.
Lindsey Graham told me today
that this deal was a bad one that was cut
and others are also uncertain about
whether they're going to back this plan
to is
This is really dumb.
The people who negotiated this,
I wouldn't let them buy me a car.
The speaker said the Democrats
didn't get any wins here.
Well, I'll tell you why.
A lot of them
believe they did
because more Democrats voted
for it than Republicans.
What does that say to you?
I know in a divided government is tough
but don't tell me that
this is the best we could do.
The party of Ronald Reagan
is in jeopardy.
This is really dumb.
This is the wrong way to address it in
just the wrong way.
It
empowers the folks on the far right.
And quite frankly,
I don't think they have
the best interests of the country.
In mind.
And
I don't think I haven't talked to anybody
that's enamored with this deal.
But it's really more a question of today.
So there are concerns on the left.
I believe the White House gave
too much
to the speaker, concerns on the right
that the speaker gave too much
the White House.
But there's also no doubt about that.
There is expectation
that this will pass
eventually, maybe tonight,
maybe tomorrow.
Senators are begrudgingly voting
for a compromise
they don't love,
but they realize
this is the only way to avoid a default
They have bipartisan disdain
for this bill.
It seems that's a sign of a compromise.
Monterrosa, live on Capitol Hill,
thanks so much.
And Brianna,
this is more
than just about raising the debt ceiling.
This has implications far and wide.
Yeah, certainly
if passed into law,
the bipartisan debt
deal would prevent
the Biden administration
from extending the federal student
loan payment
pause that began in 20, 20
during the Trump administration.
The bill reads that the pause shall cease
to be effective. 60 days after June 30th.
And that would mean
that roughly 44 million
people will have to resume
making payments on their loans.
And there is some concern
if this process is going to go smoothly.
As you can imagine,
there are so many people
who may be confused
about how much they owe,
when to pay, how they're going to pay.
Especially when you consider this
that 2 million borrowers
will have a different servicer
handling their loans
since the last time
that they made a payment.
In the meantime,
all eyes are going to be on
the Supreme Court.
Justices could rule
as early
as this month on a separate student loan
forgiveness program.
And under the Biden
administration, proposal,
individual borrowers
who made less than $125,000 in either
20, 20 or 20, 21,
and also married couples
or heads of households
who made less than $250,000 per year,
they would qualify for up to $10,000
of their federal student
loan debt being forgiven
and if a borrower got a Pell
Grant in college,
if they got a Pell Grant in college,
that individual is eligible
for up to 20 grand in debt forgiveness.
If the Supreme Court
allows this program
to take effect, it's possible
the government moves quickly
to forgive the debts
of 16 million borrowers
who are already approved for relief.
If the justices strike down
Biden, the student
loan forgiveness program,
the administration
could make some modifications.
They could try again
But that, of course,
could take months, Jim.