House approves debt ceiling deal with most Wisconsin Republicans voting yes, Democrats voting no

WASHINGTON – The House passed legislation Wednesday evening to temporarily suspend the nation’s debt ceiling and avert a potential default as a majority of Wisconsin’s delegation backed the effort despite opposition and uneasiness from several members.

Both of the state's House Democrats voted against the bipartisan bill that would suspend the nation's borrowing cap for two years in exchange for cuts to domestic programs, and Republican U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany also opposed the move. U.S. Rep. Scott Fitzgerald ultimately joined the rest of the state's House Republicans in supporting the legislation after reassurances from his conference that the bill cut spending.

The measure, brokered over the weekend by the White House and Speaker Kevin McCarthy, passed on a 314-117 vote.

The agreement now goes to the Senate, which is expected to quickly act on it. The country could run out of money to pay its bills as soon as Monday if Congress does not suspend or raise the debt limit, according to the Treasury Department.

Several members of Wisconsin's congressional delegation had been unsure of the deal over the past few days. Democratic U.S. Reps. Mark Pocan and Gwen Moore expressed concerns over the reported side deals not included in the agreement's text and over provisions clawing back funding for the Internal Revenue Service and expanding work requirements for federal aid programs. Republicans like Tiffany, meanwhile, decried the bill for not doing enough to reduce the nation's debt.

Tiffany in a statement before the vote contended the measure would add to the nation's deficit and derided the legislation for failing to repeal Biden administration efforts like forgiving student loans and investing in green energy.

"Congress cannot keep mortgaging the future of our children and grandchildren," Tiffany said. "Wisconsinites sent me to Congress to shrink Washington and grow the American economy, and this bill failed to meet the moment."

The agreement would suspend the country's $31.4 trillion borrowing limit until January 2025 and hold non-defense discretionary spending for fiscal year 2024 at roughly 2023 levels. It would limit spending growth to just 1% in 2025, and the Congressional Budget Office estimated the bill would reduce the deficit by about $1.5 trillion over the next 10 years.

Under the deal, Congress would claw back funding for the IRS — a move the CBO projected would increase the federal deficit — and expand work requirements for low-income people seeking benefits through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, formerly known as food stamps, and the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program. But the deal would also expand food assistance benefits for veterans, homeless people and others, and the CBO estimated about 78,000 more people would gain benefits in an average month under the agreement.

It includes a number of other provisions, including those rescinding unspent COVID relief funds, which could mean $447 million in Wisconsin, and undoes the Biden administration's student loan freeze. It leaves intact major Democratic achievements, like the climate provisions in the Inflation Reduction Act.

Both Moore and Pocan ahead of the vote suggested they were waiting for more details and clarification over provisions in the agreement. An hour before the vote, those clarifications never came.

Pocan told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel he had outstanding questions over the unspent COVID relief money the bill would take back from Wisconsin. He also raised concerns over the exact spending levels the bill provides for, claiming some of the funding that would allow Congress to maintain fiscal year 2023 spending levels next year was agreed to in side agreements between the administration and Republicans and are not explicitly laid out in the bill's text.

"I'm greatly concerned that funding could never emerge," Pocan said. "And that would be money that's cut from seniors and health care and education and housing, and all of those non-defense discretionary spending areas."

He also took issue with an effort in the agreement to rescind $20 billion in funding for the IRS over the next two years that wasn't mentioned in the bill's text.

Moore has been outspoken in her opposition to tighter work requirements for federal aid. In the end, she couldn't vote for a bill that went against what she's called the reason she's in Congress.

"This is not a great bill," Moore told the Journal Sentinel hours before the vote. "The notion that it could have been worse — that's obvious. But this is their bill. I'm not the deciding vote. If I'm the deciding vote, I'm not going to let us default."

Still, most of Wisconsin's House Republicans supported the agreement.

Fitzgerald Wednesday afternoon told the Journal Sentinel he "felt comfortable" with the bill after listening to colleagues like North Carolina U.S. Rep. Patrick McHenry, one of the negotiators of the deal, who reassured him the legislation would cut spending and bring down the deficit.

Before the text of the bill was released, U.S. Rep. Bryan Steil called it a step in the right direction. And Derrick Van Orden this week touted the bill as protecting farmers, veterans and "those who are most in need."

"This is an actual pragmatic approach to getting this solved," Van Orden told the Journal Sentinel a day before the vote. "It's the real deal."

Republican U.S. Rep. Mike Gallagher supported the measure, and U.S. Rep. Glenn Grothman voted to pass the measure despite failing to add amendments to the bill that would institute work requirements for people seeking low-income housing and prohibit federal agencies from spending federal funds to train employees to "carry out activities related to diversity, equity, and inclusion."

The Senate is expected to take up the measure this week.

Still, Democratic U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin has not said whether she'll support the agreement. A spokesperson Wednesday afternoon suggested the Madison Democrat was still assessing provisions in the bill's text.

Republican U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson, however, told the Journal Sentinel he is "probably a no" on the bill. Johnson, who supported the initial House Republican bill largely crafted by the far-right House Freedom Caucus that passed in April, suggested the agreement doesn't do enough to cut the deficit.

In an interview Tuesday, he lamented that the measure suspends the debt ceiling for two years rather than attaching a dollar-amount raise to the limit. He suggested he and other Senate conservatives would seek to add amendments to the text before a vote but acknowledged the bill would likely pass.

Those amendment efforts are likely to fail. Any changes to the bill in the Senate would require reapproval in the House.

Asked Wednesday whether he would allow amendments to the bill, Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), the Senate's top Democrat, said: "We are going to do everything we can to move the bill quickly, and we cannot send anything back to the House."

"We must avoid default."

Follow Lawrence Andrea on Twitter @lawrencegandrea.

This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Most Wisconsin House Republicans back debt ceiling deal