Debt ceiling news – live: Biden signs debt limit bill after hailing deal in Oval Office address

MAGA firebrand Lauren Boebert emerged as one of the fiercest critics to the debt ceiling deal brokered by House leader Kevin McCarthy and President Joe Biden to avoid a catastrophic default.

But when it was time for the House of Representatives to cast their votes on Wednesday night, she failed to show up.

Ms Boebert was mocked on social media after she reportedly “narrowly missed the vote, running up the steps right as they gaveled”, according to Axios Capitol Hill reporter Juliegrace Brufke.

Spencer Soicher, a reporter from Ms Boebert’s home state of Colorado, pointed out that she had made 23 Twitter posts in the past week voicing her displeasure with the compromise deal.

Democrat Adam Frisch, who in 2022 lost his bid to unseat Ms Boebert in Colorado’s third district by just 546 votes, wrote on Twitter: “How can you represent #CO03 when you don’t even show up? What was more important than voting?”

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Global shares clawed back gains on Thursday after the long-awaited US debt ceiling saga neared a conclusion.

Members of the House of Representatives, which is Republican controlled, passed a new bill which suspends the ceiling, and it is now heading to the Senate for final approval.

Global sentiment had been rocked over fears the nation would default on its own debt and not be able to pay any bills, with an economic impact that would be felt globally.

European markets edged higher and US investors were feeling more positive after sustaining significant losses earlier in the week, but it was a somewhat muted reaction to the debt ceiling breakthrough.

Mining stocks helped lift the FTSE 100 higher after a jump in oil and copper prices, but it still lagged below the 7,500 mark.

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Shares inched higher in London on Thursday, and the pound made gains against the dollar, after US lawmakers in the House of representatives passed a new bill on the country’s debt ceiling.

The bill, which suspends the ceiling, passed with both Democrats and Republicans supporting it, and will head to the US Senate for the final approval.

The House – which is Republican controlled – had widely been seen as the bigger hurdle out of the two bodies of Congress.

By around 2pm, ahead of US markets opening, London’s FTSE 100 was trading up 0.2% at 7,462 points.

One pound could buy around 1.25 dollars, up one third of a per cent from the day before.

But what is the debt ceiling, and what might have happened if the US had hit it?

White House staffers attempted to soft-pedal their agreement with House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, despite considering a major win, according to Politico.

Officials were concerned that any boasting about the agreement without prompt a Republican backlash and make it harder to pass.

Other than ensuring its passage, the Biden team also wanted to appear as the “adults in the room” in a highly partisan environment and use the negotiations as an outline for the 2024 reelection campaign.

The Senate voted late on Thursday night to raise the debt limit and avoid allowing the United States to default on its debt for the first time in history after having an all-night marathon session of votes to assuage Republican concerns.

The legislation passed 63 to 36 after senators held 11 votes on amendments —10 from Republicans and 1 from Democrats — to address concerns about the bill.

Eric Garcia reports for The Independent from Capitol Hill.

The US introduced the debt limit in 1917 at what today looks like a tiny 11.5 billion dollars.

At the time, they set it up to make the process of borrowing money easier – until then Congress had to pass new legislation to approve all borrowing.

By instead putting a limit on borrowing, it allowed the executive branch of the Government more flexibility in what and when it borrowed, so long as it did not borrow more than the ceiling.

Weeks of sniping back-and-forth between the White House and the Republican majority in the House of Representatives has finally yielded a deal: America will not default on its debt obligations.

Here’s what’s in the deal:

No more debt drama (for now)

The first and most significant achievement of this deal: it raises the debt ceiling through the end of 2024. That guarantees the GOP won’t be able to wage a fight over the issue again, particularly as the presidential campaign season heats up later this year and into the next.

Any debt ceiling battle during campaign season, particularly in the summer or fall of 2024, would take Joe Biden off the campaign trail and put his focus firmly on Washington at a time when either of his likely general election opponents, Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis, would be free to continue their politicking.

In total, the deal calls for raising America’s debt limit by $4 trillion. Signing away that leverage for the next year is already proving to be one of the toughest pills for congressional conservatives in both the House and Senate to swallow, especially given the lack of other major concessions in the pending legislation.

Spending caps

The GOP’s big win in the negotiating process, this legislation is set to freeze federal spending at the current level, with the exception of military funding, through 2024. And growth of that spending will be capped at 1 per cent if Congress cannot agree upon a stopgap spending deal in January of 2025.

This is a significant restriction for the federal government over the next year, and notably puts in place much stricter spending limits than members of Congress agreed to during the last debt limit fight in 2019.

The language allowing for defence spending to increase while domestic programmes face a spending freeze is already irking progressives, who have long argued that the US military’s bloated budget should be at the top of the list for reforms.

Caps set by this compromise are simultaneously the biggest victory for Republicans as well as their failure; while the spending caps are certainly more than what Democrats were demanding, they also eliminate the possibility of Republicans using the debt ceiling to make real cuts to programmes already implemented by the Biden administration as part of the Inflation Reduction Act and other legislation.

That means that Mr Biden’s 2021-2022 legislative agenda will remain largely intact, despite demands by conservatives to roll back huge parts of it, like efforts to forgive student loans or expand green energy production.

President Joe Biden tweeted his reaction to the passing of the debt ceiling deal:

Just now, Senators from both parties voted to protect our hard-earned economic progress and prevent a first-ever default.

No one gets everything they want in a negotiation, but make no mistake: this bipartisan agreement is a big win for our economy and the American people.

Our work is far from finished, but I look forward to signing this bill into law as soon as possible and addressing the American people directly tomorrow.