Others say the move would be on such shaky legal ground that markets would likely collapse even before the matter made its way to the courts - meaning Biden would have effectively sparked the very economic downturn he was hoping to avoid. They make the case that the Supreme Court would have no choice but to reject any effort to invoke the 14th Amendment because it would represent a major breach of Congress’s power over government spending. Skeptics from both sides of the aisle counter that as inconvenient as it may be for the president, the only way to avoid default is through legislation passed by Congress. ![]() Some constitutional scholars say there’s a strong chance the argument would survive any potential legal challenges, in part because they believe there won’t be five justices on the Supreme Court who would be willing to set off a massive recession by blocking it. They argue that declaring the debt ceiling unconstitutional, while an imperfect solution, is still far better than rewarding Republicans by letting them gut government programs that millions of people rely on - or standing idly by while they drive the economy off a cliff. Each of those strategies is equally unprecedented and carries its own potential pitfalls.Īs appealing as the 14th Amendment option may sound to Democrats, the theory has never been tested in court and legal experts disagree on whether the Supreme Court would reject an effort to use it.īut even amid that uncertainty, some on the left feel the 14th Amendment provides the best of a number of bad options for escaping a potentially disastrous debt ceiling standoff. There are alternative proposals that could also theoretically help defuse the debt ceiling crisis, including minting a trillion-dollar platinum coin and having the Treasury issue a special type of bond to fund the government in the short term. The theory centers around a clause in the 14th Amendment that states “the validity of the public debt of the United States … shall not be questioned.” Some legal scholars argue that this language allows Biden to order the Treasury to effectively ignore the debt ceiling because failing to do so would violate his constitutional duty to maintain the validity of U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has called June 1 a “hard deadline” to raise the debt ceiling without default, leaving the Biden administration and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy a matter of days to reach a deal that can pass through a divided Congress.īut some Democrats say the Constitution includes a ready-made off-ramp that could not only resolve the current impasse, but also put an end to all gamesmanship over the debt ceiling for good. But starting in the Obama era, Republicans in Congress began using the dangers of failing to raise the ceiling - which experts believe would trigger an economic catastrophe - as leverage to coax Democrats into signing on to spending cuts that they would oppose in any other circumstances. For most of the past century, the debt ceiling was routinely raised on a bipartisan basis. It doesn’t itself increase the deficit, but simply creates room for the government to keep its financial commitments. The debt ceiling is a dollar figure set by Congress that represents the maximum amount the U.S. ![]() With Republicans refusing to raise the debt ceiling unless Democrats agree to substantial cuts in government spending, some members of President Biden’s party are urging him to pursue an untested legal theory that they believe would allow him to stave off default without having to consent to any of the GOP’s demands. Illustration by Yahoo News / Photo: Getty Images What’s happening
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