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Biden & McCarthy both win in debt ceiling showdown | US Politics In :60 | GZERO Media

Biden & McCarthy both win in debt ceiling showdown

Jon Lieber, head of Eurasia Group's coverage of political and policy developments in Washington, DC shares his perspective on US politics.

Who won the debt ceiling showdown between President Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy?

And the answer is everyone's a winner. President Biden, first and foremost, avoided a default, which would have been a terrible consequence for Biden politically and the US and world economy. Very happy that didn't happen. Biden can now spin the modest spending reductions in the bill that increased the debt ceiling as a bipartisan victory, which should potentially help in his reelection campaign as he tries to campaign as a quasi-moderate, which is what brought him to office in 2020 and he put the debt ceiling issue behind us for another two years until at least January of 2025, which is going to be after the next presidential election. And the US is likely to revisit a lot of these fiscal issues once again, using the debt ceiling as a point of leverage to achieve further spending cuts and potentially an extension of the Trump tax cuts that expire in 2026.

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Stack of US dollar bills with ascending line

Paige Fusco, with image by DonkeyHotey

Debt ceiling crisis: A default by any other name...

The debt ceiling – dubbed by Ian Bremmer as the dumbest recurring character in US politics – is rearing its ugly head with no end in sight.

Republicans and Democrats have been sparring for weeks, and while House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and President Joe Biden made meaningful progress in recent days, a deal remains elusive. The US government, meanwhile, will breach the so-called “X-date,” when it runs out of money to pay its bills, by late next week. Yet, legislators are fleeing Capitol Hill ahead of the holiday weekend in spite of the threat of the X-date arriving before a deal.

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Pete Buttigieg explains: How the debt limit impacts transportation | GZERO Media

Pete Buttigieg explains: How the debt limit impacts transportation

Failure to raise the debt limit could be catastrophic for the US – and global – economy.

But a deal to lift the cap could also end up causing pain to many Americans. For example, the $4 trillion in spending cuts proposed by House Republicans would significantly disrupt US travel, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg told Ian Bremmer on GZERO World. Republicans who voted to slash the budget should have to explain to the American people why they “might have to wait a couple more hours in a security line at an airport because of the cuts to TSA,” Buttigieg argues. "These are real impacts that are going to have a real effect on our everyday lives, not to mention on our economy."

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Jess Frampton

Everything you need to know about the US debt ceiling

The dumbest recurring character in US politics (no, not the one you’re thinking), the debt ceiling, is back with a vengeance for yet another season of wholly unnecessary drama.

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- YouTube

US debt limit: default unlikely, dysfunction probable

Ian Bremmer shares his insights on global politics this week on World In :60.

Is the United States at real risk of default over the debt limit?

I say no. More importantly, the markets say no. Investors certainly aren't concerned about it. But of course, the fact that investors aren't concerned about it is part of the reason why the politicians will get closer to breaking the debt limit without an agreement. It's good that Biden and McCarthy are finally talking to each other, but in the near-term, if June is really the X date, the date where you would hit a default, what looks more likely, since there's not enough time to really agree to anything, is they punt for a few months with a very short-term extension, and then you're still in the same soup. And some level of credit crisis is probably required to make the deal painful enough that McCarthy feels like he can get away with it, not lose his job, Biden, get away with it, and not lose political support in the election. So that's the dysfunction of Washington around the debt limit.

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Half of the US uses TikTok but Congress may ban it anyway | US Politics In :60 | GZERO Media

Hugely popular TikTok unlikely to be banned by US Congress

Jon Lieber, head of Eurasia Group's coverage of political and policy developments in Washington, DC shares his perspective on US politics:

Is Washington going to ban TikTok?

If you used the social media app TikTok over the past week, you've probably noticed that a lot of your favorite creators are starting to sound the alarm about a potential nationwide ban on the wildly popular application. Over half of US states and the federal government have already banned TikTok from some or all government-issued devices, and Congress is now mulling further actions, with Republicans and Democrats endorsing legislation that could directly or indirectly lead to a blanket ban on its operating in the United States.

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Lessons learned from the Silicon Valley Bank collapse | US Politics In :60 | GZERO Media

SVB political fallout ... not as dramatic as you think

Jon Lieber, head of Eurasia Group's coverage of political and policy developments in Washington, DC shares his perspective on US politics:

Who does Washington blame for the Silicon Valley Bank collapse?

After the largest bank failure in the US since the 2008 Financial Crisis, fears of a wider financial system failure prompted the Federal Reserve and the FDIC to take dramatic measures to contain more potential bank runs last weekend. This will have broad implications of the future of bank oversight, including capital requirements and what to do about uninsured deposits that will not be fully understood for years.

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Picture of the Tik Tok symbol over the US Capitol Building.

Annie Gugliotta

TikTok "boom"! Could the US ban the app?

As a person over 40, the first thing I did when I heard about a new bipartisan US bill that could lead to a ban of TikTok was: call my niece Valeria in Miami.

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