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The American House of Representatives largely rejected on Thursday a new budget text from the Republicans aimed at avoiding a paralysis of the federal state. This stinging failure increases the uncertainty before the fateful hour of Friday evening midnight.
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December 20, 2024 – 01:51
(Keystone-ATS) The elected Republicans, despite having a majority in the lower house, had submitted this new proposal to a vote the day after the torpedoing by Donald Trump and Elon Musk of a previous agreement negotiated with the Democrats which would have avoided a “shutdown” in the United States just before Christmas.
The future American president nevertheless gave his blessing to the Republicans’ new text, welcoming “a very good agreement for the American people”. Before the vote, the Democratic leader in the House, Hakeem Jeffries, expressed his opposition to this proposal, “not serious” and “laughable” according to him.
And while two-thirds of the votes were necessary for adoption, the text did not even reach a simple majority, with 38 Republicans joining the Democrats’ “no”.
“Shutdown” at Christmas
The path forward is now uncertain for the Republican President of the House of Representatives, Mike Johnson, pressed on the one hand by the Democrats to return to the negotiated agreement, and on the other by certain conservative elected officials who refuse all text which would not include a budget cut to compensate for the new aid.
Time is running out before the fateful hour of midnight Friday evening. A paralysis of federal public services would lead to technical unemployment for hundreds of thousands of civil servants, the freezing of several social benefits or even the closure of certain daycare centers. An extremely unpopular situation, especially as Christmas approaches.
The likelihood of a “shutdown” was greatly increased when Donald Trump expressed his disapproval on Wednesday of a bill negotiated by Republicans in Congress with Democrats, deemed “ridiculous and extraordinarily expensive” by the president-elect.
Musk’s refusal
The twist took elected officials by surprise and gave a glimpse of a Trump 2.0 presidency even before the Republican took office on January 20. With a style similar to his first mandate, not bothering with conventions, even if it means causing a certain chaos.
The future president was not the only one to dynamite the first agreement. “Kill the text!” », Launched his ally Elon Musk in a long series of posts on X, where he denounced unnecessary expenses according to him.
The boss of Tesla and SpaceX, on the other hand, affirmed to support the new Republican proposal which notably included a provision wanted by Donald Trump: a postponement of the deadline on the debt ceiling to January 2027. The future president had in fact expressed his virulent opposition to the first agreement partly because of the absence in the text of such a provision.
The United States has the particularity of regularly coming up against a legal constraint concerning its credit capacity: this debt ceiling, i.e. their maximum amount of debt, must be formally raised or suspended by Congress.
“Vicious trap”
A suspension decided in 2023 expires at the beginning of January and the United States should reach the ceiling in June. Donald Trump therefore declared on Wednesday that he wanted to avoid, upon his return to power, this “vicious trap” set up, according to him, by the Democrats.
The White House spoke out against the new text before the vote in Congress. “Republicans are following the orders of their billionaire donors at the expense of hard-working Americans,” criticized President Joe Biden’s spokesperson, Karine Jean-Pierre.
A large number of elected Democrats also denounced the influence of the richest man in the world in the decisions of the Republican camp. “Donald Trump and elected Republican officials have bowed their heads to the real president-elect, Elon Musk,” criticized New York elected official Nydia Velazquez.
