OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
House Speaker Kevin McCarthy sent President Joe Biden a tense message on Tuesday, one day before their highly-anticipated meeting at the White House to discuss how to avoid a catastrophic default on the U.S. debt.
“The White House released a memo saying Biden will have two questions for McCarthy. First, Biden will seek a commitment from McCarthy that he will ensure the country will pay its already-incurred debt, National Economic Council Director Brian Deese and Office of Management and Budget Director Shalanda Young said in the memo,” MSN reported. “Secondly, Biden wants to know when Republicans will release their budget, which would show what programs the new House majority would cut to reduce the deficit and the debt.”
“The United States must never default on its financial obligations. Raising the debt ceiling is not a negotiation; it is an obligation of this country and its leaders to avoid economic chaos,” Deese and Young wrote in the memo previewing the meeting.
McCarthy issued a bold response of his own on Twitter.
“Mr. President: I received your staff’s memo. I’m not interested in political games,” the speaker tweeted. “I’m coming to negotiate for the American people.”
Mr. President: I received your staff’s memo.
I’m not interested in political games.
I’m coming to negotiate for the American people.
— Kevin McCarthy (@SpeakerMcCarthy) January 31, 2023
Last week, McCarthy delivered on a previous pledge to bar two members of California’s Democratic congressional delegation from serving on the Select Committee on Intelligence.
The California Republican has blocked Reps. Adam Schiff and Eric Swalwell from the panel, fulfilling a promise he made before the midterm elections to remove them should the GOP win back the House majority and make him speaker.
“House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) had written to McCarthy on Saturday asking that both Schiff and Swalwell be seated on the Intel panel, where membership assignments come solely at the discretion of the Speaker,” The Hill reported.
However, McCarthy countered that previous actions by both lawmakers have made them unqualified to serve on such a sensitive committee.
“In order to maintain a standard worthy of this committee’s responsibilities, I am hereby rejecting the appointments of Representative Adam Schiff and Representative Eric Swalwell to serve on the Intelligence Committee,” McCarthy responded to Jeffries on Tuesday.
The Hill added:
Republicans have been up in arms over the issue since 2021, when Democrats staged votes to remove GOP Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (Ga.) and Paul Gosar (Ariz.) from their committees following revelations that they had promoted violence against some of their Democratic colleagues. The eviction votes came after McCarthy declined to punish either lawmaker internally within the GOP conference, which is typically where such disciplinary actions are meted out.
Still, McCarthy on Tuesday denied that his decision regarding Schiff and Swalwell was retribution for Greene and Gosar.
“This is not anything political. This is not similar to what the Democrats did,” McCarthy told reporters late Tuesday afternoon outside his Capitol Hill office.
Schiff, who led several Democratic investigations into Donald Trump, repeatedly claimed, without evidence, that the former president colluded with Russia to steal the 2016 election from Hillary Clinton. Republicans have also accused him of leaking sensitive and oftentimes false information to the media several times during Trump’s term.
Swalwell, meanwhile, had a relationship with a suspected Chinese spy who helped him raise money for his 2014 campaign, though none of that was known until 2020. McCarthy says that a confidential briefing given to him by the FBI on the matter left him convinced that Swalwell is compromised and a risk to national security.
“When Eric Swalwell would be in the private sector and can’t get the security clearance there, we are not gonna provide him with the secrets to America,” McCarthy told reporters.
In addition, the Speaker has vowed to bar Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) from serving on the House Foreign Affairs Committee over several anti-Semitic statements she has made regarding Israel. But while House members serve on the Intelligence Committee at the pleasure of the Speaker, Republicans would have to vote to remove Omar from her assignment, and with a thin majority, that is not assured.
In fact, McCarthy already has one defector and possibly more: “Rep. Victoria Spartz (R-Ind.) announced Tuesday that she will not support keeping Omar off the Foreign Affairs Committee, and Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) has expressed a coolness to the idea,” The Hill noted.
It’s also not clear when a vote to remove Omar will occur.
