Senate Majority Whip John Barrasso told reporters Tuesday that Donald Trump wants the debt ceiling dealt with as part of a party-line package to enact the president’s sweeping domestic agenda.
The issue, according to Barrasso, came up during a meeting earlier this month when Senate Finance Committee Republicans visited the White House to discuss the path forward for the “one big, beautiful bill” that Trump is envisioning to link an overhaul of the tax code to border, energy and defense policies.
“We’ve discussed that with the President … at the White House. He’s called for including it as part of the reconciliation bill,” said Barrasso, a Wyoming Republican who is also a member of the Finance Committee.
The topic is due to come up again later Tuesday afternoon, when Senate Majority Leader John Thune, Speaker Mike Johnson and the top congressional tax writers head back to the White House to meet with Trump administration officials about the reconciliation bill and how to harmonize the House-approved budget blueprint — which would include a debt limit hike — with the Senate’s — which is silent on the matter.
Barrasso, asked if he thinks some of his colleagues will advocate for or against its inclusion, demurred: “Every member will speak for himself,” he said.
Yet even as Trump has signaled privately that he wants a hike of the debt limit inserted into a reconciliation package — which would let him avoid having to make a deal with Democrats to avoid a catastrophic default in the coming months — congressional Republicans remain unsure if they’ll have the votes to include the policy in the bill. Some Senate conservatives have also warned against including it or cautioned they would need to see steep spending cuts to other government programs as a condition of supporting its inclusion.
Time could be running out to come up with a strategy. Congress’ nonpartisan scorekeeper, the Congressional Budget Office, plans to release its debt limit forecast Wednesday. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who will take part in Tuesday’s White House meeting, has told lawmakers he plans to send his own projection in the first half of May for when the nation will surpass its borrowing authority.
