The Fix Was In With Biden’s Debt Ceiling Deal

The country may have narrowly avoided a debt default catastrophe by passing a debt ceiling deal on June 3, but that doesn’t mean we should allow the fiasco to fall into the memory hole. David Dayen, executive editor of The American Prospect, joins host David Sirota to dissect the event, discuss the political misuse of the debt limit, and explore what was traded away in this crisis.  While the Biden administration is literally advertising the deal as a bipartisan triumph, the two scrutinize its controversial implications: slashed budgets, renewed student debt payments, and major fossil fuel concessions. Dayen, who covers the intersection of politics and economics, questions the acceptance of such outcomes by the Democrats: Are these political tradeoffs, or do they represent the party’s true goals?  Links:California Passes Law To Divest Pensions From Fossil Fuels Supreme Court Won’t Review Ruling Barring Offshore Fracking In California The Leonard Leo Dark Money Behind Kansas’ Misleading Anti-Abortion Campaign Democrats’ Resounding Vote for Debt Ceiling Concessions Won’t Age Well A transcript of this episode is available here. BONUS: Next Monday’s bonus episode of Lever Time Premium, exclusively for The Lever’s supporting subscribers, is a deep dive on the climate crisis in the American West, and how new fights over climate legislation there could determine climate policy for years to come.

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