CREDIT:
SHUTTERSTOCK
Days before the nation hits
its debt ceiling deadline October 17, conservatives are beginning to abandon
their strategy of demanding concessions for a vote that prevents a U.S.
default. Even as Republicans downplay the consequences of missing this deadline, Heritage Action and
other influential conservatives have urged a new strategy that keeps Obamacare
out of the debt debate. Now, they want Republicans to stay focused on keeping
the government closed over Obamacare but relent on a debt ceiling increase.
On Wednesday morning,
Heritage Action CEO Michael Needham conceded, “We should
raise the debt limit.” “We’d give the speaker some flex on a short-term debt
limit increase,” Needham said, though he went on that Heritage will oppose a
budget continuing resolution that does not defund the healthcare law. “We’d be
opposed to anything that would be considered a long-term debt limit increase,
anything that goes beyond the 2014 election.”
Erik Erickson echoed that point on RedState, urging the GOP not to use the debt ceiling as
leverage in its anti-Obamacare crusade and a short-term raise instead.
“Conservatives need to push the debt ceiling fight off the front burner to
after Christmas,” he said, continuing, “This would buy us some time to finish the
fight to defund Obamacare and set us up well to fight the next long-term debt
limit increase to the death by removing some of the President’s scare tactics.”
At the same time, Reps.
Paul Ryan (R-WI) and Eric Cantor (R-VA) have floated a debt ceiling agreement
that does not demand a full Obamacare repeal. In separate op-eds, Ryan
suggested the healthcare debate can be pushed off, while
Cantor made no mention of it. Needham responded today that the “attention of Republicans and conservatives needs
to be back on Obamacare and not on other ways out of this situation,” so the
GOP can focus on dragging out the shutdown.
Koch Industries, the
conglomerate owned by conservatives Charles and David Koch, has made its own
dramatic departure. Despite donations to Heritage and active Tea Party groups, Koch publicly dissociated
itself from the
effort, saying the company “has not taken a position on the legislative tactic
of tying the continuing resolution to defunding Obamacare.” According to NBC News, Koch
officials have privately told lawmakers that a default would be economic
“disaster.”
Previously, those on the
right advised House GOP to conflate the debt ceiling and shutdown talks in
their larger effort to defund the healthcare law. Heritage has been the lead
actor in this push, both in threatening a default and the government shutdown.
DeMint earlier told the New York Times he thought Republicans were not aggressive enough linking the debt
ceiling to Obamacare. “They’ve been through a series of C.R.s and debt limits,”
he said, “and all the time there was discussion of ‘O.K., we’re not going to
fight the Obamacare fight, we’ll do it next time.”‘
The strategy to make a debt
ceiling vote explicitly about Obamacare was highlighted by the Wall Street Journal, Washington Examiner,
and National Review. But
business leaders and economists warn of a global economic meltdown if the U.S. passes its October 17 deadline.
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