the agency said it would cost 6 million jobs. it would increase, we would lose 15 trillion dollars of household wealth, and our gdp, our unemployment rate would go up to 9%. so, this is nothing to fool around with. we should be grown-ups and pass a clean debt limit, and then talk about, in a fiscally responsible way, the things we differ about. and the truth is, there are five republicans and the house right now, who do understand the importance of this, whether they will find the personal bravery to vote for it is another question. and beyond those five, there s certainly another 50 who would be greatly relieved, greatly relieved to have you succeeded in raising the debt ceiling this way. i hope so. i mean, it s a tough congress stuff right now. it s very partisan. the republicans are extreme. when i ran for office 30 years ago, i was a republican.
but i digress. it is not just democrats ringing the alarm about the need to raise the debt ceiling. according to the washington post, a small group of conservative budget experts is cautioning house republicans that brings mission over the nation s boring limit could lead to economic disaster. the united states has never defaulted on its debt and for good reason. according to a 2020 and analysis from rudy s, it could cost the nine states up to 6 million jobs and 15 trillion in household wealth. joining me now, congressman joe neguse, chair of the democratic policy communication to me, congressman, welcome back to the sunday show. good to be with you, jonathan. so, raising the debt ceiling is supposed to be a rudimentary process. the effects of the cuts in this bill could force families and whole economy into a depression. what is at stake if congress
congressman, you served with my husband sean. i was telephone our producers that i recently saw an old speech of sean s where he was maybe five, six years ago complaining about $15 trillion of debt. we are now at 31 trillion. talk to me about why this is a national security problem at this point. well, look. i mean, we are seeing right now the implications of having this much debt. interest rate is piling up around us as you interest rates go up. interest rates are going to surpass what we spend on national defense. the dollar is now in question. china is trying to do deals with brazil. we have obligation to stop spending money we don t have. that s why republicans are putting forward a strong plan that would limit spending simply to 2022 levels which would take us to precovid defense. pull it back so we can undo the bureaucracy that grew up under covid. simply make sure we return this town to common sense focus on
no strings attached? well, i m going to vote for a debt ceiling because we have to pay our bills. i hope my republican friends will join us. we re all in this together. but the bottom line, to say you re not going to have any cushions or negotiations on how we can get debt can under control, $315 trillion, in the last 31.5 trillion, can t we see how we expanded the debt so rapidly and find out if there s ways we can make adjustment. you don t have to scare the bejesus out of people. the first thing they go to is can cutting social security and medicare. that s not going to happen. but you can review all the spending that s gone on in discretionary which means we have to make decisions on and nondiscretionary, basically things that you don t negotiate on because it s mandatory spending. how did it increase by $1-2 the trillion in such a short period of time? how did we increase discretionary spending? can t we look at some of that and find out if there s some adjustments? we ve got
here. it never happens. that s the whole point. it never happens. that s why you have this gallup poll shows americans hate government. yeah, this waste and abuse of covid money, we re talking about literally hundreds of billions of dollars stolen, ripped off from taxpayers and the ppp program and the unemployment insurance benefit program and medicare and food stamps. hundreds of bills of dollars. then you add republicans could easily come up with a plan as jason knows. how about get rid of the $45 billion extra that they want to spending on hiring 80,000 irs agents? how about the slush fund for the green energy? they haven t spent it. cancel it. they don t have a plan. you know what the plan is? if you don t do anything, it s according to the congressional budget office, another $15 trillion of debt over the next