Once Biden blinked on taxes, the Speaker was playing with house money
that could unify his own conference. Then it was mostly a matter of waiting for Biden to abandon his “no talking to legislative terrorists” position, which the president had to do if he wasn’t willing to gamble on a nonlegislative solution to the debt-limit problem at the risk of losing in the courts or freaking out financial markets. Biden knew that, as chief executive, he’d probably bear the brunt of the blame if things went kablooey.
. But it wasn’t so hard. The total leverage the fanatics of the House Freedom Caucus had over McCarthy gave the Speaker total leverage over Biden, who knew McCarthy would surely lose his gavel if he caved on this vital piece of conservative dogma.
The deal itself, of course, was never going to satisfy the full membership of the House Freedom Caucus, and it didn’t have to, so long as McCarthy had a majority of House Republicans with him and the HFC refrained from pulling the trigger on a “
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