Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent was firm on Sunday that the United States will never default on its debt, saying the country is “on the warning track and we will never hit the wall.”
In a Sunday appearance on CBS News’s Face the Nation, Bessent strongly rejected any prospect of a U.S. debt default even as a debt ceiling hike included in President Donald Trump‘s tax bill is threatening to derail the legislation’s passage in the Senate.
“The United States of America is never going to default. That is never going to happen. We are on the warning track and we will never hit the wall,” the treasury secretary told host Margaret Brennan.
When pressed by Brennan on whether the July 4 deadline Republicans have set for Trump’s megabill to reach his desk is an “X date,” the point at which the debt ceiling must be raised in order to prevent a default, Bessent declined to say.
“We don’t give out the X date because we use that to move the bill forward,” he said.
Bessent, however, was optimistic that the Trump tax bill, dubbed the “big, beautiful bill,” will pass the Senate despite any changes the upper chamber may make to the House version of the bill text.
“[Senate Majority] Leader [John] Thune, who I’ve worked closely with during this process, has been doing a fantastic job. And Margaret, I’ll point out, everyone said that Speaker Johnson would not be able to get this bill out of the house with his slim majority. He got it out. Leader Thune has a bigger majority, and this is with President Trump’s leadership,” Bessent said.
Trump has greenlighted any changes the Senate makes to the House version of the bill, which narrowly passed the lower chamber.
“I want the Senate and the senators to make the changes they want. It will go back to the House, and we’ll see if we can get them. In some cases, the changes may be something I’d agree with, to be honest,” the president said last Sunday.
A small group of Senate Republicans have come out against the $5 trillion debt ceiling hike included in the bill, and given the GOP’s narrow majority in the Senate, they can only afford to lose three votes and still pass the bill along party lines.
Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), who along with Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) has been the most outspoken critic of the bill’s debt ceiling increase, indicated on Sunday that four GOP senators are against the bill as is.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
The Kentucky senator reiterated his concern with the debt ceiling increase.
“Look, I want to vote for it. I’m for the tax cuts … but at the same time, I don’t want to raise the debt ceiling $5 trillion,” Paul said.
