Contradicting other Republican leaders, House Majority Leader Dick Armey said Congress will refuse to raise the federal debt ceiling next month unless President Clinton agrees to GOP budget-cutting measures.
Armey's statements on NBC's "Meet the Press" put Republicans on a collision course with the White House that could bring the fiscal integrity of the country into question.House Republicans in particular have been reluctant to pass stopgap funding measures for the 1996 budget and raise the debt ceiling until the White House moves closer to the Republicans' seven-year balanced budget plan.
Talks on the balanced budget broke down last week, and it's unlikely there will be any progress in settling the differences before President Clinton delivers his State of the Union address on Tuesday. Congress returns from a two-week recess on Monday.
"Let's not play games with the future of this country or the economy of this country," White House Chief of Staff Leon Panetta said later on "Meet the Press," warning that Clinton would not accept a debt limit extension with strings attached.
Last week on the same news program, House Budget Committee Chairman John Kasich, R-Ohio, gave assurances that Republicans would extend the government's borrowing authority before Feb. 15, when interest due to bondholders would push the debt beyond the current $4.9 trillion limit.
"John Kasich's willingness to vote for it to the contrary," said Armey, R-Texas, "it's not coming through the House unless it carries with it something that is a substantial share of our agenda of decreasing the size and the intrusiveness of government. ...
"We have a House that is committed to getting this job done, and we're going to use every instrument we can to move the ball forward," he said.
Armey said he would support linking the debt limit increase to language terminating the Commerce Department, a top priority of the Republican Congress, and preventing the Treasury secretary from "ever again raiding the trust funds of federal workers' retirement programs."
After Clinton last November vetoed a debt ceiling measure with similar restrictions, Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin twice tapped government trust funds to avoid exceeding the borrowing limit.
Rubin said last week that he would be forced to take further actions so the government can avoid default after Feb. 15 and suggested that this time finding appropriate accounting maneuvers might be more difficult. He said a legal review was continuing because proposals being considered did not as yet "fully pass muster."
Armey said Congress would probably agree to another temporary spending bill when the current measure expires on Jan. 26, avoiding a third government shutdown. He said those government programs that haven't had their budgets approved would be funded at about 75 percent of 1995 levels.
Panetta said the president would sign such a bill.
But he predicted that a GOP attempt to use the debt ceiling to force Clinton's hand on the balanced budget would fail. "Raising these kinds of blackmail approaches to try to get their agenda adopted just has not worked. It's been a disaster."
Panetta also took a swipe at House Speaker Newt Gingrich, R-Ga., for saying last week that Clinton's opposition to the Republican tax cut plan was pushing the country into a recession. "Maybe that's possibly what he wishes for in order to hurt the country for the future," Panetta said.
The Senate has been less eager than the House to confront Clinton on 1996 spending and the debt ceiling, but Senate Majority Whip Trent Lott, R-Miss., asked about Armey's comments, agreed that the debt ceiling bill will not be "clean."
"There are two branches of government here and we have to have our role in developing that action" to extend the debt limit, he said.
House Minority Leader Dick Gephardt, D-Mo., appearing with Lott on ABC's "This Week With David Brinkley," responded that "I thought what Dick Armey said this morning was the height of irresponsibility. We're fooling here with the credit worthiness of the United States."