Biden says he believes US will avoid default at G7 summit

President Biden said at the Group of Seven (G7) summit on Saturday that he believes the United States will avoid a default as the deadline for lawmakers to reach a deal approaches. 

Biden said at a press conference in Hiroshima, Japan, that he is “not at all” worried about the ongoing negotiations to raise the debt ceiling before the limit is reached. He said the process goes in stages, and one meeting might not make progress, but subsequent ones do. 

“I still believe we’ll be able to avoid a default and we’ll get something decent done,” he said. 

Biden’s remarks come after national security adviser Jake Sullivan said earlier in the day, local time, that Biden “expressed confidence” to other world leaders at the summit that the U.S. would not go into default. 

“Here at the G7, you know, countries want to have a sense of how these negotiations are going to play out and the president has expressed confidence that he believes that we could drive to an outcome that we do avoid default,” Sullivan said. 

The G7 is a gathering of the world’s most advanced democratic economies. 

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has said the U.S. could default on its debts as soon as June 1 if an agreement to raise the ceiling is not enacted. 

Republicans have demanded widespread spending cuts in exchange for voting to raise the debt limit, while Biden and Democrats have wanted to minimize cuts tied to the debt ceiling and pass something closer to a clean bill to raise the limit by itself. Biden has said other issues should be addressed separately. 

Republican negotiators briefly paused the talks on Friday, accusing the White House of being “unreasonable” and unwilling to accept GOP demands on spending cuts. The talks resumed Friday evening for the negotiators to have what the lead Republican negotiator called a “candid discussion” about “what’s reasonable and acceptable.” 

Biden has warned that a default could have significant consequences that would shake the country and the world, potentially sending the U.S. into a recession and affecting the global economy as well.