Rubio May Vote Against Raising Debt Limit

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) outlined his case against raising the nation’s debt limit on Wednesday.

In an op-ed for The Wall Street Journal, the freshman conservative lawmaker said he will not support increasing the limit unless several conditions are met.

“I will vote to defeat an increase in the debt limit unless it is the last one we ever authorize and is accompanied by a plan for fundamental tax reform, an overhaul of our regulatory structure, a cut to discretionary spending, a balanced-budget amendment, and reforms to save Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid,” he wrote.

It is unclear whether most of those wishes will come true. An amendment to balance the nation’s budget would require 67 votes in the Senate, while proposals to reform the tax code and entitlements have yet to muster broad bipartisan backing.

Officials at the U.S. Treasury Department say that the current limit, set at approximately $14.3 trillion, will be reached sometime in the next two months. With the nation’s debt at around $14.1 trillion and rising, Republicans have not so quietly expressed concern over allowing more borrowing to occur.

“Some say we will go into default if we don’t increase the debt limit. But if we simply raise it once again, without a real plan to bring spending under control and get our economy growing, America faces the very real danger of a catastrophic economic crisis,” Rubio said.

However, earlier this year, President Obama’s top econimic advisor, Austan Goolsbee, said the impacts of allowing the Treasury Department to default on its loan obligations would be “catastrophic.”

Rubio isn’t alone in wanting to hold out on authorizing more borrowing. GOP Sens. Jim DeMint (S.C.), Pat Toomey (Pa.), Mike Lee (Utah), and Jerry Moran (Kan.) have all expressed opposition to the move.

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