By David Lawder
BENGALURU, Feb 25 (Reuters) - U.S. Treasury Secretary
Janet Yellen said on Saturday she was willing to negotiate with
Republicans in Congress over the Biden administration's budget
proposal to be unveiled next month - but not as a condition of
raising the debt ceiling.
Yellen told Reuters in an interview that the Biden budget
for fiscal 2024 would contain "substantial deficit reduction
over the next decade.
"And we're going to show how we're going to accomplish
that," she said on the sidelines of a G20 finance leaders
meeting. "Republicans need to put a plan on the table, and a
negotiation or discussion about that is certainly possible, but
it can't be a condition or precondition for raising the debt
ceiling."
Republicans who hold a slim majority in the House of
Representatives, have demanded that President Joe Biden agree to
spending cuts as in exchange for raising the debt ceiling.
Yellen said the United States "can't bargain over whether or
not we're going to pay our bills. It's simply a fundamental
responsibility a government has."
Yellen said that tax receipts collected around the April 15
filing deadline could allow for some adjustments in the
department's estimate of when it would no longer be able to pay
all of the government's bills without an increase in the $31.4
trillion debt limit.
The Treasury has not yet changed its early June estimate for
that time frame, made last month, although the Congressional
Budget Office has estimated the Treasury's' cash and
extraordinary borrowing measures could last until September.
"The tax receipts will be informative about when the likely
X-date is," she said, referring to a common Washington term for
a potential default date. "We felt comfortable and we told
Congress that we could at least get to early June."
(Reporting by David Lawder; Editing by Frank Jack Daniel)
david.lawder.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net))
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