Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen on Tuesday told House Speaker Nancy Pelosi that Congress has just under three weeks to address the looming debt ceiling and avoid near-certain economic calamity.
“We now estimate that Treasury is likely to exhaust its extraordinary measures if Congress has not acted to raise or suspend the debt limit by October 18,” she wrote in a letter.“At that point, we expect Treasury would be left with very limited resources that would be depleted quickly.”
Yellen, who will testify before the Senate later Tuesday morning,warned in a separate statement to lawmakers that failure to suspend or raise the debt limit would lead to the first-ever U.S. default and have severe consequences for the U.S. economy.
“It is imperative that Congress swiftly addresses the debt limit. If it does not, America would default for the first time in history,” she said in her remarks to the Senate Banking Committee. “The full faith and credit of the United States would be impaired, and our country would likely face a financial crisis and economic recession.”
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