House Republicans unveil their plan to raise the debt ceiling for just one year — and it already faces hurdles from its own party

• Kevin McCarthy unveiled his bill to raise the debt ceiling on Wednesday.
• It would raise the limit by $1.5 trillion, or until March 31, 2024, whichever happens first.
• It includes banning student-loan forgiveness and strengthening work requirements on welfare programs.

House Republicans have officially unveiled their legislation to raise the debt ceiling — and they're setting themselves up to go through this chaos all over again next year.

On Wednesday, Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy released his 320-page bill to raise the debt ceiling by $1.5 trillion, or until March 31, 2024, whichever comes first. McCarthy told reporters that he plans to bring the bill to the House floor for a vote next week, and he has expressed confidence that he will have sufficient votes to get it passed through his chamber.

In remarks on the House floor, McCarthy said that the "Limit, Save, Grow, Act of 2023" will "responsibly" raise the debt limit, while racking up $4.5 trillion in savings for Americans. Those savings will come at the expense of keeping government spending to fiscal year 2022 levels, clawing back Covid funding, expanding work requirements for welfare programs and food stamps, ending the student-loan payment pause and blocking relief, protecting gas ovens, and rolling back large parts of the Inflation Reduction Act. The nonpartisan CBO has found that a GOP proposal to rescind IRS spending from the IRA, included in this bill, would add a net $114 billion to the deficit.

"The Limit, Save, Grow Act will limit federal spending, save taxpayers trillions of dollars, grow our economy, and lift the debt limit into next year," McCarthy and other GOP leaders said in a statement. "This legislation will make us less dependent on the whims of the Chinese Communist Party and curb high inflation, all without touching Social Security or Medicare — because no one is hurt more by inflation than seniors."

"We owe it to the American people to save the economy, stand up for hardworking taxpayers, and return to a path to fiscal responsibility," they continued. "President Biden has a choice: come to the table and stop playing partisan political games — or cover his ears, refuse to negotiate, and risk bumbling his way into the first default in our nation's history."

But some GOP lawmakers have not been fully on board with McCarthy's proposal. Rep. Nancy Mace, for example, told Axios that she's concerned that receiving the bill text, and voting on it just days later, is too short of a timeframe.

"To turn it around in a week, that's pretty short order," she said. 

"There are still some negotiations that are going to happen within the conference to put a little more meat around it," she added. "I'm waiting for more information. Right now I'm not there yet."

And some Republicans don't even want to raise the debt ceiling at all. 

"I don't like raising the debt ceiling," Rep. Tim Burchett told HuffPost. "I didn't vote to raise it under Trump. And right now that's where I'm at. But I'd like to see some details of all the stuff everybody's talking about because it's very fluid right now, it seems."

Defaulting on the nation's debt would throw the country's economy — and the world — into an unprecedented crisis. Even a short default would lead to a million Americans losing their jobs and a mild recession, according to Moody's Analytics.

Up until now, Democrats and Republicans have been in a bit of a stalemate on how to actually move forward. President Joe Biden continues to insist upon a clean increase, where the ceiling is raised without any add-ons or addendums. But McCarthy and Republicans have insisted that a hike to the debt ceiling needs to be accompanied by spending cuts. In remarks at the New York Stock Exchange, McCarthy said that "'it's time for Americans to get back to work," although employment data shows that the share of prime-age Americans working is at its highest since May 2001.

Biden hit back at McCarthy's proposals, saying that he's proposing "huge cuts to important programs that millions of working- and middle-class Americans count on" while pushing to lower taxes on the wealthy and big corporations.

"Folks, it's the same old trickle-down dressed up in MAGA clothing," Biden said. "Only worse."

Earlier on Wednesday, the Problem Solvers Caucus — comprised of moderate Democrats and Republicans — unveiled their own plan to raise the debt ceiling, which included suspending the debt ceiling through December 31, 2023, to allow time to complete next year's budget, allowing for an automatic debt ceiling increase through February 28, 2025.

But even if all Republicans are not on board with McCarthy's plan, some of them are confident the US won't hurdle into an unprecedented default on its debt.

"They're not going to let that happen, dude," Burchett told HuffPost. "It'll be midnight, everybody's holding hands and something will happen. It always does."