Abby Finkenauer of Cedar Rapids, one of the Democrats competing to run against Republican Senator Chuck Grassley next year, says as a member of the U.S. House she voted to raise the government’s borrowing limit during the Trump Administration and Grassley should do the same during the Biden Administration.
Last week, Grassley voted against raising the so-called debt ceiling. Finkenauer says that vote is an example of the dysfunction in Washington. “This is the type of stuff that’s just absolutely ridiculous right now…’Oh my gosh, are Republicans going to do this? Are Democrats going to do this?’ and in the meantime they’re worried about whether they’re going to be able to get their Social Security check or not,” Finkenauer says.
Finkenauer says these kind of procedural battles have to stop. “You’ve got Iowans, you’ve got people across the country watching and they’re going: ‘Wow, this is why Washington, D.C. doesn’t function,'” Finkenauer says. “They want a government that actually works and things like this, obviously, we should be looking at and making sure that we can do the work versus continuing to play politics time and again.”
The Senate’s Republican leader has said the GOP will not provide the votes to raise the government’s borrowing limit again when the next deadline approaches in December. Finkenauer says she voted to pay the government’s bills during her term in the U.S. House and will do so again if she’s elected to the U.S. Senate.