WASHINGTON – President Biden delivered his first Oval Office address to the nation Friday night to have fun the passage of laws to raise the federal debt ceiling through January 2025 – telling Americans the country narrowly avoided an “economic collapse.”
“Reaching a deal was very essential, and it’s extremely excellent news for the American people,” Biden said, announcing that he would sign the bill Saturday ahead of the Monday deadline to avoid a possible federal default.
“No one got every thing they wanted. However the American people got what they needed,” the president added during his 13-minute speech from behind the Resolute Desk.
“We prevented an economic crisis, an economic collapse. At the identical time, we’re cutting spending and reducing deficits.”
Biden, 80, took advantage of a rare seat after the Senate vote on Thursday night 63-36 approve a bipartisan compromise passed by the House that limited the rise in future spending while modifying social welfare program rules and latest revenues for IRS enforcement.
“My fellow Americans, once I ran for president, I used to be told that the times of bipartisanship were over and that Democrats and Republicans could not work together. But I don’t desire to imagine it,” Biden began his speech.
![President Joe Biden](https://nypost.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/06/NYPICHPDPICT000012115532.jpg?w=1024)
“America mustn’t ever give in to this manner of considering. Look, the one way American democracy can function is thru compromise and consensus. And that is what I’m working on as your president, to forge a bilateral deal where possible and where it’s needed.”
Biden added that he was addressing the nation “to inform the crisis averted … The stakes couldn’t be higher.”
“I need to praise the Senator – Marshal [Kevin] McCarthy, you already know, him and me, us and our teams, we were able to get along and get things done,” the president later said in his statement. “We were honest with one another, completely honest with one another, and we respected one another. Each parties are acting in good faith. Either side kept their word.”
![President Joe Biden](https://nypost.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/06/NYPICHPDPICT000012115792.jpg?w=1024)
The nation’s oldest-ever president, who received negative publicity on Thursday by collapsing onstage at his Air Force Academy graduation after which banging his head on the doorframe of a Marine One helicopter upon returning to the White House, also used the venue to advertise the survival of lots of his key legislative feats through the deal, including the bipartisan infrastructure bill of 2021, the environmental spending package, and the bill that funds expanded health look after veterans.
He also presented himself as a voice for fiscal restraint, despite massive spending during his first two years in office that even Democratic economists blamed for triggering the worst inflation since the early Eighties.
“Almost $8 trillion was added to the national debt in the previous administration, and now we’re turning the tables. And that is good for America,” Biden said, adding that he would push for more “revenue” — including higher taxes on billionaires and corporations and tougher enforcement of what he called “tax fraud for the wealthy.”
“I’ll come back and together with your help I’ll win,” Biden said of the Democratic tax proposals.
![Kevin McCarthy](https://nypost.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/06/NYPICHPDPICT000012028923.jpg?w=1024)
The speech got here at an unusual time for viewers – after the stock market closed for every week, as employees across the country turned off the news and headed home to benefit from the start of the weekend.
“It is not just the number of people that see the address, it is also how the address is portrayed on TV and newspapers – they’ll have the option to see it on the 11 o’clock news and in their newspaper,” said political scientist Martha Kumar, creator of “Managing the President’s Message”.
“People associate speeches in the Oval Office with essential presidential statements, and I believe he respects the history of the presidency and sees it as a moment to stop and reflect on the importance of this event.”
Notable speeches in the Oval Office were made by Ronald Reagan after the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster, George W. Bush after the September 11 attacks and declaration of the invasion of Iraq, and Donald Trump firstly of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“By giving his speech from the Oval Office, he’s signaling the importance he places on what they completed and the bullets they dodged,” Kumar said.
“The emphasis has been on the necessity to do that all along, but now that it has been agreed, it’s a reminder that now we have come much closer than we must always to a dire situation.”
Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) recurrently briefed reporters on the negotiations with the White House throughout the method, irritating some Democrats in Congress.
Kumar said the speaker’s message served his need to keep Republicans engaged, while Biden’s lower-profile public approach reflected his legislative style during his Senate tenure.
Kumar also said that Biden’s victory lap reflects his administration’s sense that the Obama administration, where Biden and plenty of current White House staffers served, didn’t receive enough credit for leading the country through the Great Recession after the 2008 financial crisis.
![House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) sits down for debt ceiling talks with US President Joe Biden in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, D.C.](https://nypost.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/06/2023-06-02T154111Z_584173942_RC2S31A1O08M_RTRMADP_3_USA-DEBT-RATINGS.jpg?w=1024)
The Republican House of Representatives passed the debt ceiling bill 314-117 on Wednesday, losing the support of many Conservative and far-left members but attracting moderates and others who agreed to postpone budget fights to later bills.
The wide margin resulted from condemnation from some fiscal hawks who said more must have been done to contain spending, and from leftists who opposed changes to food stamp laws requiring people aged 50 to 54 to work or train as a minimum of 20 hours every week.
The work requirement in the shape of food stamps already applies to childless adults aged 18 to 49.
The change was offset by relaxed requirements for veterans, the homeless, and up to date foster children.
The laws will limit the annual increase in non-defense discretionary spending to 1% per 12 months.
Critics of the Republican Party said they were outraged by the dearth of a cut, although conservative defenders of the deal say the increases could be lower than inflation, which might effectively lead to cuts.