GOP Congressman: Obama Can Mint Trillion Dollar Coin
It’s looking more and more likely that congressional Republicans aren’t actually serious about blocking an increase the debt ceiling, a move that could push us into default. But if they have a change of heart and decide to push us to the brink, one of President Obama’s best options for mitigating the fallout just got an unlikely boost from none other than Oregon’s Congressman Greg Walden, who serves in the House Republican leadership.
Walden, it turns out, has written legislation that would bar the executive branch from minting coins of any denomination. That would include the much-talked-about trillion dollar coin, which would allow the U.S. government to continue to meet its obligation in the event Congress refuses to raise the debt limit. And, as Joe Weisenthal points out, by introducing legislation to ban such a maneuver, Walden is implicitly acknowledging that under current law, the trillion dollar coin is a perfectly legal and workable way to get around the debt limit.
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