From Grok:
The U.S. government is currently operating under a continuing resolution (CR) that extends funding until March 14, 2025. This means that while there is funding in place for government operations, it is not a full-year budget but rather a temporary measure to avoid a government shutdown. The passage of this CR was necessary as Congress did not finalize the regular appropriations bills for the fiscal year 2025 before the previous funding lapsed. This situation reflects ongoing challenges in the U.S. budgetary process, where full-year funding through individual appropriations bills has been elusive, leading to reliance on CRs or omnibus bills.
Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen announced that the U.S. would need to start using “extraordinary measures” on January 21, 2025, due to the reinstatement of the statutory debt ceiling. The debt ceiling, which limits the amount of money the U.S. government can borrow to pay for existing obligations, had been suspended until January 1, 2025, under the Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2023. Once this suspension ended, the debt limit was reestablished at the level of outstanding debt at that moment.
Yellen’s statement was not that the U.S. was “out of money” in the traditional sense but that the Treasury would need to employ special accounting maneuvers to manage cash flow and avoid defaulting on its obligations due to hitting the newly reinstated debt ceiling. These measures include stopping contributions to certain government funds like the Civil Service Retirement and Disability Fund and the Postal Service Retiree Health Benefits Fund, essentially using these funds as temporary sources of cash to keep the government operational until Congress could act to either raise or suspend the debt ceiling again.
The timing of this announcement, right before the transition to a new administration, underscores the urgency for Congress to address the debt ceiling to prevent a potential default, which could have significant economic repercussions.
Just do what the Democrats did. Pass a 2025 Fiscal Responsibility Act; with an expiration date of Jan. 01,2030.