From Roll Call: Debt ceiling hangs over Democrats’ legislative home stretch

In 2305 we will start to look at the budgeting process. Here's what's up now: 

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Democrats have a brief respite to try to raise the debt limit before the Treasury Department runs out of borrowing authority as early as December. But the path forward is littered with procedural questions and political obstacles.

Senate Republicans are insisting Democrats raise the debt ceiling without GOP help by using the filibuster-proof reconciliation process. Democrats have largely rejected that option, which Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer says would be a “drawn-out, convoluted and risky” endeavor, though Speaker Nancy Pelosi on CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday acknowledged that reconciliation is “one path,” but not the preferred one.

And, according to budget experts, reconciliation procedures appear to require lawmakers to vote for a specific debt limit amount, at least during the initial phase. That’s a potential political problem for Democrats’ preferred approach of taking the debt ceiling off the table until after the 2022 midterms, which could require raising the limit by something like $2 trillion — topping $30 trillion for the first time.