Should the U.S. commit cash and credit to bail out foreign countries’ debt? The Senate will vote today on an amendment by Jim DeMint, R-S.C., that would prevent the IMF from using its U.S. accounts for that purpose:
[T]he amendment would rescind authorization that the U.S. gave the IMF in 2009, allowing it to use $8 billion in dues and up to $100 billion in a credit arrangement with the international institution.
The Republican proposal wouldn’t be able to take back the $8 billion already sent to the IMF, but would direct the U.S. representative at the IMF that he no longer can support the group’s use of up to $100 billion in U.S. credit to support bailouts of foreign nations. The IMF has access to lines of credit from other countries, but losing access to some U.S. funds could complicate attempts to stabilize the sovereign debt crisis in Europe.
The Republican proposal wouldn’t be able to take back the $8 billion already sent to the IMF, but would direct the U.S. representative at the IMF that he no longer can support the group’s use of up to $100 billion in U.S. credit to support bailouts of foreign nations. The IMF has access to lines of credit from other countries, but losing access to some U.S. funds could complicate attempts to stabilize the sovereign debt crisis in Europe.
If it passes, we could have another separation of powers crisis, like the one over Libya:
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President Barack Obama has asserted in a signing statement after a House vote on an IMF provision that he doesn’t recognize Congress’s ability to tell the administration how to vote at the IMF.
