President Barack Obama
was scheduled to meet on Wednesday with chief executives of major banks
to discuss the government shutdown and the looming deadline to raise
the nation's debt limit, the White House said.
Bank chiefs included Lloyd Blankfein of Goldman Sachs, Michael Corbat of Citigroup, Jamie Dimon of JPMorgan Chase & Co, and Brian Moynihan of Bank of America. The meeting was set for noon EDT.
Congressional
Republicans and the White House are in a stalemate over government
funding, which has forced the first government shutdown in 17 years.
Republicans, seeking to stop Obama's signature health care law, have
tied spending bills for the fiscal year that started October 1 to
defunding or delaying the law, a course rejected by the president and
his fellow Democrats.
While the
government closure has already had repercussions from frustrated
tourists turned away from national parks to canceled stops on Obama's
Asia trip, the deadline for raising the nation's debt limit poses a much
graver risk.
If Congress fails to
raise the $16.7 trillion borrowing cap, the United States would go into
default, likely triggering financial market shockwaves around the world.
Conservative
Republicans have signaled they will take the same tactic on the debt
limit as they did on government funding by seeking to dismantle or put
off the health care law. The president has refused to negotiate over
raising the debt limit.
Also due to
attend the meeting with the president and Vice President Joe Biden are
Robert Benmosche of AIG, James Gorman of Morgan Stanley, and John Stumpf
of Wells Fargo, among others.
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