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Article snippet: WASHINGTON — Senator Mitch McConnell thinks Democrats were a tad premature in exuberantly celebrating the surprise spending deal they struck last week with President Trump. “Let’s put it this way,” Mr. McConnell, the Kentucky Republican and majority leader, said Monday in an interview for The New York Times podcast “The New Washington.” “The deal is not quite as good as my counterpart thought it was.” The reason? Mr. McConnell said that he insisted the newly passed legislation preserve Treasury’s ability to apply “extraordinary measures” and shift money within government accounts to pay off debt and extend federal borrowing power. That will delay the need for another increase in the debt limit well beyond the December deadline that Democrats have been trumpeting as their big moment of leverage. And Mr. McConnell said he did so over the objections of Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the Democratic leader and aforementioned counterpart. In fact, Mr. McConnell said, the debt limit will not have to be increased until well into 2018, taking that volatile subject off the table for the December spending talks, and eliminating the Democrats’ most dangerous bargaining chip in the first round of negotiations. Separating the debt ceiling from the deadline to fund the government also addresses one of the main complaints of conservatives who were unhappy that last week’s legislation linked hurricane relief and the increase in the debt limit, forcing many to either cast a de... Link to the full article to read more