U.S. debt hits $13 trillion for 1st time; growing at $4.9 b a day

The federal government is now $13 trillion in the red, the Treasury Department reported Wednesday, marking the first time the government has sunk that far into debt and putting a sharp point on the spending debate on Capitol Hill.

Calculated down to the exact penny, the debt totaled $13,050,826,460,886.97 as of Tuesday, leaping nearly $60 billion since Friday, the previous day for which figures were released.

At $13 trillion, that figure has risen by $2.4 trillion in about 500 days since President Obama took office, or an average of $4.9 billion a day. That's almost three times the daily average of $1.7 billion under the previous administration, and led Republicans on Wednesday to place blame squarely at the feet of Mr. Obama and his fellow Democrats.

"A $13 trillion debt is an alarm bell and a wake-up call combined, but Democrats are not even trying to pass a budget," said House Minority Leader John A. Boehner, Ohio Republican. "How out of touch can Washington Democrats get? Instead of continuing to pay lip service to this issue, President Obama should call on congressional Democrats to pass a budget that provides the fiscal discipline economists say is needed to create jobs and grow our economy."

The White House would not comment for the record, but an official speaking on the condition of anonymity said the administration is "committed to restoring fiscal responsibility."

Spokesmen for the Democratic chairmen of the House and Senate budget committees didn't return messages Wednesday.

In the budget he submitted to Congress in February, the president acknowledged that his plans are not enough to reduce annual deficits to sustainable levels, which he said amounted to a yearly shortfall of 3 percent of gross domestic product. Mr. Obama called for a fiscal commission to make recommendations to close the gap, and commission members at their meeting last week said even that may not be enough.

"I think we've got to be more ambitious than that," said Alice Rivlin, former director of the Congressional Budget Office. "We really have to pick a trajectory that has the debt coming down. And there's probably no magic of whether it comes down 1 percent a year or 2 percent a year or whatever. But it's got to come down over time."