President Obama met with congressional leaders Sunday evening but failed to break a partisan stalemate over how to raise the federal borrowing limit. Democratic and Republican lawmakers are divided on how far the parties should go in cutting the deficit over the next decade or whether tax cuts and entitlement reductions should be a part of any deal. Last week, news reports indicated President Obama is now backing significant cuts to Medicare spending and retirement benefits under Social Security in return for Republican support. Independent Bernie Sanders of Vermont warned this weekend that such cuts to Social Security could put some 245,000 people into poverty. U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner appeared on Meet the Press on Sunday.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner: “If Congress doesn’t act by the 2nd, they will put our—they will downgrade our credit—first time in history—and if that happens, you’re going to see catastrophic damage across the American economy and across the global economy. It’s not something we can really—failure is not an option.”