U.S. House Democrats move to force debt-limit increase as default date looms: New York Times

NEW YORK, May 2 (Xinhua) -- U.S. House Democratic leaders who have been quietly planning a strategy to force a debt ceiling increase to avert default began taking steps on Tuesday to deploy their secret weapon, according to The New York Times.

"The only clue to the gambit was in the title of the otherwise obscure hodgepodge of a bill: 'The Breaking the Gridlock Act'," said the report. "But the 45-page legislation, introduced without fanfare in January by a little-known Democrat, Representative Mark DeSaulnier of California, is part of a confidential, previously unreported, strategy Democrats have been plotting for months to quietly smooth the way for action by Congress to avert a devastating federal default if debt ceiling talks remain deadlocked."