Fall will test leaders' ability to keep Congress on rails

WASHINGTON (AP) — Year-end pileups of crucial legislation and the brinkmanship that goes with them are normal behavior for Congress. This autumn, lawmakers are barreling toward battles that are striking for the risks they pose to both parties and their leaders.

Though few doubt that Congress will again extend the government's borrowing authority when it expires in December, no one seems certain of how they'll do it . Democrats don't have the votes yet to enact President Joe Biden's top priorities into law. And Republicans are nervous that Democrats may weaken the filibuster rule that lets the Senate's minority party derail legislation.

Miscalculate and there could be a calamitous federal default, a collapse of Biden’s domestic agenda and, for good measure, a damaging government shutdown. Stir in lawmakers whose nerves are already frayed and are looking to tee up issues for next year's midterm elections, and it's a recipe for confrontations that could damage each party if leaders aren't careful.

Here are gambles each side faces:

DEBT LIMIT

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., blinked last week. And then he said he wouldn't blink again.

McConnell said since summer that Republicans wouldn't supply the votes majority Democrats needed to extend the federal debt limit. But Thursday night, 11 Republicans including McConnell joined Democrats in narrowly overcoming a procedural hurdle so the Senate could subsequently approve $480 billion in fresh borrowing.

The vote staved off until December a first-ever federal default that could disrupt the global economy, delay government checks to Social Security recipients and others and unleash voters’ wrath on lawmakers.

But the partisan dispute will resume in two months.

Republicans want Democrats to raise the debt ceiling...