President Joe Biden witnessed some of the lowest approval ratings of his administration despite moderating price levels and the Democratic Party avoiding severe midterm losses, according to a new poll from Reuters.

Some 40% of Americans currently approve of Biden’s job performance, marking a slight increase from the commander-in-chief’s approval rating of 39% one month earlier. The metric fell as low as 36% in May and June of last year, during which inflation reached the highest levels of his tenure as a result of soaring gas prices.

Biden is presently managing fallout from the discovery of classified documents in his private office at the Penn Biden Center, a think tank in Washington, D.C., on November 2. Attorneys have since located more classified documents at Biden’s home in Wilmington, Delaware, on three separate occasions: an unspecified number found in the garage on December 20, one found in Biden’s study on January 11, and five more found in the study on January 12.

Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed former U.S. Attorney Robert Hur, who served during the Trump administration, as special counsel in the investigation. “We’re fully cooperating, looking forward to getting this resolved quickly,” Biden said in a recent statement. “I think you’re gonna find there’s nothing there. I have no regrets. I’m following what the lawyers have told me they want me to do.”

A handful of positive economic developments have meanwhile led Biden and other senior officials to claim that their initiatives have been successful. Price levels declined slightly last month amid a decrease in energy prices: year-over-year inflation fell from 7.1% in November to 6.5% in December, marking the largest overall decline in nearly three years while food and shelter prices continue to increase, according to a report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen remarked during an interview with NPR that inflation “has really been quite moderate, quite low for the last six months or so” even as price increases remain well above the 2% annual rate seen before the lockdown-induced recession. White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre likewise dismissed significant layoffs at prominent technology companies while claiming that Biden “inherited an economic crisis and turned it into the strongest two years of job growth on record.”

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) has a dismal 20% approval rating, according to the poll from Reuters, indicating a rocky start for the lawmaker after he was elected to the top position only after making concessions to holdouts in the House Freedom Caucus. Among the arrangements was a pact to avoid budgets that increase the debt ceiling, a deal that came shortly before the statutory limit on the government’s obligations was surpassed.

Democrats retained their control of the Senate following the midterm elections, while Republicans gained a slim majority in the House. Some 38% of Americans have a positive view of the former chamber, according to Reuters, while 35% have a positive view of the latter. Lackluster victories for Republicans occurred despite several polls showing the likelihood of blowout wins across the country; many commentators had forecasted that dismal economic performance and low approval ratings for Biden would translate to Democratic losses.

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen asserted on Saturday that House Republicans attempting to negotiate spending cuts amid the renewed debt ceiling battle are “very irresponsible.”

The official informed House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) and other lawmakers in a recent letter that the debt ceiling, an arbitrary cap on the national debt established by Congress, exceeded the statutory limit of nearly $31.4 trillion as of this week. Yellen said in an interview with the Associated Press that House Republicans calling for spending cuts are risking a “self-imposed calamity in the United States and the world economy.”

“This is about paying bills that have already been incurred by decisions with this and past Congresses and it’s not about new spending,” she said, commenting that sustainable expenditures cannot be “negotiated over whether or not we’re going to pay our bills.”

Yellen, who is currently touring multiple African countries for a trip centered on the continent’s economic development, said that the position of withholding a debt ceiling hike until more spending cuts occur is “a very irresponsible thing to do” and added the position could have serious consequences even before “the day of reckoning.” Her letter to lawmakers said that new investments into the Civil Service Retirement and Disability Fund and the Postal Service Retiree Health Benefits Fund have been tentatively suspended; the “extraordinary measures” adopted by the Treasury Department to keep the government solvent are expected to last until June.

Yellen nevertheless forecasts that lawmakers will defuse the situation because they understand the economic calamity that would be spurred by the federal government defaulting on obligations. Beyond the possibility of a default, diminished trust in the government’s ability to repay debt can also cause “markets to become quite concerned,” she continued.

The federal government has relied upon sizable budget deficits over the past several decades to continue deficit-driven expenditures. Social Security, Medicare, and other health initiatives constituted 46% of the federal budget during the last fiscal year, according to data from the Treasury Department, even as maintenance costs on the national debt soar due to the present rise in interest rates across the economy.

Yellen, who previously directed the Federal Reserve, said in another notice last week that “failure to meet the government’s obligations” would mean “irreparable harm” to the domestic economy and the global financial system. “Presidents and Treasury Secretaries of both parties have made clear that the government must not default on any obligation of the United States,” she wrote. “Yet the use of extraordinary measures enables the government to meet its obligations for only a limited amount of time.”

As McCarthy plans to meet with President Joe Biden to discuss the debt ceiling negotiations, House Republicans have called upon their Democratic counterparts to determine possibilities for spending cuts. Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith (R-MO) remarked in a statement that “reckless spending” has produced “the worst spike in prices in forty years” and resultant decreases in living standards.

“Instead of attacking his political opponents, President Biden should be spending this time working with House Republicans to address the debt ceiling in a way that imposes some fiscal sanity. Otherwise, the President is simply scheduling America’s next debt crisis,” he continued. “We can find commonsense solutions to halt reckless spending, put American’s finances on stable footing, and ensure we meet our debt obligations.”