WASHINGTON — The partisan fight over raising the debt ceiling has temporarily derailed Congress’ work on the annual defense authorization bill.

The House’s markup of the fiscal 2024 National Defense Authorization Act — initially scheduled for this week — is now postponed until Republicans and Democrats can reach a spending agreement as part of the gridlocked debt ceiling negotiations, Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., told Defense News on Wednesday.

“I’m hopeful that as the speaker [of the House] meets with the president and the other congressional leaders on Friday that they can get some real specifics that get us closer to an agreement,” Scalise said at a news conference after the weekly Republican caucus meeting. “For now, we’re going to wait and see how that process plays out before starting the NDAA. But we’ve already been doing work on what those policies would look like on a national defense authorization.”

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., met with President Joe Biden and other congressional leaders at the White House on Tuesday to discuss the debt ceiling, but the parties involved noted no progress was made on the issue.

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has told Congress that the U.S. will default on its debts by June 1. absent congressional action to raise the ceiling.

House Republicans passed a bill last month along party lines that would raise the debt ceiling in exchange for several concessions, including $130 billion in discretionary spending cuts. The defense budget accounts for roughly half of annual discretionary spending.

Democrats are arguing Congress should pass a clean debt ceiling bill as congressional Republicans did under former President Donald Trump.

The Senate has not officially scheduled a markup for its version of the FY24 NDAA.

“We will be prepared to pass a robust NDAA,” said Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., the chair of the House Republican Conference and a member of the House Armed Services Committee. “The NDAA is the one bill that every single year we’ve been able to deliver and pass, certainly since I’ve been in Congress, but for decades.”

This is a developing story. Stay tuned for updates.