Updated 2:26 p.m. - Republicans will act to push the deadline at which the U.S. government would default on the national debt to mid-April, demanding that Democrats pass a budget in exchange for a long-term extension in borrowing authority.

House Republicans said they will take up legislation next week to temporarily extend the debt limit for three months, past the mid-February deadline when the government, according to the Treasury, would reach its legal limit on borrowing to finance the government's obligations.

"Next week, we will authorize a three month temporary debt limit increase to give the Senate and House time to pass a budget," House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., said. "Furthermore, if the Senate or House fails to pass a budget in that time, members of Congress will not be paid by the American people for failing to do their job. No budget, no pay."

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"We are encouraged that there are signs that congressional Republicans may back off their insistence on holding our economy hostage to extract drastic cuts in Medicare, education and programs middle class families depend on," White House press secretary Jay Carney said in response. "Congress must pay its bills and pass a clean debt limit increase without further delay."

Such a move would push the deadline for default to mid-April, around the time at which the House and Senate are typically expected to produce and pass budgets. To secure a longer-term extension in the debt ceiling, Republicans said Friday, the Senate must finally pass a budget.

"Before there is any long-term debt limit increase, a budget should be passed that cuts spending," House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, told GOP lawmakers at the conclusion of their retreat, according to remarks released by his office.

Republicans have vocally criticized the Democratic-controlled Senate for failing to produce a budget in recent years, a mark of the upper chamber's unseriousness in the eyes of many conservatives. Democrats have used the two budgets authorized by House Republicans as a political cudgel against the GOP; the Senate's failure to pass a budget has been partially meant to escape similar political culpability.

"We are going to pursue strategies that will obligate the Senate to finally join the House in confronting the government’s spending problem," Boehner said. "The principle is simple: no budget, no pay."

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Republicans' new strategy cuts against a strain of thought within the GOP that suggests that default would not be as catastrophic for the economy as many experts have warned. These Republicans have argued for using the debt ceiling deadline -- and the specter of default -- as leverage to extract spending cuts or entitlement reforms from President Barack Obama.

"It is reassuring to see Republicans beginning to back off their threat to hold our economy hostage," Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said in response. "If the House can pass a clean debt ceiling increase to avoid default and allow the United States to meet its existing obligations, we will be happy to consider it."

But Republicans are facing increasing political pressure to act, and prevent default. The party's favorable/unfavorable rating was near its worst ever in Thursday's NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll following a drawn-out battle over the fiscal cliff, a political fiasco many Republicans aren't eager to repeat. And Obama gave a press conference earlier this week explicitly refuse bargaining over the debt limit.

J. Scott Applewhite / AP

Speaker of the House John Boehner, R-Ohio, right, and House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., left, walk to a second Republican conference meeting to discuss the fiscal cliff bill passed by the Senate Monday night and now awaits a vote in the GOP-controlled House, at the Capitol in Washington on Tuesday, Jan. 1, 2013.

In recent days, high-profile Republicans had steadily backed away from the prospect of defaulting on the national debt, sending signals that they'll extend the nation's borrowing authority for at least a little while longer.

"We will raise the debt ceiling. We're not going to default on our debt," Texas Sen. John Cornyn, Republicans' No. 2 in the upper chamber, told the editorial board of the Houston Chronicle. "I will tell you unequivocally, we're not going to default."

And Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., the House Budget Committee chairman and former vice presidential nominee, told reporters at House Republicans' retreat on Thursday that lawmakers were "discussing the virtue of a short term debt limit extension."

They join Republican Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, in acknowledging the need for a debt ceiling increase; more and more members of the conservative media have also questioned the political wisdom behind using the debt limit as leverage in the spending debate.

What's more, traditionally GOP-friendly business groups have privately urged lawmakers against wrangling over the debt limit, which has become a factor weighing upon Republicans' strategy.

"There was serious displeasure and concern within the financial services community over the way Republicans handled the debt ceiling issue in 2011," said one business advocate tied into Republican politics. "It was the financial community that helped deliver the resources for a Republican takeover in 2010 and now House Republicans are at risk of jeopardizing their credibility with their free market allies. Cutting spending and helping the economy are not mutually exclusive, but republicans have found a way to make it seem that way in the eyes of voters."

President Barack Obama ratcheted up pressure on congressional Republicans to authorize an increase in the nation’s debt limit, warning of potentially catastrophic results for many Americans and the overall economy if the U.S. were to default on its obligations.

“The issue here is whether or not America pays its bills,” Obama said at a press conference on Monday, the last of his first term in office. “We are not a deadbeat nation.”

Jason Reed / Reuters

President Barack Obama is reflected in a mirror as he speaks during a news conference in the East Room of the White House, Jan. 14, 2013.

Anticipating a politically bruising fight this spring with the GOP – members of which in Congress have increasingly and openly discussed the prospect of refusing to raise the debt ceiling or allowing a government shutdown – Obama urged lawmakers to avoid using the vote over the debt limit as a point of leverage.

And the president sought to frame the risks of default in stark terms. He warned markets would go “haywire” if Congress would not act; Obama said that interest rates would rise, and checks to Social Security beneficiaries and military veterans would cease.

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But as some Democrats urge the administration to consider options to sidestep Congress and assert the authority to unilaterally authorize more borrowing, Obama all but ruled out these sorts of “Plan B” options.

“If the House and the Senate wants to give me the authority so they don’t have to take these tough votes… I’m happy to take it,” he said. But, Obama added: “There are no magic tricks here, no loopholes. There’s no easy way out.”

All but ruling out these fallback maneuvers, Obama’s pronouncement all but ensures another incident of brinksmanship versus Republicans in Congress.

The past two years of Obama’s presidency were marked by showdowns with House Republicans on taxes and spending that turned acrimonious and extended in most cases to the last possible minute. Fights over extending government funding and raising the nation’s debt limit took the government to the verge of shutdown and default, respectively, in 2011. And the unresolved issues from those debates culminated in the “fiscal cliff” showdown at the end of last year.

Though Republicans eventually acceded to Obama’s demand that taxes be allowed to rise on the wealthiest Americans, something that was passed with mostly Democratic votes, the fiscal cliff agreement pushed back a series of automatic spending cuts for two months. As a result, the deadline at which Congress must authorize the government to borrow more basically overlaps with the deadline at which the government runs out of money for its day-to-day operations. Republicans have argued that tax rates are now settled, and have suggested they intend to use those rapidly-approaching deadlines to extract new spending cuts and entitlement reforms that were absent from the New Year’s deal to handle the tax component of the fiscal cliff.

But these battles could exhaust much of the political capital won by Obama during his re-election last November. The president will formally be sworn into his second term on Sunday. And while planning for that second term is well underway, top priorities like confirming new cabinet secretaries, reforming the nation’s immigration system and passing new measures to address gun violence might be imperiled by a protracted and bloody fight with Republicans over spending.

Obama said that he would detail one of those initiatives, his administration’s proposals to curb gun violence, later this week. But even as the president renewed his support for stricter magazine regulations and tighter background checks – along with a ban on assault weapons – Obama nodded to the difficulty in passing those proposals.

“Will all of them get through this Congress? I don't know,” he said.

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For their part, Republicans argue that Obama and his administration have been largely unserious about actually addressing spending – the primary cause of the mounting national debt, in the GOP’s view. Republicans cite the president’s request for more infrastructure spending as part of his fiscal cliff negotiations as indicative of the White House’s disinterest in actually cutting spending.

“The president and his allies need to get serious about spending, and the debt-limit debate is the perfect time for it,” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said in a statement. 

In a statement following the president’s press conference, House Speaker John Boehner said, “The consequences of failing to increase the debt ceiling are real, but so too are the consequences of allowing our spending problem to go unresolved. Without meaningful action, the debt will continue to act as an anchor on our economy, costing American jobs and endangering our children's future."

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But much of Obama’s remarks on Monday were directed toward framing the political terms of that debate, which might dictate the outcome of these impending fights as much as ideological motives.

“It would be a self-inflicted wound on the economy. It would slow down our growth, might tip us into recession. And ironically it would probably increase our deficit,” Obama said of the risk of default. “So to even entertain the idea of this happening, of the United States of America not paying its bills, is irresponsible. It's absurd.”