It's not being in debt, it's having so much debt you have to borrow to pay off the interest in your debt is when there's a problem
This isn't how it works. Look up MMT.
The national debt is just a record of how much money the government has invested in its people historically. Nobody needs to "pay off" the debts.
The government pays out interest on government bonds that it has chosen to issue when their date becomes due. Because this amount is in U.S. dollars and the U.S. issues that currency, the government can always pay
out the interests on these bonds to citizens, corporations or foreign governments. There is no risk of defaulting on this "debt". The money doesn't need to be raised through taxes first.