If you follow the "boy scout" rule of leaving every file a little better every time you touch it, you will be slowly cleaning up debt while also slowing down velocity. If that is not an acceptable trade-off to the PM, then they need a proper estimate for what the cleanup will take- that's the armor they have to shield you from shit raining down from higher levels when someone wants to know why the new feature timeline is being delayed.
If your tech debt is so bad it can't be incrementally improved, then it can usually be reframed as building a new version of feature X when really you're just rewriting it. Sell it as a performance / stability improvement and voila, it can be prioritized appropriately.
If you have tried all of the above and your work priorities are still being dictated, either the company is in a tight spot (contracts require features on a tight timeline) and you need to muddle through until the next phase, or the company isn't regarding you as a professional and it is time to move on.
No skilled tradesman worth their salt would let management tell them not to clean the shop because that takes time away from building things. The professional dictates the work practices.
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