White House Cancels $5B in Student Debt for 74K Borrowers

Facts

• US Pres. Joe Biden's administration on Friday announced that 73.6K student loan borrowers will have their debt forgiven as part of a $4.9B plan that brings the number of borrowers receiving loan forgiveness under the administration to 3.7M.¹
• The Department of Education released a statement saying that the discharges come from fixes to income-driven repayment (IDR) forgiveness and Public Service Loan Forgiveness. The administration has forgiven a total of $136.6B in student loans.²
• The plan will see $1.7B go to 29.7K borrowers through “adjustments to IDR payment counts” and $3.2B go to 43.9K public service workers.²
• The nearly 44K public service workers include teachers, nurses, firefighters, and social workers, among others with 10 or more years of service. The other 30K have been making loan payments for at least 20 years. Last week, the administration said that it would erase remaining loan balances for people with less than $12K in loans and who have been making payments for at least 10 years.³
• Biden campaigned on forgiving at least $10K of student loan debt for every borrower, and he pushed a $400B plan to cancel debt for tens of millions of people. However, the Supreme Court struck down the legislation last June, claiming that the executive doesn’t have the authority to cancel that much consumer debt without Congressional authorization.⁴
• Last month, the Biden administration canceled $4.8B in student debt for more than 80K borrowers. According to Penn Wharton University of Pennsylvania's budget model, Biden’s Savings on Valuable Education (SAVE) plan will cost $475B over the next decade.⁵

Sources: ¹NBC Los Angeles, ²US Department of Education, ³CBS, ⁴CNBC and ⁵FOX News.

Narratives

• Republican narrative, as provided by PJ Media. Joe Biden’s administration continues to defy last year’s Supreme Court ruling, pushing radical wealth redistribution plans and stealing from hardworking taxpayers. The court decided that the executive cannot cancel $400B of debt without Congressional approval, but Biden’s rogue administration has decided to implement this unconstitutional plan in smaller waves.
• Democratic narrative, as provided by The Washington Informer. Pres. Biden is keeping his promise to hard-working Americans who have devoted their lives to public service and have consistently sacrificed to pay their debts for more than 10 years. While far-right Supreme Court justices may have struck down Biden’s comprehensive plan, the administration has every right to relieve public workers and other borrowers from the immense burden of student debt.

Predictions