(Joshua Paladino, Headline USA) President Joe Biden so far has ignored his campaign promise to reduce each American’s student loan debt by at least $10,000, and now Democratic lawmakers have asked him to cancel “up to $50,000 of student loan debt per borrower,” The Daily Wire reported.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., signed the letter along with more than 80 Democratic Senators and Representatives.
The Democrats thanked Biden “for extending the federal student loan payment pause,” a move that he made in December under the guise of relief from the COVID-19 pandemic.
Biden froze payments until May 1, at which point he will likely extend it once again.
“As you continue to evaluate the best way forward to an equitable recovery [from COVID-19], we urge you to direct the Department of Education to publicly release the memo outlining your legal authority to broadly cancel federal student loan debt and immediately cancel up to $50,000 of student loan debt per borrower,” the letter stated.
Presidents do not have the unilateral authority to cancel student loan payments, but Biden seems to believe than an indefinite pause will accomplish the same goal.
The pause benefits 41 million American who hold outstanding loans, and nearly 27 million Americans have not had to pay their loans since March 2020, when former President Donald Trump cancelled payments and interest accumulation.
Vice President Kamala Harris said the Education Secretary Miguel Cardona “is working on what we can do and must do frankly to relieve the pressures of student loan debt.”
Once the Democrats construct a legal argument for loan forgiveness, they will likely use it.
Biden sees student debt forgiveness as a way to “close the racial and gender gap” that has been “borne out of generations of discriminatory policies.”
The Democrats absolved all non-white people of their responsibility to pay off their loans.
“Due to systemic barriers, Black, Latino and Native American borrowers are more likely to struggle with repayment and consequently default on their loans at higher rates,” the letter stated.
