As Biden cancels up to $20,000 of student debt, some groups want more
Student loan borrowers gather near The White House to tell President Biden to cancel student debt on May 12, 2020.
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President Biden’s long-awaited plan to forgive student debt, announced on Wednesday, drew immediate pushback from some lawmakers and consumer groups even as they praised the historic measure.
The White House said it would cancel $10,000 in federal student debt for most borrowers and up to $20,000 for recipients of Pell Grants, which are available to undergraduates based on financial need. The plan may eliminate balances for at least 9 million borrowers, according to higher education expert Mark Kantrowitz.
Biden ‘should have, and could have, done much more’
Astra Taylor, co-founder of the Debt Collective, a union for debtors, called Wednesday’s announcement “bittersweet.”
“On the one hand, this is a landmark victory for our movement,” she said in a statement. “Yet, President Biden should have, and could have, done much more than cancel $10,000 or 20,000 — and he could have made the relief automatic, instead of imposing unnecessary hurdles,” she added.
Nearly 8 million borrowers may be eligible for automatic relief; however, some borrowers may need to apply if the U.S. Department of Education doesn’t have relevant income data, according to the federal student aid website. That application isn’t yet available.
“We intend to keep fighting until all student debt is canceled and college is free,” Taylor said. “If President Biden can cancel this much debt he can cancel it all.”
Biden paired the debt cancellation and payment pause with a measure to cap undergraduate loan repayments at 5% of monthly income.
Warren, Schumer pledge to ‘pursue every available path’
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., hailed the policy announcement Wednesday as “the single most effective action that the President can take on his own to help working families and the economy.”
The duo had been pushing the White House to cancel up to $50,000 in federal student debt — and they alluded to an ongoing fight for more relief.
“Make no mistake, the work — our work — will continue as we pursue every available path to address the student debt crisis, help close the racial wealth gap for borrowers, and keep our economy growing,” Schumer and Warren said.
Canceling $10,000 ‘hardly achieves anything’
Derrick Johnson, president and CEO of the NAACP, lamented that Biden didn’t cancel $50,000 of loans or more per borrower. He called student debt forgiveness a “racial and economic justice issue” that could help close the racial wealth gap, which often pushes Black students to borrow more than other students.
“Canceling just $10,000 of debt is like pouring a bucket of ice water on a forest fire,” Johnson wrote in an op-ed. “It hardly achieves anything — only making a mere dent in the problem.”
Data suggest that doubling…
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