CNN points to something most people do NOT know…..
BOTH Biden AND Trump HAVE ‘forgiven’ student loan debt….
Even though the Supreme Court struck down President Joe Biden’s student loan forgiveness program, more debt will be canceled during his time in office than under any other president.
The Biden administration has already canceled a record $66 billion in student loan debt for nearly 2.2 million borrowers.
While his one-time student loan forgiveness program would have been far reaching, promising up to $20,000 of debt cancellation for eligible borrowers and wiping out roughly $400 billion overall, the Department of Education has made some lesser-known changes to existing student loan forgiveness programs.
The administration has made it easier for people to qualify for the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program, which grants relief for public sector workers after they’ve made 10 years of qualifying payments.
It has also made more people eligible for the borrower defense to repayment program that cancels student loan debt for borrowers who attended a school that may have misled them or violated certain state laws, as well as made loan discharges automatic for more borrowers who are permanently disabled…..
President’s cancelling student loan debt…..
As the Biden administration continues to evaluate whether it’s possible to enact widespread student loan forgiveness using executive authority, lost in the debate is a simple fact: President Biden and former President Trump collectively have already cancelled $90 billion in student loan interest using executive action.
As the COVID-19 pandemic was rapidly accelerating in March of last year, President Trump issued an executive order suspending all interest accrual for government-held federal student loans. Weeks later, Congress codified the interest freeze when it passed the CARES Act, which continued the suspension of interest to September 30, 2020. President Trump then extended the interest freeze twice more using executive action — first to December 31, 2020, and then again to January 31, 2021. And on President Biden’s first day in office, he signed an executive order to extend the interest moratorium yet again, this time to September 30, 2021.
In total, assuming there are no further extensions, this amounts to 18 months of suspended interest on government-held federal student loans. The U.S. Department of Education released dataearlier this month indicating that this comes out to around $5 billion per month. Over the course of 18 months, that is $90 billion in student loan interest that has been cancelled….