Washington — President Biden announced Friday that his administration is forgiving $5 billion in student debt for another 74,000 borrowers, marking the latest round of debt cancellation since the Supreme Court voided the president’s student loan forgiveness program.
The debt relief is the result of fixes to income-driven repayment forgiveness and the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program, according to the Education Department. Mr. Biden said that of the borrowers who can receive relief, nearly 44,000 are teachers, nurses, firefighters and others who are eligible for forgiveness after working 10 years of public service. Almost 30,000 Americans who will have their debt wiped clean have been repaying their loans for at least 20 years, but did not get the relief they earned through income-based plans, the president said.
With the latest round of student loan forgiveness, more than 3.7 million Americans have had their debt erased under the Biden administration, Mr. Biden said.
“From day one of my administration, I vowed to improve the student loan system so that a higher education provides Americans with opportunity and prosperity — not unmanageable burdens of student loan debt,” he said in a statement. “I won’t back down from using every tool at our disposal to get student loan borrowers the relief they need to reach their dreams.”
Education Secretary Miguel Cardona said the loan forgiveness comes while the Biden administration is working to provide greater debt relief to borrowers.
“The Biden-Harris administration has worked relentlessly to fix our country’s broken student loan system and address the needless hurdles and administrative inaccuracies that, in the past, kept borrowers from getting the student debt forgiveness they deserved,” he said.
Since the start of his presidency, Mr. Biden has undertaken several efforts to tackle student debt, including rolling out a new income-driven repayment plan last year and forgiving debt for certain types of borrowers, including those who worked in public service and are disabled. The president announced this month that those who took out less than $12,000 in loans and have been in repayment for 10 years will also have their remaining debt canceled, beginning in February.
Mr. Biden’s most sweeping effort was a program that would’ve provided relief to 40 million Americans who stood to have up to $20,000 in student debt wiped clean, but the plan was blocked by the Supreme Court in June. The high court determined that federal law did not authorize the loan forgiveness plan.
