President Biden is vowing to forge ahead with his plan to forgive billions of dollars in student loans, just months ahead of his expected 2024 presidential election rematch with Donald Trump.
Despite a national debt soaring past $34.5 trillion and the U.S. Supreme Court previously serving as a roadblock for such handouts to loan borrowers, the president is again vowing to forgive the borrowed sums.
“From day one, I promised to fix broken student loan programs and make sure higher education is a ticket to the middle class, not a barrier to opportunity,” Biden wrote on X.
He added: “I’m not backing down.”
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President Biden vows to forge ahead with his plan to forgive billions of dollars in student loans. (Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP via Getty Images)
While some college students have praised the free money, the move has drawn criticism from many conservatives.
Biden’s repeated attempts to give thousands of dollars to each borrower are akin to “buying votes,” according to South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem.
“He’s buying votes,” Noem argued in Feb. on “FOX & Friends.” “That’s exactly what he’s doing. The timing of this, to follow through on what he has threatened to do for so long, is incredibly hypocritical of him to say that he cares about this country and continue to accumulate debt and hand out money to get himself re-elected.”
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She added: “I just hope everybody in America realizes that we’re still spending more money than what we bring in in this country. So when he does stuff like this, he’s literally borrowing this money from China and then giving it to people so that they will support him and put him back in the White House, so he can continue his reign of control.”
“So, it’s really the worst of the worst and Americans are waking up to it with all these crises we have going on at the border, our national security, people’s gas and groceries being unaffordable,” Noem continued.
South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem argued on “FOX & Friends” last month that President Biden was “buying votes” with the student loan handouts. (Melissa Sue Gerrits/Getty Images)
In February, Biden announced the Savings on Valuable Education (SAVE) plan and asserted that the Supreme Court would not stop him from canceling student debt.
The plan cancels debt for enrolled borrowers who have been in repayment for at least 10 years and hold $12,000 or less in student loan debt. Those with larger debts will receive relief after an additional year of payments for every additional $1,000 they borrowed.
In June 2023, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6-3 against President Biden’s $430 billion student loan handout. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)
The president said he was canceling federal student loans for nearly 153,000 borrowers enrolled in the plan. More borrowers are now eligible to have their monthly payments reduced to $0, and many will qualify for lower payments compared to other repayment plans.
“Early in my term, I announced a major plan to provide millions of working families with debt relief for their college student debt,” Biden said at the Julian Dixon Library in Culver City, California. “Tens of millions of people in debt were literally about to be canceled in debts. But my MAGA Republican friends in the Congress, elected officials and special interests stepped in and sued us. And the Supreme Court blocked it. But that didn’t stop me.”
Months earlier, in June 2023, the Supreme Court ruled in a 6-3 decision that federal law does not allow Biden’s Secretary of Education to cancel more than $430 billion in student loan debt.
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Biden said at the time that his administration would continue to push for relief for students.
Fox News’ Lindsay Kornick contributed to this report.
