Biden Administration Takes New Steps to Forgive Billions in Student Loans Transcript

The Biden administration is taking steps to forgive billions in student loan debt.

That’s right. It’s doing so by making fixes to some repayment plans. This likely impacts many of you. The move automatically forgives $39 billion of education debt. This impacts more than 800,000 borrowers and comes after the Supreme Court struck down the administration’s student debt forgiveness plan just weeks ago.

CBS News reporter, Natalie Brand joins us now. Hey there, Natalie. So it feels like it’s a little bit of Groundhogs Day in a lot of the stories that we’re covering, especially for this. So just off the top, tell us who is going to qualify for this new student debt forgiveness program that’s being announced?

Well, Lana, Errol, this is a very specific population of student borrowers, specifically those with income driven repayment plans and those who have been making monthly payments for the equivalent of 20 to 25 years. It also involves the direct loans and federal family education loan programs within that universe of student borrowers. And the administration says this is really an effort to fix historic failures within this system and inaccurate payment counts. Student advocacy groups I’ve talked to say this also fixed decades of servicer abuse and mismanagement. And it’s really this broader effort by the Biden administration to try to make specific fixes to this income driven repayment plan and also enhance that program and make it more generous rather, this fall.

And we should make it clear, because as Lana mentioned, it feels like we’ve been talking about this already. This specific development is separate from the Education Department’s plan on student loan forgiveness, which was taken up after the Supreme Court’s action. What is the status of that policy?

Yeah, that’s right. This is a completely separate track than that effort to create more broader, widespread student loan forgiveness. So as you may remember, the Biden administration suffered a loss at the Supreme Court. Now they’re trying to go down a different avenue through the Higher Education Act, which is really a negotiated rulemaking process that advocates say could take much longer. But more immediately, there is actually a virtual public hearing on this next week, followed by public comments. But at the end of the day, the Administration Education Department has to come up with a new broad loan forgiveness plan that then has to go through this lengthy process. Advocates say it could take months, if not up to a year.

Well, I’m wondering, Natalie, if there’s concern in the White House that this new plan might be also struck down by the courts.

That’s certainly a concern, especially by advocacy groups that we will see continued legal challenges. But I also think that that’s a reason why the Biden administration has really been forward about what they’ve done so far and trying to put a positive spin on this, especially since, as we know, this is a very popular issue to the Democratic base and potentially younger voters when we’re talking about widespread student loan debt forgiveness. But really at the end of the day, different groups and students I’ve talked to say they want to know how long is this going to take? And there is certainly a sense of urgency, especially since we’re heading into presidential election season.

All right. Natalie Brand, thank you.