Biden announces more than $7 billion in student debt relief for 277,000 borrowers

WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden announced Friday that his administration is canceling $7.4 billion in student loans for 277,000 borrowers.

The White House said the latest round of aid helps borrowers enrolled in the Saving on a Valuable Education (SAVE) repayment plan, as well as those in income-driven repayment or public service loan forgiveness plans. Under the SAVE plan, an income-based repayment plan that came into effect last summer, the new policy will allow those who took out smaller loans to have the debt canceled more quickly, which Department of Education he said.

With its latest move, the administration has now canceled $153 billion for 4.3 million Americans, the White House said.

“Today’s announcement builds on the significant progress we have made for students and borrowers over the past three years,” Biden said in a statement. “These include: providing the largest increases to the maximum Pell Grant in more than a decade; fixing public service loan forgiveness so that teachers, nurses, police officers and other public service workers get the relief they are entitled to under the law and hold colleges accountable for taking advantage of students and families.”

Biden said that since taking office in 2021, he has “pledged to fight to ensure that higher education is a ticket to the middle class, not a barrier to opportunity.”

“I will never stop working to cancel student debt — no matter how many times Republican elected officials try to stop us,” he said.

Earlier this week, Biden announced revised plans to cancel student debt which, when implemented, will provide relief to more than 30 million Americans “when combined with the actions the Administration has taken over the past three years,” the White House said.

The Department of Education said the new plans would waive accrued and capitalized interest for millions of borrowers, automatically pay off debt for borrowers who would otherwise be eligible for loan forgiveness under SAVE or other plans, eliminate student debt for borrowers with repayment for 20 years or more, help those enrolled in low-value programs and help borrowers who face difficulties repaying their loans.

The public will have the opportunity to comment on the proposed actions “in the coming weeks,” the DOE said.

The administration introduced current efforts to provide student debt relief after the Supreme Court struck down Biden’s original student debt relief program, which aimed to cancel up to $20,000 in debt for about 43 million borrowers.