- Former Education Minister Betsy DeVos has criticized Biden’s plans to forgive student loans.
- She said borrowers have many opportunities to repay their debt without this relief.
- The Biden administration has previously criticized DeVos for its student loan management.
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Former US Secretary of Education hopes President Joe Biden will suspend plans to forgive student loans.
Betsy DeVos, who works in the education department of former President Donald Trump, told the conservative podcast The Daily Signal on Tuesday that she did not think Trump had the power to cancel student debt in general and hoped Biden would “comply” with the law. to the same conclusion.
“When we talk about this idea of forgiving student loans, what we’re really talking about is benefiting those who don’t necessarily need it,” DeVos said. “And those who will pay for it in the end are those who have never attended college, who have not taken out student loans, the taxpayers who have chosen not to go to higher education and take out student loans, or to be honest. , many taxpayers who have gone who have faithfully repaid their student loans. “
“So it’s a matter of justice,” DeVos added. “It’s not fair to go and just give a huge pardon on a student loan.”
Biden is reportedly considering a $ 10,000 student debt forgiveness for federal borrowers who earn less than $ 150,000 a year, and the announcement is likely to come close to the time when student loan payments will resume after Aug. 31. DeVos’ remarks on student loan easing are similar to those of many Republican lawmakers who have criticized widespread forgiveness, saying the policy will hurt the economy, cost taxpayers and benefit those who need it least.
DeVos also said that instead of forgiving student debt, “there are a bunch of different income-based repayment plans” that borrowers can use, along with college scorecards that show potential costs and benefits for a particular field of study.
“So, there are a lot of tools that students can use, and I would encourage all students to do that, because they do their due diligence,” DeVos said.
However, income-oriented repayment plans have been wrong for decades. While the idea of the plans is to provide borrowers with affordable monthly payments based on their income with a promise to repay the loan after at least 20 years of repayment, an NPR investigation revealed in April that student loan companies failed to track payments. carried out by the borrowers of the plans, pushing them away from the path of forgiveness.
Biden’s education department also criticized DeVos’ attitude toward the student loan portfolio, especially when it comes to targeted student loan relief for borrowers defrauded by profitable schools. The relief known as protecting the borrower on repayment was supposed to repay the debt of these borrowers after they filed a lawsuit, but DeVos lagged far behind in these lawsuits, leading to a 99% waiver rate.
Despite Republican rejection, many Democratic lawmakers are pushing Biden to take advantage of the student loan forgiveness to benefit those who are fighting the hardest. New York spokeswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez wrote on Instagram over the weekend that a “random number” of relief would not work.
“People are addicted to sharing things in the middle, but there are policies where a half-approach is a waste, because it’s not much better than nothing, and resources are better spent elsewhere,” she said. “We insist that people can really experience the benefits of a policy.
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