The Biden administration forgave another $4.23 billion in student loans Monday, likely the final round of relief for borrowers under this president.
The initiatives affect three groups: public service workers, borrowers with disabilities and those who were misled by their colleges or who took out loans for schools that violated state laws.
Nearly 85,000 students who attended any school owned by the Center for Excellence in Higher Education from January 2006 to Aug. 1, 2021, and Drake College of Business from Jan. 1, 2008, until it closed in 2015, will see all their loans discharged.
The department found CEHE engaged in widespread and pervasive misrepresentations, while the Drake College of Business “extensively recruited at homeless shelters and other temporary housing facilities and lied to borrowers about the promise of ‘free stipends’ that were actually student loans,” according to the department’s news release.
Over all, more than 152,000 borrowers will have their debts released under the latest action. In the last four year, more than five million people had their loans wiped out by Biden.
“I promised to ensure higher education is a ticket to the middle class, not a barrier to opportunity,” Biden wrote in a statement Monday. “I’m proud to say we have forgiven more student loan debt than any other administration in history.”
Student loan forgiveness was a pillar of Biden’s 2020 presidential campaign and a major policy focus for his Education Department, but the administration’s ambitious plans were largely scuttled by the courts. Biden withdrew two pending debt-forgiveness plans last month that would have offered relief to more than 36 million Americans.
A spokesperson for the department declined to say whether this latest action is the administration’s final push on loan forgiveness. They also said they “don’t have any insight” on what the incoming Trump administration’s plans for continuing to execute student debt relief might be, but that borrowers affected by congressionally approved plans are entitled to receive it regardless of who is in the White House.
But some of department’s authority to forgive loans as it did Monday is question: On Friday, the U.S. Supreme Court announced it would review the borrower-defense plan. A department spokesperson could not say how many borrowers who’d requested relief under that plan were still awaiting approval from the department.
