'There's no reason for him to stop here': Advocacy groups blast Biden's $10,000 in student-loan forgiveness and call for more
- On Wednesday, President Joe Biden announced $10,000 in student-loan forgiveness for some borrowers.
- Advocates say that $10,000 is not enough, and doesn't adequately address disparities.
After months of silence and payment delays, President Joe Biden announced on Wednesday that some borrowers will have $10,000 in student loan debt cancelled.
The cancellation is targeted at primarily lower-earning and lower-income debtors. But advocates say that $10,000 is far from enough, as debtors find themselves buried under $1.7 trillion in student loan debt.
"This wouldn't have happened if an organized group of debtors didn't leverage their financial and political power to demand student debt abolition," said Braxton Brewington, spokesperson for the Debt Collective. "But if President Biden can cancel $10,000 here and $20,000 there, he can eliminate every penny. There's no reason for him to stop here."
NAACP President Derrick Johnson and national director of youth and college Wisdom Cole took to CNN ahead of the announcement to decry the amount of forgiveness, writing that $50,000 or more in forgiveness "would free millions of Americans" and would "drastically reduce the racial wealth gap."
Black borrowers are disproportionately burdened with student debt. In 2016, the Brookings Institute found that Black borrowers hold on average nearly $53,000 in student loan debt four years after they've graduated. That's close to double the loan burden of their white peers; similarly, the NAACP has found that, 20 years after arriving at college, the median Black borrower owes 95% of their debt — compared to 6% for the median white borrower.
A survey of nearly 1,300 Black borrowers from the Education Trust found that 66% of respondents said they regret taking out loans, and 58% "do not believe that student loans advance racial equality for Black borrowers."
"Today's announcement marks a historic moment and critical first step in the long fight to end the student debt crisis. Broad-based student debt cancellation will free millions of Americans to invest in their futures, support their families, and contribute to their communities and the economy," Natalia Abrams, president and founder of Student Debt Crisis Center, said in a statement. "While this announcement is a major win for many, it is important to stress that $10,000 will leave many others still crushed by debt and important details will determine who has access to much-needed relief."
Nina Turner, a student-debt-forgiveness advocate, national co-chair for Sen. Bernie Sanders' 2020 presidential campaign, and senior fellow at the Institute on Race, Power and Political Economy, said that $10,000 of cancellation "isn't something to be "grateful" for."
"Student debt is a trap and 45 million Americans were scammed into predatory loans," Turner wrote on Twitter. "Cancel all debt to free the 45 million Americans from the scam, then let's fix the cost of tuition."
Some Democratic lawmakers have also joined advocates in expressing disappointment with just $10,000 in relief. Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders has frequently called for the entirety of the $1.7 trillion student debt crisis to be wiped out, and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer vowed to keep fighting for $50,000 in relief — even after Biden struck down that amount.
"The goal should be to see the most amount of relief for the highest number of borrowers," Johnson and Cole write. "Even so, President Biden has indicated that he is not considering a $50,000 debt reduction. But canceling just $10,000 in debt would be bad public policy and a devastating political mistake."