Have student loan debt? You're barely represented in Congress.

• Americans with student loan debt are underrepresented in federal politics, Insider's analysis found.
• Only 44 members of Congress listed a student loan on their financial disclosure forms.

Americans who owe a student loan are an underrepresented constituency in federal politics, Insider's analysis of congressional finances reveals.

While large segments of the working-age population are burdened with student loans, even after factoring in age, their peers in Congress are overwhelmingly unburdened.

Insider investigated congressional finances as part of the Conflicted Congress project that exposed lawmakers' numerous violations of the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act of 2012. Besides potential conflicts of interest based on what members own, this analysis reveals that Congress may also be influenced by what they do not owe.

Of the 535 representatives seated in Congress as of December, Insider found 44 members of the House and three Senators who listed a student loan on their financial disclosure forms. But many of those were from spouses, or co-signed of their children: Setting those debts aside, just 22 members of the House and two Senators appear to be on the hook for an individual student loan.

Of all Americans over the age of 25, 16.7% owe a student loan — compared to just 5.1% of the House and 2% of the Senate.

Granted, Congress' advanced age and dramatic wealth — the wealthiest 15 members together had an estimated net worth of at least $1.3 billion — compared to the populace as a whole has something to do with that skew, but even adjusting by age reveals that disproportionately, your typical member of Congress can't empathize with your typical student loan payer.

Underrepresented in Congress

Of the 46 million Americans aged 25 to 34, 14.8 million owe a student loan.

That means just under a third of that age bracket owes student debt. The one senator in that age bracket, Sen. Jon Ossoff, does not have a student loan. Of the nine members of the House of Representatives aged 25 to 34, only two — Rep. Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez and Rep. Mondaire Jones — still have a student loan on their books, or just over a fifth of the House 25 to 34s.

Looking then at the 62 million Americans aged 35 to 49, 14.3 million owe a student loan, or 23% of the cohort. Of the nine senators in that age bracket, 22% owe an individual student loan, roughly par. But in the House, just 14 out of the 97 members aged 35 to 49 owe a student loan, just 14% of the cohort.

Overall, of the 116 members of Congress aged 25 to 49, just 18 owe a personal student loan, or 15.5% in total. Of Americans aged 25 to 49, more than a quarter owe a student loan, which is more than double the congressional rate for their age cohort.

Lawmakers who owe are rare

"We, in a representative democracy, want people representing us to have fluency in the day-to-day struggles that people have," said Rep. Ilhan Omar, one of the rare members of Congress with student loan debt. "Obviously if you elect more people who have the struggles of everyday folk they intend to fight for that."

And while Congress may be wealthier than your typical American, that doesn't mean that other debtors are unrepresented.

For instance, 286 members of the House of Representatives — about two-thirds — have a mortgage, as do 75 senators, or approximately three-fourths of the Senate. That outstrips the national rate: of the 65% of Americans who own a home, only 62% are still paying a mortgage, meaning only around four-in-ten adults are paying a mortgage.

That's well below the rate seen in Congress, which has been eager to implement policies that favor homeowners over renters.

Rep. Jamaal Bowman of New York, who reported having student loan debt in his financial disclosure and is a strong proponent of canceling federal student loans, echoed Omar and said that having student loans of his own helps inform his decision-making on the matter.

"I was the first of my family to go to college. I didn't understand the cost of college at all," Bowman told Insider. He said that first-generation college students are frequently preyed upon by lenders and that it's "good economics" to cancel student loan debt during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut, one of the pair of senators still chewing on student debt, told Insider he's not worried about people like himself, who don't have any challenge paying off their loans.

"I worry about people that have student loan debt and don't have an income that meets that burden, so I don't know that my personal circumstances really educate or inform me because I'm in a pretty good situation compared to compared to most."

Biden's stance on student loan forgiveness has fluctuated

In March 2020, President Joe Biden pledged to "forgive a minimum of $10,000/person of federal student loans," echoing calls from Sen. Elizabeth Warren, Sen. Bernie Sanders, and other presidential candidates at the time.

Then, in a speech in November 2020, Biden said that forgiving $10,000 "should be done immediately." Upon entering office, however, Biden did no such thing, instead extending the student loan payment pause and expanding its scope.

In February 2021, Biden reiterated at a CNN town hall that he was "prepared to write off the $10,000 debt but not the $50 [thousand] because I don't think I have the authority to do it." He then asked the Departments of Justice and Education in April 2021 to draft a memo outlining his legal authority to forgive $50,000 in student loans per individual, but never released its contents.

But by December 2021, the Biden Administration had a different tone regarding student loan cancellation. When asked by a reporter about Biden's campaign promise, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki punted the responsibility over to a gridlocked Congress.

"If Congress sends him a bill, he's happy to sign it. They haven't sent him a bill on that yet," Psaki said.