Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley, who represents Boston and surrounding communities, called on President Joe Biden to cancel student loans in a tweet on Tuesday.
“Another fiscal cliff we can avoid with the flick of a pen. @POTUS must #CancelStudentDebt & deliver for the people,” she wrote.
The congresswoman quote-tweeted a post from the Student Debt Crisis Center which read, “Student loan payments resume in 70 days. @POTUS must #CancelStudentDebt before February 1.”
This comes soon after Sen. Elizabeth Warren made the same request from the president on the podcast, “Pod Save America,” stressing that the action would support racial equality as well as the economy.
In the interview, the senator cited a study which suggested that statistically, 20 years out of college, white people owe on average about 6% of what they borrowed.
“Part of me wants to say, ‘damn 20 years and you’re still paying on this stuff’, but end is in sight,” she said.
But if you’re Black, Warren explained, you owe 95% of what you borrowed when you were in school 20 years out.
“This is the single best opportunity for the president of the United States to help close the Black/white wealth gap for people who have student loan debt,” Warren said.
When asked why Biden hasn’t made a mass cancelation, Warren said she hopes that it’s just that he hasn’t had the time.
During his presidential campaign, Biden said he would support $10,000 in student loan forgiveness, which, according to Forbes, would eliminate debt for up to 15 million borrowers. However, there are no clear plans from the Biden Administration to broadly cancel student debt at the moment.
Meanwhile, federal student loans are scheduled to resume when the payment moratorium ends on January 31, 2022.
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