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Biden’s Unfulfilled Student-Debt Promise Is Keeping 15 Million in Debt

  • Fifteen million borrowers would have their student debt wholly wiped out with Biden’s $10,000 forgiveness promise.
  • Info acquired by Sen. Elizabeth Warren also discovered 36 million debtors would be personal debt-free if Biden were to forgive $50,000 for each borrower.
  • Biden has but to fulfill his marketing campaign assure as strain ramps up for broad university student personal debt cancellation.

President Joe Biden campaigned on canceling $10,000 in university student personal debt per borrower. He has yet to fulfill that guarantee, and Instruction Department knowledge furnished to Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren demonstrates why so many borrowers are counting on it.

Warren, who has been a main lawmaker calling for wide pupil personal debt cancellation, questioned the Education and learning Division in April for facts on how a lot of borrowers would reward from several levels of bank loan forgiveness. The section shipped in August, demonstrating that of the 45 million borrowers bearing the $1.7 trillion college student-credit card debt crisis, about 15 million would have their student credit card debt absolutely wiped out if Biden fulfilled his assure.

Beneath Warren’s proposal to terminate $50,000 in student financial debt for every borrower, far more than 36 million would see their balances flip to zero.

“Cancelling $50,000 in pupil financial debt would entirely wipe out university student loans for 84{ac23b82de22bd478cde2a3afa9e55fd5f696f5668b46466ac4c8be2ee1b69550} of borrowers, which include a lot more than 3 million debtors who have been repaying their financial loans for additional than 20 decades,” Warren explained to Insider. “This is the single most productive govt action President Biden could acquire to jumpstart our economic climate and begin to slim the racial prosperity hole.” 

The data also disclosed that of the 10.3 million debtors in default on their debt, 9.8 million of them would see their burdens entirely forgiven with $50,000 in cancellation. 

In almost 100 times, millions of pupil-financial loan borrowers will have to start generating payments on their credit card debt following a close to two-year pause. Even though the Education Office is reportedly making ready a “basic safety net” for debtors to restart these payments, wide student-financial debt cancellation doesn’t surface to be 1 of the aid actions less than thought.

Whilst Biden has canceled $11.5 billion in scholar credit card debt so much for focused groups of people, like people defrauded by for-profit educational institutions and borrowers with disabilities, he has not responded to lawmakers’ and advocates’ phone calls for broad personal debt cancellation. The urgency of ths move is ramping up as the pandemic freeze on student-loan payments is set to lift on February 1. 

The evaluation on Biden’s legal capability to terminate college student debt broadly has been in the works for in excess of 6 months

White Home main of personnel Ron Klain advised Politico in April that Biden had asked Education Secretary Miguel Cardona to produce a memo on the president’s authorized authority to forgive $50,000 in college student financial loans per particular person. White Household Press Secretary Jen Psaki claimed in February that Biden would also question the Justice Office to critique his authority to use executive action to cancel pupil personal debt, but it really is unclear when the department started that evaluate. 

Provided that aspects of the opinions experienced nonetheless not been manufactured community, two weeks in the past, a group of Home Democrats led by Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar gave the Education and learning Division 14 days to launch the memo. They wrote in a letter to Cardona that with the pandemic pause on university student-personal loan payments lifting in February, borrowers ended up “anxiously awaiting the administration’s steps.”

“The time has come to launch the memo and terminate university student debt,” they extra, location a deadline of October 22.

Psaki explained during a push briefing earlier this month that she did not have any update on the memos, but that Biden would assist laws brought to him from Congress to terminate college student personal debt. 

But Warren beforehand said that she didn’t want to go the legislative route.

“We have a great deal on our plate, like going to infrastructure and all sorts of other matters,” Warren reported, including: “The president can do this, and I quite substantially hope that he will.”

Do you have a tale to share about college student personal debt? Arrive at out to Ayelet Sheffey at asheffey@insider.com.

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Debt cancellation and free college aim to fix student loan crisis

Most Americans see college or university as excessively pricey, but it was not normally that way.

Over the last decade, the price tag of attending a four-calendar year public school or college has grown significantly quicker than income.

Deep cuts in condition funding for better education contributed to considerable tuition increases and pushed extra of the costs of school onto students, in accordance to an examination by the Centre on Spending budget and Plan Priorities, a nonpartisan investigation group centered in Washington, D.C.

More from Private Finance:
A lot more education and learning doesn’t usually get you additional cash
Family members massively underestimate price of faculty
Less college students are going to higher education because of the value

At personal four-yr faculties, normal tuition and charges rose 26{ac23b82de22bd478cde2a3afa9e55fd5f696f5668b46466ac4c8be2ee1b69550} in a 10-yr interval. Tuition as well as expenses at four-12 months general public educational facilities, which have been harder strike, jumped 35{ac23b82de22bd478cde2a3afa9e55fd5f696f5668b46466ac4c8be2ee1b69550}.

Simply because so couple families can shoulder the increased price tag, they have significantly turned to federal and personal assist to go over at least some of the tab.

Approximately fifty percent of households now borrow, or take out financial loans, in accordance to Sallie Mae’s most modern “How America Pays for Higher education” report, pushing exceptional college student financial debt to a stunning $1.7 trillion.

The standard senior now graduates with practically $30,000 in credit card debt.

Despite the fact that acquiring a faculty diploma is, in general, increasingly significant for individuals aiming to get ahead in modern financial system, value has turn out to be a deterrent, notably among low-cash flow households.

“There is a recognition that university selling prices are out of regulate and not just at the leading stop but even at neighborhood college or university where tuition is fairly very affordable,” said Mark Huelsman, director of coverage and advocacy at the Hope Heart for University, Community, and Justice.

Now, for the very first time considering that 1944, when Congress passed what is now identified as the GI Bill — which helps veterans include the price of tuition, publications and housing — there are two items of legislation to make bigger instruction a lot more accessible.

Scholar credit card debt forgiveness

For people previously struggling underneath the body weight of hefty pupil personal loan payments, there is certainly a prospect that borrowers could see their balances diminished or eliminated fully.

“It is really much more probable we will see some type of wide mortgage forgiveness vs . whenever in the earlier,” according to better education and learning specialist Mark Kantrowitz.

President Joe Biden explained he supports erasing at minimum $10,000 for all borrowers — a transfer he could probably make via government motion.

If we never do a little something that prevents this difficulty from going on in the long run, we are likely to be below yet again in five years.

Mark Huelsman

director of policy and advocacy at the Hope Heart for Higher education, Group, and Justice

Alternatively, if the White Home leaves pupil financial loan forgiveness to Congress, Democrats could use the budget reconciliation process to get it carried out.

Both way, if all federal college student financial loan borrowers get $10,000 of their personal debt forgiven, “it erases the debt of about a third of all pupil financial loan debtors,” in accordance to Kantrowitz. And, the superb instruction financial debt in the place would slide to all-around $1.3 trillion, from $1.7 trillion.

However, “it’s right after the point,” Kantrowitz added. “It will not make school far more economical and it isn’t going to increase the amount of college students heading to higher education or graduating from college.”

Even more, “if we really don’t do anything that helps prevent this issue from taking place in the potential, we are heading to be below once more in five several years,” the Hope Center’s Huelsman explained.

Tuition-absolutely free school

Kevin Dodge | The Image Financial institution | Getty Illustrations or photos

Which is exactly where no cost higher education arrives in.

To be guaranteed, free of charge community college or university is not new. As of the most current tally, 26 states now have some variety of software in place.

Most are “previous-dollar” scholarships, that means the method pays for regardless of what tuition and costs are still left immediately after fiscal assist and other grants are used. In other words and phrases, pupils get a scholarship for the volume of tuition that is not protected by current condition or federal support.

The Democrats’ $3.5 trillion paying approach, if still left largely intact, would make group higher education tuition-totally free for two decades across the board — a move President Biden has also been advocating because the marketing campaign path.

Under this system, states would no more time have to fill the hole between scholarships and tuition. If they opt into the method, college student tuition is compensated for totally by the federal government.

Enrollment at 4-year personal colleges would fall by about 12{ac23b82de22bd478cde2a3afa9e55fd5f696f5668b46466ac4c8be2ee1b69550}, though enrollment at four-calendar year community universities and community faculties would rise by roughly 18{ac23b82de22bd478cde2a3afa9e55fd5f696f5668b46466ac4c8be2ee1b69550}, in accordance to a examine on the financial effects of building some college tuition-cost-free by the Campaign for Free of charge College or university Tuition and the pupil-led advocacy team Increase.

“You’ve received a internet result of just about 2 million a lot more students enrolled in university,” claimed Robert Shapiro, lead author of the examine and a previous economic advisor to President Monthly bill Clinton.

“Every state which is completed it proper has seen an massive boost in enrollment, significantly among females and minority teams,” said Morley Winograd, president and CEO of the Campaign for Free College Tuition.

Graduation premiums would also rise, Shapiro discovered, ensuing in an enhance in social mobility and larger incomes overall.

In the aftermath of the pandemic, “it really is pretty well timed,” Huelsman added. “School enrollment is down.

“Some thing like totally free local community university could spark university-likely once again,” he included.

“When you feel about the fact that those college students would also be earning more funds, that is an enormous raise to the financial system,” Winograd stated.

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Biden quietly deciding how to restart student loan payments

The options, some of which are nonetheless in progress and not finalized, are aimed at averting a potential surge in delinquencies when payments resume in February, which the Biden administration introduced in August.

Turning back on the federal government’s massive, $1.6 trillion university student lending equipment that is mostly been frozen for virtually two decades is an unprecedented logistical obstacle for the Education Division. It is also total of political pitfalls as progressives urge the administration to aim on popular credit card debt forgiveness rather than resuming payments.

Far more than 40 million federal scholar loan debtors have benefited from the Schooling Department’s pause on curiosity and regular payments that started in March 2020. The Biden administration most not too long ago prolonged the reduction through the stop of January, which officials have insisted was the previous reprieve.

Schooling Secretary Miguel Cardona has formerly mentioned he desires to develop a clean “ramp up” for debtors to restart payments. Rich Cordray, the department’s pupil assist main, has talked about his programs for a major general public outreach campaign, like paid advertisements, to let debtors know about their selections.

Quite a few inside paperwork attained by POLITICO under a Flexibility of Information and facts Act ask for outline far more particulars of the department’s “return to repayment” system — which it has internally dubbed “R2R.”

“In recognition of the historic impression of a just about two-yr pause in student personal loan payments, borrowers will be permitted extra adaptability in the early levels of the return to reimbursement,” the office wrote in one of the paperwork.

The Training Division declined to remark directly on its options to restart federal pupil personal loan payments.

“A smooth transition again into reimbursement is a substantial priority for the Administration,” an administration official stated in a assertion in response to POLITICO’s ask for for comment. “In the coming months, we will launch extra specifics about our programs and will engage right with federal pupil personal loan borrowers to make sure they have the assets they need to have.”

Section officials have instructed their personal loan servicers to generate a “safety net” for debtors in the to start with 3 months soon after their first payment is because of subsequent 12 months, in accordance to interior paperwork. Borrowers who miss out on a payment all through that initial 90-day grace period would not be penalized or dinged on their credit score reports, according to the prepare. Those people debtors would as an alternative be immediately placed in a forbearance status and be considered latest on their loans.

The Schooling Section is organizing immediate outreach to sure “at-risk” teams of debtors, this kind of as individuals who were being delinquent ahead of the pandemic, never ever graduated from faculty or only just lately started repaying their financial loans. And the agency has increased the get in touch with heart several hours of its financial loan servicers, anticipating a deluge of borrower requests in the coming months.

Officers are also discussing proposals that would make it substantially a lot easier for debtors to enroll in profits-centered repayment systems, which commonly need debtors to submit proof of their earnings and spouse and children size each calendar year.

That need was suspended during the pandemic. But now that payments are restarting, some 9 million debtors who participate in the earnings-based reimbursement software will have to recertify their income or else confront a perhaps steep increase in their month to month payment quantity.

To account for that likely deluge of hundreds of thousands of requests, the Education Division is considering permitting borrowers, for a limited time, to speedily self-certify their cash flow and loved ones sizing about the cellular phone with their loan servicer, in accordance to two individuals acquainted with the prepare.

In addition, the Training Section is weighing a program to mechanically pull extra than 7 million debtors out of default on their federal university student financial loans. The energy to support people debtors, which has not been finalized, is currently being internally referred to as “Operation New Get started,” according to the sources common with the prepare.

A group of Senate Democrats, led by Sens. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Raphael Warnock of Ga, before this 12 months referred to as on the Biden administration to clear away defaults from all federally held college student financial loans.

They argue that the Schooling Section has the electric power to do so for the reason that the CARES Act authorized defaulted debtors to rely the pandemic-suspended payments towards the 9 months of payments that are ordinarily required for a borrower to carry their financial loans out of default through a system recognized as “rehabilitation.” Borrowers typically need to fill out paperwork with a financial debt collection organization to get started that course of action, but Democrats are pushing the administration to nix that need.

Some Democrats are also continuing to press the Biden administration to use govt authority to terminate up to $50,000 of exceptional federal university student personal loan debt for every borrower. Biden has said he is much more at ease with a determine nearer to $10,000, and the White Home has mentioned it really is nevertheless deciding no matter if it has the power to cancel massive quantities of financial debt employing govt action.

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Borrowers learn student loans could be forgiven earlier than expected : NPR

Zahra Nealy (left) and Victoria Chamberlin both stand to benefit from recent changes to the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program.

Roxanne Turpen and Amanda Andrade-Rhoades for NPR


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Roxanne Turpen and Amanda Andrade-Rhoades for NPR

Zahra Nealy (left) and Victoria Chamberlin both stand to benefit from recent changes to the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program.

Roxanne Turpen and Amanda Andrade-Rhoades for NPR

The U.S. Department of Education has begun sending emails to thousands of teachers, nurses and other public servants to tell them they could have some of their federal student loan debts erased months — and even years — earlier than borrowers had expected.

Education Secretary Miguel Cardona highlighted the move Friday night on Twitter: “Our first batch of PSLF emails regarding loan forgiveness have all gone out to those with Direct Consolidation Loans and certified employment – check your inboxes! And if you didn’t get one, hang tight! More are on the way.”

The flood of emails comes after the department announced it would overhaul the troubled Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) program, including giving borrowers a retroactive waiver from some of its toughest rules. As a result, the department estimates it could erase the student loan debts of nearly 50,000 public service workers and help half a million more get closer to the loan forgiveness they were promised.

Some borrowers who have received emails and have been told they’ll be getting additional credit toward loan forgiveness have taken to social media to celebrate.

When Victoria Chamberlin heard the news, it hit her: This could mean the end of her $70,000 in student loan debt. The U.S. Army veteran says she and her husband were cautiously elated.

“By the time our baby is 3,” Chamberlin says, “both of us will be student loan debt free. And that’s just unbelievable. We never thought it would be possible.”

What borrowers need to know about the Public Service Loan Forgiveness overhaul

Zahra Nealy says she was listening to NPR one morning when she heard the news about the waiver that would likely help her too.

“I was so excited when I heard [it] in the shower — made sure I didn’t slip!”

Years of mismanagement created a nightmare for borrowers

To appreciate the excitement — and relief — of thousands of public service borrowers, you have to understand how a program that was meant to do so much good ended up causing so much pain.

The Public Service Loan Forgiveness program began in 2007 to encourage borrowers to work in public service. But the rules were strict and badly communicated by the Education Department to the companies that manage student loans. Those companies then spent years mismanaging the program and misinforming borrowers.

Victoria Chamberlin served in the U.S. Army for several years. Now, new changes to the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program should help erase her $70,000 in student debts, which, she says, would be “unbelievable. We never thought it would be possible.”

Amanda Andrade-Rhoades for NPR


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Amanda Andrade-Rhoades for NPR

Victoria Chamberlin served in the U.S. Army for several years. Now, new changes to the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program should help erase her $70,000 in student debts, which, she says, would be “unbelievable. We never thought it would be possible.”

Amanda Andrade-Rhoades for NPR

“I don’t have a heartbreaking case where I was in the wrong repayment plan or my payment was off by a penny. I did everything exactly right,” says Chamberlin, who nevertheless ran afoul of the program after she and her husband enlisted in the Army.

Several times, when the couple attempted to recertify their incomes, as the program regularly requires, Chamberlin says the company managing their loans erroneously increased their monthly payments.

Why Public Service Loan Forgiveness Is So Unforgiving

“And then we would have to go into forbearance while they figured it out,” Chamberlin remembers, “because we were both active duty and couldn’t afford [the higher payments].”

This constant back-and-forth — getting the payments corrected, then restarted — was exhausting, Chamberlin says, especially having to do it from military bases in Germany and South Korea.

“I’d have to go to the base and use the secure phone that you can call the States with but that you’re not supposed to use for personal reasons,” Chamberlin remembers. “It’s just been awful.”

The new waivers could transform borrowers’ financial futures

These stories of PSLF mistakes are legion — and a big reason the Education Department is giving borrowers retroactive waivers from some of the program’s toughest rules.

Borrowers who were disqualified for being in the wrong repayment plan, for example, or for having the wrong kind of loan can now get credit for past payments. In fact, in an email on Friday, the department notified Chamberlin that she should get credit for at least 11 months she spent paying down the wrong kind of loan. According to the details of the overhaul, she should also get credit for the months her payments were paused while she was on active duty.

Chamberlin now works for a private company, but she says she served more than enough time to qualify for forgiveness. “It sounds dramatic, but if my loans can actually get forgiven, then I won’t have to leave the job that I really like.”

Zahra Nealy is nine months from having half her student loan debts erased under the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program. Now, because of changes to the program, she could be completely free of student debt within a year.

Roxanne Turpen for NPR


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Roxanne Turpen for NPR

Zahra Nealy is nine months from having half her student loan debts erased under the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program. Now, because of changes to the program, she could be completely free of student debt within a year.

Roxanne Turpen for NPR

Zahra Nealy has spent nearly a decade working for nonprofits in Southern California, and like Chamberlin, she also had a paperwork problem. But she is now back on track.

“I am nine payments away from being eligible for loan forgiveness,” says Nealy. That means she has made 111 eligible on-time payments and is now less than a year away from having some of her student debts erased. Some, because she has always had two kinds of loans. Half her debts qualify for PSLF; half don’t. Roughly $140,000 in all.

But after the Education Department announced it was loosening its rules, Nealy learned that potentially all her loans could be eligible for forgiveness and could be erased within a year. “Which would be huge!” Nealy says, laughing with excitement.

She says that because of her debts, homeownership has felt unattainable. But soon, maybe not.

And this news has her feeling something she’s not used to feeling about her student debts: “Hope,” Nealy says. “It’s really hope. In a desperate time.”

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Cancel Student Loans? It’s Possible If Congress Does These 5 Things

Want scholar financial loan cancellation? Right here are 5 approaches that Congress could terminate your scholar financial loans without the need of President Joe Biden.

Here’s what you need to have to know.

Student Financial loans

Check with a member of Congress why your college student financial loans have not been cancelled, and you’re possible to get diverse solutions. A single popular solution, at the very least among the progressive Democrats, is this: “We are waiting on Biden to terminate college student loans.” Progressives in Congress believe that Biden has current lawful authority to cancel college student bank loan financial debt as a result of an government order. “With the flick of a pen,” some have argued, Biden can erase up to $1.7 trillion of scholar mortgage debt. Many others these types of as Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and Senate The vast majority Chief Chuck Schumer (D-NY) say that Biden ought to terminate up to $50,000 of university student loans for every student mortgage borrower. Biden, having said that, suggests he doesn’t consider he has this kind of legal authority without the need of more authorization from Congress. As these kinds of, it appears not likely that Biden will cancel everyone’s student loan credit card debt. (Really don’t assume pupil bank loan forgiveness). That claimed, Biden has moved aggressively to terminate university student financial loans. Due to the fact getting to be president, Biden has cancelled $11.5 billion of university student loans. So, in which do we go from listed here? Here’s the factor: Congress does not require to wait around for Biden to enact college student financial loan cancellation. The reality is that Congress can terminate your student financial loans today. Below are 5 techniques that Congress can cancel college student loans with no Biden:

1. Scholar bank loan forgiveness: go new laws

The most straightforward and most uncomplicated way for you to get vast-scale student mortgage forgiveness is for Congress to go standalone legislation. Members of Congress simply just propose a invoice for college student mortgage cancellation, and Congress approves said invoice. Biden has by now indicated that he will sign any legislation on student bank loan forgiveness that Congress sends to his desk. Though Biden isn’t eager on signing an government buy for large-scale university student bank loan forgiveness, Biden needs Congress to terminate up to $10,000 of student financial loans for college student personal loan borrowers. (Big changes to student bank loan forgiveness may possibly appear this week). This isn’t to say that customers of Congress have not proposed laws to cancel university student loans. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) proposed college student personal loan cancellation of all $1.7 trillion of pupil loans, like all private and federal college student personal loan credit card debt. As a presidential candidate, Warren proposed that 95{ac23b82de22bd478cde2a3afa9e55fd5f696f5668b46466ac4c8be2ee1b69550} of scholar debt need to get cancelled. Inspite of these proposals, Congress has but to move any laws on scholar financial loan forgiveness.

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Inside the Biden administration’s plan to restart student loan payments

BIDEN TEAM WEIGHS HOW TO RESTART STUDENT LOAN PAYMENTS: The Biden administration is developing plans for how it will resume collecting federal student loans early next year, when the government’s pandemic-related pause on monthly payments for tens of millions of Americans ends.

— The Education Department is considering proposals that would give borrowers more flexibility, as they face student loan bills for the first time in nearly two years. The plans, which are not yet finalized, are aimed at averting a surge in delinquencies when payments resume in February.

— Key context: The government’s $1.6 trillion student lending apparatus has been largely been frozen since March 2020, and turning it back on will be an unprecedented logistical challenge. It will also be full of political pitfalls as progressives urge the administration to focus instead on sweeping debt forgiveness.

— Internal documents obtained by POLITICO under a Freedom of Information Act request outline details of the department’s “return to repayment” strategy, internally dubbed “R2R.” Several people familiar with the department’s planning also described other policies that are under consideration by the administration.

Here’s a rundown of what’s on the table when payments resume in about three months:

— Grace period: Department officials have instructed loan servicers to create a borrower “safety net” for the first three months after their first payment is due next year, according to internal documents. Borrowers who miss a payment during that initial 90-day period will not take a hit on their credit reports. Those borrowers will instead be automatically placed in a forbearance and be still considered current on their loans.

— Targeted outreach: The department is planning direct outreach to certain “at-risk” groups of borrowers, such as those who were delinquent before the pandemic, never graduated from college or only recently began repaying their loans.

— Beefed up customer service: The department has increased its loan servicers’ call center hours, in anticipation of a deluge of requests and questions from borrowers.

— Easier income-driven repayment: Officials are also discussing ways to make it simpler for borrowers to enroll in income-based repayment programs, which typically require borrowers to submit proof of their income and family size each year. The Education Department is considering allowing borrowers, for a limited time, to quickly self-certify their income and family size over the phone with their loan servicer, according to people familiar with the plan.

— A ‘Fresh Start’? Education Department officials are also weighing a plan to automatically pull more than 7 million borrowers out of default on their federal student loans. The effort to help those borrowers, which has not been finalized, is being internally referred to as “Operation Fresh Start,” according to people familiar with the department’s planning.

A group of Senate Democrats, led by Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Raphael Warnock, earlier this year called on the Biden administration to remove defaults from all federally-held student loans.

— “A smooth transition back into repayment is a high priority for the Administration,” an administration official said in response to POLITICO’s request for comment. “In the coming months, we will release more details about our plans and will engage directly with federal student loan borrowers to ensure they have the resources they need.”

— Read our full story on the department’s return to repayment plan here.

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BIDEN DOUBTS DEMOCRATS CAN PASS FREE COMMUNITY COLLEGE: President Joe Biden is expressing doubt that his plan for tuition-free community college will make it into the final sweeping economic and social policy bill to carry out his domestic policy agenda. Democratic leaders and the White House are trying figuring out how to scale back the size of the entire bill in order to win over the votes of the more conservative members of their caucus.

— “I don’t know that I can get it done,” Biden said of his free community college proposal during a speech on his “Build Back Better” agenda in Connecticut on Friday.

— Biden later clarified to reporters: “I doubt whether we’ll get the entire funding for community colleges, but I’m not going to give up on community colleges as long as I’m president.”

Biden’s initial proposal called for a new program, to cost $109 billion over 10 years, aimed at eliminating tuition at the nation’s community colleges. House Democrats’ proposal calls for five years of the program at an estimated cost of $45.5 billion.

— Education Secretary Miguel Cardona said in an interview that aired on Sunday that he’s not recommending any of the education proposals for the chopping block, as Democratic leaders look for ways to shave as much as a trillion dollars off their initial $3.5 trillion plan.

“For far too long, it’s been predictable which students are going to be successful or not based on place and race. The education package is an honest approach to level the playing field and lift our country,” Cardona said in an interview with Axios on HBO. “I know that a lot of conversations are happening at the Hill.”

— Cardona singled out the free community college plan. “For me, it’s critically important that we deliver on community college for all,” he said in the interview, describing it as an economic imperative.

LOAN FORGIVENESS BLITZ BEGINS: The Education Department on Friday began notifying some borrowers in the long-troubled Public Service Loan Forgiveness program that they’re now months or years closer to having their debts wiped out, as a result of the sweeping changes the Biden administration made to program earlier this month.

— “Elections Matter!” Cardona tweeted over the weekend, as some borrowers posted screenshots of the emails they’d received.

— No data yet: The Education Department’s online trove of statistics about the PSLF program hasn’t been updated in nearly six months.

PANEL TO TACKLE PELL GRANT EXPANSION FOR INCARCERATED STUDENTS: An Education Department rulemaking subcommittee will meet this week to discuss the Biden administration’s proposal for implementing the expansion of Pell grants to incarcerated students that Congress passed last December. The bipartisan deal was included as part of a slew of higher education policies that hitched a ride to the year-end government funding and Covid relief legislation.

— Quality control: Congress expanded Pell grants only to incarcerated students who attend prison education programs that federal or state correctional authorities approve as operating in “the best interest of students.” Now the Education Department will need to define that phrase.

The Biden administration’s starting proposal would judge prison education programs based in part on the wages and job placement rates of their graduates, compared to students without a college degree or other formerly incarcerated students who didn’t attend classes while in prison.

— Also on the agenda: The subcommittee will also discuss how accreditation rules apply to prison education programs and what types of consumer disclosures would be helpful for incarcerated students. And they’ll debate how to prevent Pell grants from funding prison education programs in fields in which incarcerated students would not ultimately be able to obtain an occupational license because of their criminal conviction.

— The process: The subcommittee will meet virtually this week and again in November. Any proposals will eventually be voted on by the full rule-making committee that is also considering a slew of changes to federal student loan policies.

— For-profit chain Vista College closes abruptly, files for bankruptcy protection: Higher Ed Drive.

— How West Virginia established universal pre-K: The New York Times.

— Covid-19 precautions prompt backlash on college campuses: The Wall Street Journal.

— University of Southern California to issue honorary degrees to displaced Japanese students: The New York Times.