教育部将于周三向背负学生债务的美国人发送一封电子邮件，列出大约2500万人如何在今年秋天取消部分或全部债务的选项。
这封电子邮件是拜登-哈里斯政府4月份宣布的拟议规则的第一步，该规则仍在定稿中，旨在更窄、更有针对性的债务减免。
自从乔·拜登总统取消4300万人的部分或全部债务的最初努力在去年夏天被最高法院推翻以来，拟议的规则一直作为B计划在工作中。
如果它按照草案实施，并在预计的共和党主导的诉讼中幸存下来，它可以为2500万人提供一定数量的债务减免，此外还有近480万人已经在拜登任期内取消了债务。
教育部长米格尔·卡多纳(Miguel Cardona)将在电子邮件中概述债务减免的途径——其中大多数是针对利息失控或已经偿还债务超过20年的人——并通知借款人，如果他们想退出，他们必须在8月30日之前通知他们的服务人员。
卡多纳在邮件中写道，教育部“正在最终确定谁有资格获得学生债务减免，但我们希望让你了解这种潜在的减免”。
拜登在周三的一份声明中表示，目标是提前通知借款人即将到来的债务减免计划，以便他们能够“在规则最终确定后迅速受益”鉴于共和党人对拜登迄今为止试图进行的任何债务减免或学生贷款制度改革提出了一系列诉讼，迅速采取行动让救济走出大门肯定对该计划的成功至关重要。
拜登说:“尽管共和党当选官员试图阻止我们的努力，但我们不会停止努力，为学生贷款借款人提供救济，修复破裂的学生贷款系统，并帮助借款人摆脱学生债务负担。”
拜登对学生债务偿还的标志性改革——储蓄计划，本月早些时候被法院搁置，因为共和党人认为这超越了政府的权限。该计划被吹捧为借款人最负担得起的贷款偿还计划，将每月还款与借款人的收入挂钩，并允许获得小额初始贷款余额的人在10年后获得债务减免。
根据这项新计划，最新的债务减免计划将适用于谁。
最大的群体将是利息失控的人，超过所有借款人的一半。由于不断膨胀的利息，现在大约有2500万人比他们最初贷款时欠下了更多的债务。根据该计划的草案，新规定不会完全取消他们的贷款，而是减少或取消积累的利息。
一些人将获得高达20，000美元的利息取消，而那些收入低于一定水平的人——单身120，000美元或已婚夫妇240，000美元——将获得全部失控利息取消。
教育部估计，超过90%的人，或大约2300万人，将落入第二桶，并完全重置回他们最初的贷款金额。
第二大群体是那些已经偿还贷款20年或更长时间，但仍未还清的人。教育部估计，这可能适用于260万借款人。如果他们有自2005年7月1日或之前一直在支付的大学贷款，或者有自2000年7月1日或之前一直在支付的研究生贷款，他们就有资格获得贷款。
该规定还将为几十万已经符合公共服务贷款豁免等项目资格但从未申请的人提供债务减免，并为那些从没有向学生提供其宣传的财务安全的学校支付学位的人提供债务减免。
该规则的一个更大的组成部分，将评估借款人的“困难”作为债务减免的限定条件，也仍在工作中，但不太可能在同一时间表。
Biden administration to notify 25 million student loan borrowers of debt relief options
The Department of Education will send an email to Americans with student debt on Wednesday, laying out options for how roughly 25 million could have some, or all, of their debt canceled this fall.
The email is the first step of the Biden-Harris administration’s proposed rule announced in April – and still being finalized – for narrower, targeted debt relief.
The proposed rule has been in the works as a plan B ever since President Joe Biden’s initial effort to cancel some or all debt for 43 million people was overturned by the Supreme Court last summer.
If it’s implemented as drafted, and survives the expected Republican-led lawsuits, it could give some amount of debt relief to 25 million people, on top of the nearly 4.8 million people that have already had their debts canceled under Biden’s tenure.
Education Secretary Miguel Cardona will outline in the email the pathways for debt relief -- most of which are targeting people with runaway interest or who have been paying their debt for over two decades -- and inform borrowers that they have until August 30 to inform their servicers if they’d like to opt-out.
The Education Department "is in the process of finalizing who will be eligible for student debt relief, but we want to make you aware of this potential relief,” Cardona writes in the email.
Biden, in a statement on Wednesday, said the goal is to notify borrowers of the upcoming debt relief programs in advance, so they can “benefit swiftly once the rules are final.” Moving quickly to get relief out the door is sure to be important to the program’s success, given the barrage of lawsuits from Republicans on any debt relief or student loan system reform Biden has attempted so far.
“Despite attempts led by Republican elected officials to block our efforts, we won’t stop fighting to provide relief to student loan borrowers, fix the broken student loan system, and help borrowers get out from under the burden of student debt,” Biden said.
Biden’s hallmark reform to student debt repayment, the SAVE Plan, was put on hold by a court earlier this month after Republicans argued it was overstepping the administration’s authority. The plan has been touted as the most affordable loan repayment plan for borrowers, tying monthly payments to borrowers’ incomes and allowing debt relief after 10 years for people who took out small initial loan balances.
Here is who the latest debt relief plan would apply to, under this new plan.
The largest group will be people who have runaway interest, which is more than half of all borrowers. Roughly 25 million people owe a larger debt now than when they initially took out their loans due to ballooning interest. The new rule would not cancel their loans entirely, but rather reduce or cancel the interest that’s built up, according to a draft rule of the plan.
Some people would get up to $20,000 of interest canceled, while those who make below a certain income -- $120,000 as a single person or $240,000 as a married couple -- will get their entire runaway interest canceled.
The Department of Education estimated that over 90% of people, or roughly 23 million, will fall into the second bucket and be fully reset back to their initial loan amount.
The second largest group will be people who have been paying down their loans for 20 years or more, but still haven’t paid it off. This could apply to 2.6 million borrowers, the Department of Education estimated. People would be eligible if they have undergraduate loans they’ve been paying since or before July 1, 2005, or if they have graduate school loans they’ve been paying since or before July 1, 2000.
The rule will also provide debt relief to a few hundred thousand people who already qualify under programs like Public Service Loan Forgiveness but have never applied, and to those who paid for a degree from a school that didn’t provide students with the financial security it advertised.
A vaster component of the rule, which would evaluate borrower “hardship” as a qualifier for debt relief, is also still in the works but not likely on the same timeline.
