President Joe Biden is considering extending the pause on federal student loan payments beyond the current May 1 deadline, according to White House chief of staff Ron Klain.
“The president will look at what we should do about student debt before the pause expires, or he will extend the pause.” Klain told the Pod Save America podcast in an interview posted Thursday.
Klain said the administration would make a decision on the use of executive action to cancel any amount of student debt per borrower “before payments resume.”
Around 40 million Americans have $1.7 trillion in student loan debtaccording to politician.
Democratic lawmakers have been urging the president to write off student debtwith dozens of members of Congress writing to the president earlier this year saying he should use his executive powers to eliminate $50,000 in student debt per borrower.
Student loan payments were halted in March 2020 as part of the CARES Act related to the pandemic, and extended by the Trump and Biden administrations.
Lawmakers have criticized the Biden administration because the Department of Education has not released a memorandum, which supposedly has had since April 2021 — detailing the president’s legal authority to cancel federal student loan debt.
Biden previously said it was “unlikely” to eliminate $50,000 in student loan debt per person. During his presidential campaign, he said that he supported the passage of legislation that forgives $10,000 of debt per person.
Widespread loan forgiveness would make a significant dent in the racial wealth gap, as black students are more likely than any other racial group to have to borrow money to pay for college, and African-American students graduate with the highest student loan debt of any group, according to a 2019 report from the American Council on Education.