Before he launched his political career, Nebraska U.S. Senator Ben Sasse was a former college president at Midland University in Fremont. On Wednesday Sasse, a long time advocate for higher education reform, sounded off after President Biden announced his student loan forgiveness policy.
“The President can spin it however he wants with Pell window dressing, but at the end of the day his debt forgiveness scheme forces blue-collar workers to subsidize white-collar graduate students,” Sasse says. “Instead of demanding accountability from an underperforming higher education sector that pushes so many young Americans into massive debt, the Administration’s unilateral plan baptizes a broken system. This deeply regressive action, which fails even to acknowledge that most debt is held by folks with graduate degrees, will do nothing to jumpstart the reform higher education desperately needs.”
Experts estimate that student loan forgiveness will cost between $300 billion and $980 billion over the next 10 years, with the majority of relief going to the top 60 % of earners.