US President Joe Biden will announce new steps Wednesday to help people affected by the Supreme Court’s canceling of his student loan forgiveness program, the White House said.
Biden will announce $9 billion in debt relief for 125,000 individuals, the latest in a string of announcements this week by the Democrat as he seeks re-election in 2024.
The statement comes as rival Republicans sink into bitter internal turmoil, dismissing their own House Speaker Kevin McCarthy in a historic move on Tuesday.
“President Biden has long believed that college should be a ticket to the middle class — not a burden that weighs on families,” a White House official said.
Repayments on federal student loans — 46 million people in the United States have outstanding student loans totaling more than $1.6 trillion — resumed in October after a pause that began with the Covid pandemic and the financial strains it caused.
This followed June’s ruling by the conservative-dominated Supreme Court striking down Biden’s ambitious plan to cancel more than $400 billion of student debt.
Biden quickly announced at the time that he would repackage his student loan relief program.
The Supreme Court, featuring three judges appointed by Biden’s likely 2024 rival, Donald Trump, has moved sharply to the right in recent years, notably with last year’s landmark overturning of the federal right to abortion.