On Thursday, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer cursed Republicans who oppose President Biden’s White House’s student debt forgiveness plan.
Schumer made his remarks at a press conference where he was joined by hard-Left House Reps. Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), Ilhan Omar (D-MN) and Mondaire Jones (D-NY).
“Those damn Republicans,” Schumer raged. “They are bellyaching, you know, when anyone helps regular people. When they give tax cuts to the rich, they say they’re helping the middle class. When we help the middle class, they say we’re helping the rich.”
“They only want to help the rich,” Schumer continued. “The reason they don’t this is all of their rich friends … might have to pay a little more in taxes. Disgraceful, disgraceful, disgraceful.”
Later in the day, Arizona GOP Attorney General Mark Brnovich filed suit against the Biden administration policy, making Arizona the seventh state to sue the Biden administration over the issue. Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, and South Carolina had already filed suit.
“The president’s action is contrary to several recent United States Supreme Court decisions striking down federal agencies’ assertion of power never granted to them by Congress,” Brnovich stated. “Despite being told by members of congress he cannot pursue such an action, Biden is relying on the Higher Education Relief Opportunities for Students Act (HEROES Act) and the COVID-19 pandemic. The HEROES Act was a response to the September 11th attacks to relieve active-duty personnel from financial hardship while defending our nation.”
“The act also includes individuals who reside in disaster areas affected by a national emergency. The president attempts to stretch the HEROES Act to assert authority over all borrowers in the country, citing the COVID-19 pandemic as a national emergency and the entire United States as a disaster area,” he added.
Arkansas Republican Attorney General Leslie Rutledge, who is leading the effort by the other six states, had similar reasoning to opposing Biden’s plan.
“It’s patently unfair to saddle hard-working Americans with the loan debt of those who chose to go to college,” Rutledge stated. “The Department of Education is required, under the law, to collect the balance due on loans. And President Biden does not have the authority to override that.”
In the lawsuit Rutledge filed, it quotes a study from Penn Wharton University of Pennsylvania contending that the majority of the mass debt cancellation will “accrue[ ] to the debt borrowers in the top 60% of the income distribution.” The lawsuit adds, “And none of the benefit will accrue to those who worked and paid their debt.”