Bernie Sanders, a leading advocate in Congress for widespread student debt relief, has rebuked Republican lawmakers who have lambasted President Joe Biden’s proposal to cancel billions of dollars in federal student loan debt, relieving up to $20,000 in debts per borrower for millions of people.

“I don’t hear any of these Republicans squawking when we give massive tax breaks to billionaires,” the Vermont progressive senator told ABC’s This Week on 28 August, pointing to Donald Trump’s 2017 plan that slashed the corporate tax rate from from 35 per cent to 21 per cent.

“I know it is shocking … to some Republicans that the government actually, on occasion, do something to benefit working families and low-income people,” he said. “Suddenly when we do something for working people, it is a terrible idea.”

Senator Sanders and progressive lawmakers have praised the administration’s move to cancel up to $10,000 for federal student loan borrowers and up to $20,000 for borrowers who received Pell grants, while underscoring that broad-based relief – a project of advocates who have pushed the administration and lawmakers for years – marks a massive first step in addressing wealth and education disparities.

Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren, who had previously endorsed legislation to cancel up to $50,000 in debt, said the administration and Congress must work to address ballooning higher education costs.

“We have a lot of problems in the whole system. The president has done what he can do with the tool in front of him, and that is he’s helped relieve the debt burden for millions of Americans,” she told CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday. “We need to deal directly with the cost of college. Absolutely.”

Senator Sanders acknowledged right-wing criticism that broad debt relief could be considered “unfair” to those who already paid off loans but said that “the answer is not to deny help to people who cannot deal with these horrendous student debts.”

“The answer is not to do what Republicans want to do – ‘oh, it’s unfair to this person because we’re helping that person’. The answer is that maybe create a government that works for all people and not just wealthy campaign contributors,” Senator Sanders said.

He revived his call for tuition-free public colleges and universities, an idea floated among a raft of policy considerations under a “unity” task force under the Sanders and Biden campaigns in 2020. That document also supported student debt cancellation.

Roughly 43 million federal student loan borrowers will be eligible for relief under the president’s plan announced this week, including 20 million people who are eligible to have their debts canceled completely, according to the White House.

The president also is extending a pandemic-era freeze on repayments, with interest rates set at zero per cent, until 31 December. That moratorium was set to expire on 1 September.

Borrowers who took out federal student loans to pay for their college education and who make less than $125,000 a year – or $250,000, if filing jointly – are eligible for up to $10,000 in debt cancellation.

Pell Grant recipients under the same income threshold will be eligible to have up to $20,000 in their federal student loan debts canceled.

Senator Warren noted that she was able to pay her way through college while working part-time as a waitress before becoming a special education teacher, which opened a “million doors” of opportunities for her, she said.

“That opportunity is not out there today for any of our kids,” she told CNN. “Our public education system is no longer creating opportunities for kids like me and other families who can’t afford to write a check. … Instead, we’re saying to these young people, ‘You got to get an education, but we are going to wrap the chains of debt around you’.”

More than 40 million Americans hold roughly $1.9 trillion in student loan debt, most of which is wrapped up in federal loans. The average balance is $37,667, according to the Education Data Initiative. That debt soars to tens of thousands dollars more among advanced degree holders.

The amount of debt taken out to support student loans for higher education costs has surged within the last decade as the cost of tuition has increased and private university enrollment grew as governments stripped investments in higher education and aid, putting the burden of college costs on students and their families while wages have stagnated.

Borrowers also have been trapped by predatory lending schemes and sky-high interest rates that have made it impossible for many borrowers to make any progress toward paying off their debt, with interest adding to balances that exceed the original loan years after a degree was earned.

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