Tangle - Biden's new student debt cancellation plan.

Starting point is 00:00:00 Based on Charles Yu's award-winning book, Interior Chinatown follows the story of Willis Wu, a background character trapped in a police procedural who dreams about a world beyond Chinatown. When he inadvertently becomes a witness to a crime, Willis begins to unravel a criminal web, his family's buried history, and what it feels like to be in the spotlight. Interior Chinatown is streaming November 19th, only on Disney+. The flu remains a serious disease. Last season, over 102,000 influenza cases have been reported across Canada, which is Chinatown is streaming November 19th, only on Disney+. yourself from the flu. It's the first cell-based flu vaccine authorized in Canada for ages six months and older, and it may be available for free in your province. Side effects and allergic reactions can occur, and 100% protection is not guaranteed. Learn more at flucellvax.ca.

Starting point is 00:01:00 From executive producer Isaac Saul, this is Tangle. Good morning, good afternoon, and good evening, and welcome to the Tangle podcast, a place we get views from across the political spectrum, some independent thinking, and a little bit of my take. I'm your host, Isaac Saul, and on today's episode, we're going to be talking about Biden's new student loan cancellation plan. That's right, President Biden has unveiled a new plan to cancel student loans after his previous one was struck down. So we are going to break down what's in the plan and also talk a little bit about why or why not it might survive some legal scrutiny and what my thoughts are on the merits. As always, we'll share some views from the left and the right.

Starting point is 00:01:54 Before we jump into that, though, I want to give a quick reminder that we are hiring right now. In fact, we are hiring for this podcast and our YouTube channel. We are looking for people with experience editing audio or video. This is kind of an internship assistant type role. So ideally, probably somebody who is a college student or recent college graduate, though we're accepting all applications. It's a part-time gig. If you're interested, there is info in today's episode description. There is a link to the job description. There's also info about it in today's newsletter if you want to go check that out. And you can send an application to john, J-O-N, at readtangle.com, and also me,

Starting point is 00:02:39 Isaac, I-S-A-A-C, at readtangle.com. All right, with that out of the way, we're going to jump in with some quick hits. First up, Arizona's Supreme Court ruled yesterday that an 1864 near-total ban on abortion is enforceable, superseding a 15-week abortion passed in 2022 that goes into effect in two weeks. Number two, Jennifer and James Crumley, the parents of a convicted high schooler who committed a mass shooting in Michigan, were sentenced to 10 to 15 years in state prison for failing to prevent their son's actions. Number three, Norfolk Southern agreed to pay $600 million in a class action lawsuit settlement with East Palestine, Ohio, where one of their trains derailed and spilled toxic chemicals in 2023. Number four, the Environmental

Starting point is 00:03:31 Protection Agency will require more than 200 chemical plants to cut their emissions of toxic chemicals as part of an effort to reduce cancer. And number five, the European Union Court of Human Rights ruled that countries have an obligation to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to protect people from climate change, the first international ruling of its kind. President Biden said to announce a new student debt relief plan that will impact millions of Americans if it goes into effect. Supreme Court struck down a previous plan. President Biden is set to announce a new student debt relief plan that will impact millions of Americans if it goes into effect. Supreme Court struck down a previous plan. President Biden is set to announce new proposals for partial or complete student loan forgiveness in the battleground state of Wisconsin today. The Biden administration has been working on this since the Supreme Court rejected the president's original plan to address the issue last year.

Starting point is 00:04:23 objected the president's original plan to address the issue last year. And so they've spent the last year or so trying to come up with a narrower plan that ultimately the White House believes could benefit up to 25 million people or so. And it's going to help essentially assist those who have been in repayment for 20 years or longer on their undergraduate loans, 25 years or longer on their graduate loans. On Monday, President Biden unveiled a new plan that could erase some or all of the college loans for up to 30 million borrowers. The plan comes less than a year after the Supreme Court blocked a broader effort that would have forgiven an average of $20,000 for roughly 40 million Americans. Today, around 43 million Americans own about $1.7 trillion in student loan debt. Biden's previous plan leveraged the Higher Education Relief Opportunities for Students,

Starting point is 00:05:10 or HEROES Act, to grant waivers for student debt relief. The Supreme Court ultimately ruled that the Biden administration was using the bill in a way that Congress had not intended. This time, Biden is using the Higher Education Act, which gives the Secretary of Education the power to compromise, waive, or release federal student loans. The new plan targets five main groups. First, borrowers whose loan balances have grown despite their consistent payments due to interest rates. The provision would cancel up to $20,000 in interest for Americans who owe more than they originally borrowed. than they originally borrowed. That cap would not apply for people making less than $120,000 per year or couples making less than $240,000 per year who are enrolled in an income-driven repayment plan. This is the largest group of borrowers who would be impacted, an estimated 25 million people.

Starting point is 00:05:57 Borrowers whose undergraduate or graduate loans have been in repayment for at least 20 or 25 years, respectively, would also be impacted. This provision would impact roughly 2.5 million people. Anyone with undergraduate debt who began repaying their loans at least 20 years ago or with graduate debt who began repaying their loans 25 years ago would be eligible. Then, there are borrowers with debt who attended low financial value colleges. This provision would apply to anyone who went to colleges that lost their eligibility or were denied recertification because they cheated students, or those who went to college programs that left students with low incomes compared to their student loans. The plan also addresses borrowers experiencing hardship and struggling to pay back loans. This provision

Starting point is 00:06:39 would apply to borrowers who are considered highly likely to default on their loans due to hardships like medical debt or child care costs. The White House did not specify what financial thresholds qualifies for hardship, so it's unclear how many borrowers this might impact. And finally, the plan addresses borrowers whose income levels qualify them for forgiveness but who haven't applied. This provision would apply to roughly 2 million people who qualify for programs like the Public Service Loan Forgiveness or Income-Driven Repayment Plans but haven't applied. No application would be necessary. The Education Department has not yet released a formal proposal, as it is still going through a federal rulemaking process to clarify how the Education Secretary can invoke their authority

Starting point is 00:07:18 to cancel the debt. Most of the cancellation would be done automatically, with no need for beneficiaries to apply. The one exception is the group of borrowers who want to make a case that they face some sort of hardship that merits cancellation. Typically, the rulemaking process would have the cancellation going into effect in the summer of 2025, but the administration has fast-tracked some rules for early implementation, and officials say the forgiveness could happen as soon as this fall. Like the administration's previous attempt, the effort is expected to face legal challenges that could delay or halt it entirely. Today, we're going to break down some arguments from the left and the right about that

Starting point is 00:07:52 plan, and then my take. We'll be right back after this quick commercial break. First up, we're going to start with what the right is saying. The right has strongly opposed the Biden's plan, depicting it as unconstitutional and dishonest. Some say Biden is pushing this issue solely for political gain. Others criticize young voters who continue to insist on sweeping loan forgiveness. The Wall Street Journal editorial board called the plan Biden's latest lawless student loan forgiveness. Mr. Biden's previous repayment plans prevent interest from compounding, eliminating the punishment for not making full and regular payments. Now borrowers also won't have to pay interest they've racked up, which could total hundreds of billions of dollars.

Starting point is 00:08:43 Wouldn't Americans love to write off interest that accrues on credit cards too, the board wrote? Borrowers who can't find or don't want gainful employment could get their loans canceled simply by claiming a hardship. One example the White House gives is child care expenses. Get ready for an elastic definition of hardship. Mr. Biden's new loan forgiveness is still illegal. The high court stressed that student loan forgiveness is a major question that requires clear authorization from Congress. But Mr. Biden's new loan forgiveness is still illegal. The high court stressed that student loan forgiveness is a major question that requires clear authorization from Congress. But Mr. Biden seems to believe he can jam the courts by automatically forgiving student debt before a judge has time to stop him. The White House says most borrowers won't even have to apply for loan relief. Sometime before the November election, Mr. Biden will simply declare

Starting point is 00:09:21 their debt forgiven. That means a future Congress and a President Trump might be unable to undo the lawless act. Where are the press scolds who warn about a president who threatens democracy? For the American Enterprise Institute, Beth Akers argued that Biden knows student loan cancellation is a bad idea. Biden knows better. Less than a month into his presidency, he declared, I will not make that happen in response to a voter asking whether or not he'd back Progressive's proposal to broadly forgive student debt. And beyond the question of authority, he seemed to acknowledge the ill-conceived nature of broad-based student loan cancellation when he offered that he didn't want taxpayers to pick up the tab for graduates of Harvard and Yale and Penn, Aker said. Such broad forgiveness is simply bad policy. Not only is it regressive, it also

Starting point is 00:10:06 provides colleges and universities with precisely the wrong incentives. So why the change of pace? It seems that this administration is more interested in scoring political points than enacting good policy. The math is simple. 30 million Americans with lower or completely forgiven student loan balances will have Biden to thank, and they may repay the favor in November by giving him their vote. As is the case with many transfer programs, costs are distributed while benefits are concentrated, Akers said. One thing is abundantly clear. Biden has transformed the federal direct loan program, enacted with the intention of solving a narrow problem, into a giant drain on the U.S. Treasury. In USA Today, Deys Potas said Gen Z wants student loan forgiveness

Starting point is 00:10:46 without any accountability. It doesn't work that way. My generation has a political problem. We gravitate toward quick fixes for massive problems that plague our country. The generation raised on instant gratification, to little surprise, is looking for the same in politics and government. On no other issue is this more apparent than the student loan crisis, POTUS wrote. Not only are we broadly in favor of other people paying off our debts, a majority of whom do not hold a bachelor's degree or higher, we don't even have the decency to be more aware of the issues than generations that are more likely to have already paid off their loans. While I think this course of action is unwise and immoral, Gen Z has a better chance of accomplishing debt relief through Congress, which is responsible for the power of the purse.

Starting point is 00:11:29 Blanket cancellation does nothing to combat the problem of the student loan crisis. In fact, it would only serve as a further incentive for students to attend colleges they can't afford, obtaining degrees that give them little chance of allowing them to pay off the debt they accrued in the process. Congressional efforts are much better geared toward legislation curtailing the federal student lending programs that have gotten us into this mess in the first place. All right, that is it for the rightist saying, which brings us to what the left is saying. The left mostly supports Biden's ongoing efforts to cancel student loan debt. Some argue forgiving these loans will benefit all of society in the long run. Others say Biden is failing to address the underlying cause of the student debt crisis.

Starting point is 00:12:17 In MSNBC, Hayes Brown said the plan is a winner. The focus on interest is a smart pivot for the administration, given the massive resistance that previous attempts to wipe out student debt wholesale has seen. In wiping out accumulated interest, allowing any remaining payments to go directly to the principal, many who have been drowning in debt may actually be able to pay back what they owe, while avoiding accusations that the program is unfair to those who already pay their loans in full. What makes his announcement doubly important is that it manages to be good policy and good politics, Brown said. Biden's campaign pledge to propose student loan

Starting point is 00:12:50 debt relief to Congress was a major turning point in the debate over what to do about spiraling education costs in America. It's a promise that many student loan holders who saw repayments and interest rates totally frozen during the pandemic have been keen to see brought to life, especially now that repayments have resumed. Being able to rack up wins is crucial considering how much Biden needs to keep younger voters in his camp at the polls this fall. In the Los Angeles Times, LZ Granderson suggested forgiving student loans is the least we can do. Some conservatives have accused Biden of trying to buy votes, as if Donald Trump offering tax breaks to a room full of billionaires was a policy-motivated decision. Others point out the president is only doing this to fulfill a campaign promise, which, for some reason, I thought was

Starting point is 00:13:33 part of the job, Granderson said. In America, the childless pay for schools they don't need, and city dwellers pay for country roads they'll never drive on. That kind of economic cooperation is needed in a land as vast as ours. Student loan debt isn't an impediment to the ultra-rich who pay out of pocket for college, or even for many in the upper middle class who have connections to turn their $400,000 degree into a $200,000 a year starter job. But for the bottom 20% of earners in our society, people who once had a chance to climb up the economic ladder, college has become a treacherous option, Granderson said. Like public schools and country roads, we all need college to be accessible for people from all economic backgrounds. Out-of-control college costs and crushing student debt are everyone's problem.

Starting point is 00:14:18 The St. Louis Post-Dispatch editorial board said that the student loan crisis is actually a tuition crisis. Focus on that. Based on Charles Yu's award-winning book, Interior Chinatown follows the story of Willis Wu, a background character trapped in a police procedural who dreams about a world beyond Chinatown. When he inadvertently becomes a witness to a crime, Willis begins to unravel a criminal web, his family's buried history, and what it feels like to be in the spotlight. Interior Chinatown is streaming November 19th, only on Disney+. The flu remains a serious disease. Last season, over 102,000 influenza cases have been reported across Canada, which is nearly double the historic average of 52,000

Starting point is 00:15:00 cases. What can you do this flu season? Talk to your pharmacist or doctor about getting a flu shot. Consider FluCellVax Quad and help protect yourself from the flu. It's the first cell-based flu vaccine authorized in Canada for ages six months and older, and it may be available for free in your province. Side effects and allergic reactions can occur, and 100% protection is not guaranteed. Learn more at FluCellVax.ca. With its latest student loan forgiveness proposal, the Biden administration is attempting to revive one of its most ill-advised campaign stunts, or fiscal policies. The details have changed, but the deeply problematic issues are the same. American taxpayers, many of whom didn't go to college because they didn't want to rack up debt, will be forced to help pay off the loans of those who chose differently and who, in many cases, are far more financially comfortable than

Starting point is 00:15:48 their unwitting benefactors. The inherent unfairness of it is only one of many problems. In the end, this temporary one-off solution to the chronic crisis of out-of-control tuition costs could drive these costs up further while giving the federal and state governments cover for failing to address the core issues causing it. This policy deserves a failing grade, the board said. Ultimately, this short-sighted approach to the issue of spiraling student debt, just cancel it, not only doesn't solve the problem, but makes it worse going forward. All right, that is it for what the left and the right are saying, which brings us to my take. So when Biden's original student debt forgiveness plan was released,

Starting point is 00:16:42 I argued two things that I think are still relevant today. First, on the merits, I did not support the idea of broadly canceling student debt. Student debt is something that has impacted me, my family members, and my friends. I am part of the generation most burdened by student debt, and in principle, I do not think student loan cancellation is inherently bad. There are situations where it's good and useful as an economic stimulus or as a way to relieve students who are victims of predatory lending. But that's a much narrower scope of forgiveness than what Biden first proposed, or what his new plan is targeting. In April of 2022, when Biden's first plan was released, I argued that it was bad

Starting point is 00:17:15 timing and not justifiable. The economy was doing better, inflation was already rising, and more economic stimulus was not needed. Furthermore, too many people in advantageous positions would have had their debt forgiven, making the policy regressive. I was also convinced by the argument that simply canceling debt would do nothing to solve the structural issues resulting in economic hardship for college graduates unless the actual system was reformed.

Starting point is 00:17:38 Otherwise, as Des Potas and the St. Louis Post-Dispatch are both arguing today, we'll just get a whole new generation of borrowers who think they won't have to pay back their loans because eventually the government will forgive them. That will only exacerbate future problems. Second, I argued that student debt cancellation, as Biden initially tried to execute it, was probably illegal. It turned out I was right, and the Supreme Court struck it down. Both of those points are still true now. The timing is not justifiable, and the plan is probably going to get struck down.

Starting point is 00:18:10 On the timing issue, while inflation has improved, we are still not out of the woods. An economic stimulus like this would still be premature and too risky. On top of that, the economy is improving. Unemployment is low, wage growth has caught up to inflation, and the stock market is booming. Again, there might be a time for broad student loan forgiveness, but I don't think that time is right now. Don't forget that Biden has already approved $146 billion of student debt relief for 4 million borrowers. As for the legality, I also don't expect all of this plan to survive. The devil will be in the details, and the education secretary is apparently still exploring the rulemaking process to make this

Starting point is 00:18:49 possible. But the Supreme Court made it quite clear that student loan forgiveness is a major question that requires clear authorization from Congress. The court has already defined the applications of the Higher Education Act it deems acceptable. In its 2022 ruling in Biden v. Nebraska, Chief Justice Roberts wrote, quote, the act authorizes the Secretary of Education to cancel or reduce loans in certain limited circumstances. The secretary may cancel a set amount of loans held by some public servants. He may also forgive the loans of borrowers who have died or become permanently and totally disabled, borrowers who are bankrupt, and borrowers whose schools falsely certify them, close down, or fail to pay lenders. That is about as clear as the court can

Starting point is 00:19:29 be, and it casts doubt on the legality of much of Biden's new plan. As the Wall Street Journal wrote under what the right is saying, the president seems to be hoping he can automatically forgive the debt before a court stops him. I sincerely doubt it works. That said, it's worth conceding this plan is better than the original one for a few reasons. First, it targets students burdened by absurd interest rates that never allow them to climb out, which is a real problem. Second, it is genuinely narrower, at least in that it impacts fewer people. And third, it includes specific relief programs for students who are conned by bogus for-profit colleges or misleading college programs, which I actually do think is something we should address and which the Supreme Court has

Starting point is 00:20:09 signaled it would permit. I also want to be clear that there are bad arguments against student debt cancellation. For instance, it is silly to argue that Biden is buying votes and therefore we should oppose this effort. If you define buying votes as trying to improve the economic situation of Americans and sell them on your plan, then every president buys votes. Forgiving debts is pretty similar to cutting taxes or creating a program like the Child Tax Credit. It's an economic plan designed to benefit one group that other groups will have to pay for in some way. I also don't believe in the argument that I paid my loans so they should too. That argument strikes me as not only selfish, but also misapplied. I suffered and sacrificed to pay my debt for years, but I also know that I was fortunate to be able to and that I got a little bit of help from my family

Starting point is 00:20:55 as time went on also. Many people got mired in the 2008 crisis or suffered some kind of setback or just didn't get the same opportunities I did. Things that were hard for me should always be hard for everyone. It just doesn't feel like it makes our country any better. This could help people who really need help. I don't feel spiteful that I didn't get the same help. I just question whether, on net, it is the right solution to the problem. Again, we must fix the system. Any debt cancellation that is impaired with a major overhaul to how student loans are constructed isn't going to fix the issue. It's just going to create a whole new generation of people who think they can borrow without worrying about paying off their loans and then get trapped under the mountains of debt and interest rates. Any debt forgiveness plan that isn't coupled with

Starting point is 00:21:37 a long-term fix will result in the government spending a lot of money just to end up with the same problem, only worse in another 10 or 20 years. This latest plan is better than the first, but it still fails on the merits, and given the bar set by the Supreme Court for how executive action can be used to cancel debt, it's also likely to get curtailed or struck down. We'll be right back after this quick break. All right, that is it for my take, which brings us to your questions answered. This one's from Ellie in Los Angeles, California. Ellie said, something I've been wondering since the 2016 election. Is there any research being done around the effect that polls themselves can

Starting point is 00:22:24 have on voter turnout? My hypothesis is that because the polls leading up to the 2016 election made it look like Hillary Clinton's victory was so much more probable than Trump's, she actually lost voter turnout on election day, possibly younger voters teetering on the edge of disillusionment. Is there any credibility to this theory? So actually, yes. Obviously, there is not now, and there probably won't ever be, definitive proof of why something as large and complex as the U.S. voting public does what it does, including in 2016. But there's pretty good evidence to say that you're right on both counts. In 2016, tons of people expected Hillary Clinton to win. The polls showed her with a commanding lead in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania, all states she would go on to lose. Hillary's own campaign assumed she would

Starting point is 00:23:08 win. James Comey assumed she would win. You can be almost certain that Clinton would have campaigned differently if her staff were all uncertain of the outcome up until election day, and if her campaign would have acted differently, then it stands to reason the voters would have too. As for the effect polling has had on voter turnout, a collaboration from researchers in Germany, Switzerland, and Chicago found that there is indeed a causal relationship between voter turnout and how close the polls are. The research found that not only did more people show up in elections that they thought would be close, but more people showed up in what the study called politically unrepresentative

Starting point is 00:23:43 municipalities, where locally available signals of closeness are less correlated with national closeness. On top of that, more voters in close elections show up to vote for the underdog than the favorite. Anecdotally, I've seen the difference myself among voters in places I've lived. In New York, so many friends and family have been ambivalent about national elections. In Pennsylvania, that has never been true. That my experience matches studies like the one above is pretty compelling to me. So yes, it's absolutely credible to think that Clinton voters stayed home because they believed there was no point, but Trump voters, specifically those in areas they believed would be very competitive, showed up. A quick reminder, if you want to ask a question and have it answered in the podcast, you can email me, Isaac, I-S-A-A-C, at readtangle.com, with the subject line listener question.

Starting point is 00:24:35 All right, next up is our under the radar section. In an unusual act of unity, several of the biggest television networks have co-signed a letter insisting that President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump participate in televised debates, something neither candidate has committed to doing. The letter was endorsed by Fox News, ABC, CBS, CNN, and NBC. We, the undersigned national news organizations, urge the presumptive presidential nominees to publicly commit to participating in general election debates before November's election, the letter said. The networks are seeking more endorsements from major newspapers for its letter, which has not been finalized. Axios has the story, and there's a link to it in today's episode description. All right, next up is our numbers section. The approximate amount of student loan

Starting point is 00:25:23 debt held by the federal government in 2008 is $577 billion. The approximate amount of student loan debt held by the federal government in 2023 is $1.6 trillion. The average amount of student loan debt owed per borrower up to graduation in the U.S. is $28,950,000. The average amount of student loan debt owed per borrower upon graduation in the U.S. is twenty eight thousand nine hundred fifty dollars. The number of schools on the Princeton Review's list of the three hundred eighty nine best colleges with a tuition cost of more than ninety thousand dollars for the 2024-2025 academic year is eight. The percentage of Gen Z voters in swing states who say President Biden is doing too little to address the burden of student loan payments is 43%, according to a December 2023 poll from Bloomberg News slash Morning Consult. The percentage of all voters in swing states who say President Biden is doing too little to address the burden of student loan payments is 27%.

Starting point is 00:26:20 The percentage of voters who say canceling student loan debt is an important issue to them in the 2024 presidential and congressional elections is 48%. And the percentage of voters who believe the government should take some action on student loan debt, including 50% who support partial or complete loan cancellation, is 73%. All right, and last but not least, our Have a Nice Day section. All right, and last but not least, our Have a Nice Day section. A collaborative project at the Mass General Cancer Center in Boston, Massachusetts, has shown dramatic results in a novel kind of cell therapy among patients with a deadly form of brain cancer. In a paper published in the New England Journal of Medicine, researchers shared the results of their new approach to CAR T-cell therapy, a process for adapting the immune system's T-cells to develop chimeric antigen receptors to target tumors.

Starting point is 00:27:10 The first three patient cases from a Phase I clinical trial showed success in targeting glioblastomas. We report a dramatic and rapid response in these three patients. Our work to date shows signs that we are making progress, but there is more to do, said co-author Elizabeth Gerstner. Mass General has the story, and there's a link to it in today's episode description. All right, everybody, that is it for today's podcast. Don't forget, if you want to submit a question, you can write in to me, Isaac, at readtangle.com. If you want to support our work, you can go to readtangle.com forward slash membership. We've still got some VIP tickets

Starting point is 00:27:49 left for our event next week, a week from today in New York City. And we are hiring for this podcast on our YouTube channel right now. And you can find that job description in our episode description and also in today's newsletter. All right, everybody, we'll see you tomorrow. Same time, have a good one. Peace. Our podcast is written by me, Isaac Saul, and edited and engineered by John Wall. The script is edited by our managing editor, Ari Weitzman,

Starting point is 00:28:21 Will Kabak, Bailey Saul, and Sean Brady. The logo for our podcast was designed by Magdalena Bokova, who is also our social media manager. Music for the podcast was produced by Diet75. And if you're looking for more from Tangle, please go to readtangle.com and check out our website. We'll see you next time. police procedural who dreams about a world beyond Chinatown. When he inadvertently becomes a witness to a crime, Willis begins to unravel a criminal web, his family's buried history, and what it feels like to be in the spotlight. Interior Chinatown is streaming November 19th, only on Disney+. The flu remains a serious disease. Last season, over 102,000 influenza cases have been

Starting point is 00:29:21 reported across Canada, which is nearly double the historic average of 52,000 cases. What can you do this flu season? Talk to your pharmacist or doctor about getting a flu shot. Consider FluCellVax Quad and help protect yourself from the flu. It's the first cell-based flu vaccine authorized in Canada for ages six months and older, and it may be available for free in your province. Side effects and allergic reactions can occur, and 100% protection is not guaranteed. Learn more at FluCellVax.ca.

Tangle - Biden's new student debt cancellation plan.

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