Federal Student Loan Debt forgiveness application open, local reaction

(ABC 6 News) – The Biden-Harris Administration is entering into its second phase of supporting Americans with significant debt, with applications opening this week for federal student loan debt relief.

This student loan forgiveness plan is expected to provide debt relief to as many as 43 million borrowers.

Higher education is expensive and leaves many Americans in debt for decades. The new unprecedented student loan forgiveness plan aims to relieve those struggling to pay their loans back.

“College is one of the leading sources of debt in this country. I’m a first generation college student and the only way I’m able to do it is actually through scholarships from that,” said University of Minnesota-Rochester student, Hannah McMillin. “If it wasn’t for that, college would probably not be an option for me.”

For those who want to apply to have their loans forgiven, the application process is up and running.

Go to studentaid.gov and click on “Apply Now”.

There is a form to fill out that asks for basic information, such as your name, social security number and date of birth. Once you are done, click “Submit”

While the application may be simple, there is a lot of controversy surrounding student loan debt relief. Not everyone agrees the plan is a good thing.

“I know when you take loans out, you’re gonna have to pay them back, that’s kind of the purpose of a loan. With school, I’m gonna be able to get a job that hopefully will allow me to pay those off eventually,” said University of Minnesota-Rochester graduate student, Maddie Steffen.

Other people who have already paid off their loans say, it is not fair and it will fall back on taxpayers.

“The money that’s paying for these loans now is all taxpayers,” said Andy Lundgren. “We have to turn around and pay for these student loans and I’ve already paid off mine. Now, I’m paying off other ones; It’s unconstitutional.”

But others say with the extremely high cost of higher education, this debt relief will help a lot of people.

“We can’t go back, retrospectively, and help people in older generations that didn’t have this,” said McMillin. “But, also the price of college is constantly increasing.”