SAN ANTONIO – Federal student loan borrowers will have to resume payments in October as millions wait to see if the Supreme Court is going to approve President Joe Biden’s student loan forgiveness program.
U.S. Department of Education officials confirmed in a statement to POLITICO that monthly payments will resume in October and interest on loans will resume on Sept. 1.
It’s been widely reported that payments for student loans would resume 60 days after June 30 or 60 days after the Supreme Court rules on Biden’s forgiveness plan.
If the Supreme Court strikes down Biden’s student loan forgiveness plan before June 30, borrowers are expected to have to start paying their remaining balances 60 days after the court’s decision.
However, DOE officials told POLITICO borrowers would be notified “well before payments restart.”
If Biden’s student loan forgiveness plan holds up, borrowers can expect to see $10,000 in federal student debt forgiven for people who make less than $125,000 per year, and up to $20,000 for people who received Pell Grants.
According to the White House, nearly 90% of relief dollars will go to those earning less than $75,000 per year.
There’s no exact date when the Supreme Court is expected to make a decision, but the consensus is that borrowers will have an answer regarding debt relief sometime this summer.
San Antonio Student Loan Borrowers
Student loan borrowers in Texas carry the second largest amount of debt in the U.S., behind California, according to a report from Lending Tree.
The digital financial network company analyzed data from the U.S. Department of Education and found that 1,389,100 Texans have already been approved for an estimated $18.1 billion in student debt relief. That equals roughly $13,000 in forgiveness per borrower.
In San Antonio, nearly 164,000 people with student loan debt applied for loan forgiveness since President Joe Biden announced his initiative last year.
POLITICO previously filed an open records request to determine how many applications were sent to the Biden administration for loan forgiveness in each US ZIP code.
KSAT parsed out 64 San Antonio-area ZIP codes and found that 163,798 people applied for student loan forgiveness based on POLITICO’s data set, which was provided by the U.S. Department of Education.
According to POLTICO, student loan borrowers living in lower-income areas applied for the program at a higher rate compared to those who live in wealthier neighborhoods. The data shows the majority of applications came from areas where the per-capita income is under $35,000.
An estimated 3,759,300 people in Texas have student loan debt, according to Lending Tree.
Editor’s note: The video attached to this article is from a previous report.