Can This 'Student Debt Release Tool' Get Your Student Loans Forgiven? Worth A Try At Least!
We say go for it.
When the Supreme Court in June murderized Joe Biden’s plan to forgive a portion of federal student loan debt for most borrowers, the president promised he’d keep working on fulfilling that promise through a new mechanism, but it would take some time to come up with the new plan that would forgive up to $10,000 in debt for most borrowers, or up to $20,000 for borrowers who received Pell grants.
As you may recall, the Supremes overruled the first try, saying Biden lacked authority to do widespread debt forgiveness under the law the administration cited, the 2003 HEROES Act. Biden said that he’d be back with a new proposal that would use the Education Department's authority under the 1965 Higher Education Act (HEA), which established low-interest federal student loans in the first place.
The Education Department is still putting that new plan together, with an eye to making it more resilient against the legal challenges that sank the first version. In the meantime, activists with the Debt Collective, a radical debtors’ union that wants to eliminated student debt across the board, have released a Student Debt Release Tool aimed at nudging the administration along by encouraging people to request immediate release from their student debt under the HEA, which gives the Education Department the power to “compromise, settle, waive or release” all federal student debts.
Here’s how the tool works, per the Debt Collective website, which says the process will take about 10 to 20 minutes.
You answer some basic questions about your student debt.
Based on your answers, [the Debt Collective has] created legal language to assert why your loans are BS and should be canceled. Those answers will generate a demand letter.
When you've completed all the questions, the form will get sent automatically to key officials with the power to act at the Department of Education.
As you may have gathered, this isn’t a formally approved application form from the government; it’s the work of activists who want to make it convenient for large numbers of people to demand debt relief under the existing law.
Another indication that this isn’t an extremely formal government form: I went through the tool (with a fake name and address that I didn’t submit, of course), and found this excellent request for additional personal testimony:
"Finally, set aside the legal mumbo-jumbo. Who cares what the Department of Education's categories are? How have student loans fucked up your life? Feel free to let loose. The people responsible for collecting your loans should know what they're doing to you.
How have student loans fucked up your life?"
Discuss amongst yourselves.
Debt Collective spokesperson Braxton Brewington tells Common Dreams that while it’s entirely up to the Education Department to decide whether to honor the petitions, “Using this new tool can in no way harm you,” because, he says, “the Education Department has the authority to eliminate a person's federal student debts if they want to. We know because they've done it before.”
Nothing is guaranteed, and the Education Department isn’t obligated to respond to the requests. But as the Debt Collective’s FAQ points out, the goal is to “remind them, in legal language, that they have the power to cancel your debt” — and to flood the Department of Education with so many requests that “they will HAVE to make a statement.”
Why do this instead of a conventional petition drive? For starters, it’s not just a letter with thousands of names, it’ll be (one hopes) thousands and thousands of borrowers demanding relief under the Higher Education Act, with pre-formatted legalese attached.
The Biden administration’s Education Department has done a hell of a lot more than any previous administration to actually address the student debt crisis, from providing relief from longstanding mismanagement of student loans by debt servicers, to forgiving loans that went to grifty for-profit colleges, to rolling out a new income-driven repayment plan that will help millions of Americans.
Now, with the pandemic pause on student loan payments set to end in October, a lot of people are set to step back on the student debt panic treadmill, so a mass demand for debt relief may help the administration find additional motivation to get its new plan for debt relief in place. Heck, it might even result in the Ed Department agreeing that all those debt forgiveness requests are valid.
[Common Grounds / Debt Collective / OregonLive / Debt Release Tool / Image by “DonkeyHotey,” Creative Commons License 2.0]
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Updated with a screenshot of an excellent section from the application form, which asks for personal narrative:
"Finally, set aside the legal mumbo-jumbo. Who cares what the Department of Education's categories are? How have student loans fucked up your life? Feel free to let loose. The people responsible for collecting your loans should know what they're doing to you.
How have student loans fucked up your life?"
I'm more concerned with my teenagers facing piles of debt, even for trade certifications.
Kids can't afford to live on their own. Can't afford college, a car, or anything I worked for a bit to get. They'll be lucky to swing their own phone, but cost them an arm and a leg because credit.
😱