Amid uncertainty about President Joe Biden’s student loan forgiveness program, the President has announced an extension on student loan repayments to June 2023.
Biden made the announcement on Tuesday (November 22). In a tweet accompanying news of the extension, Biden described his student loan forgiveness program as being “on hold” because Republican officials have the desire to block it, adding that he believed the forgiveness plan is legal.
He then continued, noting that the litigation surrounding the forgiveness plan is what led Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona to “extend the payment pause to no later than June 30, 2023, giving the Supreme Court time to hear the case in its current term.”
Following the last extension in August, student loan repayments were set to resume on January 1, 2023; however, this gives student loan borrowers six months more reprieve while they await to ascertain what happens with Biden’s student forgiveness program.
Biden is counting on the case before the Supreme Court to be resolved before the end of June when the Court’s term typically concludes.
Those with student loan debt have not had to make a payment on federal student loans since March 2020, when the pause on payments was first announced.
Since launching, the student loan pause has been extended six times.
But as the deadline for student loan repayments is fast approaching and Biden’s forgiveness program in limbo, Democrats, bolstered by activists, have called for some reprieve. Tuesday’s announcement offered them that reprieve.
The website accepting applications for student loan forgiveness has also had to shut down pending the court’s decision.
