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- AOC said Democrats will not get re-elected if they don’t act on student debt and pass Biden’s agenda.
- The Senate likely won’t vote on Build Back Better until 2022, causing the child tax credit to lapse.
- Plus, 43 million federal student-loan borrowers will have to resume payments on Feb. 1.
AOC gave her Democratic colleagues a reality check: act on issues their voters care about or lose the next election.
“It is actually delusional to believe Dems can get re-elected without acting on filibuster or student debt, Biden breaking his BBB (Build Back Better) promise, letting CTC (child tax credit) lapse, 0 path to citizenship, etc,” New York Rep. Ocasio Cortez wrote on Twitter on Friday.
—Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) December 17, 2021
All those issues Ocasio-Cortez listed are ones progressive lawmakers, and Americans who voted for them, are strongly advocating for. Although it’s been almost a month since the House passed President Joe Biden’s $2 trillion social-spending package, which included a one-year expansion of the child tax credit for families with children, it looks like the Senate will not be voting on the package until after Christmas.
Given the pushed-back timeline, not only will the $300 monthly checks per child lapse in January, but just one month later, 43 million federal student-loan borrowers will be resuming payments on their debt once the pandemic pause lifts on February 1.
As Insider previously reported, many fully-employed borrowers do not feel financially secure enough to make payments next year, and per a new Data for Progress poll, 55% of voters think the payment pause should be extended since COVID-19 cases are still rising.
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said in a recent press briefing that while the administration still plans so stay on schedule with the payment resumption, they are continuing to review the impact of the Omicron variant.
Ocasio-Cortez has been one of the many progressive lawmakers urging Biden to not only extend the pause on student-loan payments, given the pandemic is ongoing, but to cancel student debt broadly for every borrower. She took to the House floor earlier this month to urge Biden to act on the $1.7 trillion crisis, and she slammed the “ridiculous assertion” that canceling student debt would benefit the rich.
“Do we really think that a billionaire’s child is taking on student loans?” Ocasio-Cortez said.
Biden campaigned on approving $10,000 in student debt per borrower, but that promise has yet to come to fruition and voters are beginning to take notice. For example, an independent voter recently appeared on CNN to weigh in on Biden’s actions so far, and she gave the president a B-minus rating for not yet delivering on his student-debt promises.
“I would definitely say he has delivered on many promises, but some of them he has not,” Amikka Burl, an independent voter, said on CNN. “He promised when he was actually running, on his campaign trail, that he would wipe out $10,000 worth of student-loan debt for every individual that has student loans. That has yet to come to fruition, so I am waiting for that to happen.”
Aside from student-debt cancellation, the most pressing issue right now for many borrowers is being thrown back into repayment early next year, and lawmakers and advocates are working to ensure that does not happen.
“This debt is just overwhelming for people,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said last week. “If we don’t extend the pause, interest rates just pile up. Students owe a fortune. And with Omicron here, we’re not getting out of this as quickly as we’d like.”
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