Early in my term, I announced a major plan to
provide millions of working families with debt relief for their
college student debt.
10s of millions of people in debt were literally about
to be cancelled their debts.
But my major Republican fans in the Congress,
elected officials and special interests stepped in and sued us,
and the Supreme Court blocked it and blocked it.
But that didn't stop me.
I announced we're going to pursue alternative paths for student
debt relief for as many borrowers as possible.
And that's the effort that's been underway the last two
years.
I fix what's called the Save plan.
It existed, but I fixed it to make it the
most affordable repayment plan ever.
Before I took office, student borrowers had to pay 10%
of the discretionary income on a monthly basis.
If they made less than if they didn't have enough
to do that,
they were able to not have to pay that month.
But their interest continued. A lot of people don't have
the means to do that,
though. Under my saved plan,
we're cutting in half to 5%.
The undergraduate borrowers with undergraduate borrowers have to pay.
After their living expenses are accounted for.
That means no one with an undergraduate loan,
whether it's a Community College or a four year college,
will have to pay more than 5%
of the discretionary income to repay those loans starting in
July.
And that's income after you pay for necessities like food
and housing.
Already 7.5 million Americans have enrolled in this so-called safe
plan,
and there's more than 4 million of those bars had
their monthly payments dropped to 0 if they're living paycheck
to paycheck below a certain level.
This plan is the most generous repayment program ever,
and today we're doing it even faster and quicker than
ever before.
I'm proud to announce our Save Plan.
We are immediately canceling the debt loans for over 150,000
borrowers nearly six months ahead of schedule.
Starting today, we're canceling student debt for borrowers who are
enrolled in the SAFE Plan and have been paying student
loans for as little as 10 years.
If they took less than if they borrowed less than
$2000,
it's forgiven. The $12,000, excuse me,
it's the loan is forgiven.
This act will be a used help to graduates of
Community College and borrow those smaller loans,
putting them back on track faster for debt forgiveness than
ever before.
This builds on other progress I've made in canceling student
debt for close to 4 million Americans through various actions,
for example.