Millions of student loan borrowers will see the “light at the end of the tunnel” after the Trump administration agreed to reinstate loan forgiveness plans it had partially blocked following a court battle.
According to New York Post, the Trump administration reached an agreement with the American Federation of Teachers to approve student debt cancellation for millions of borrowers who continually make their regular payments.
The AFT and Department of Education came to an agreement Friday to begin cancelling student loans for borrowers enrolled in income-driven repayment plans, according to a joint status report filed the same day.
Winston Berkman-Breen, legal director for Protect Borrowers, which acted as counsel for the teachers’ union called the decision a “tremendous win for borrowers. With today’s filing, borrowers can rest a little easier.”
In a lawsuit filed in March, the AFT, which has about 1.8 million union members, accused Trump officials of blocking federal student loan holders from accessing repayment and forgiveness programs that were in effect when they first borrowed.
The White House had paused student loan forgiveness under some income-driven repayment plans, which calculate a borrowers monthly payment based on their salary, earlier this year.
After satisfying a certain number of months of qualifying payments on an IDR plan, borrowers can typically get the remaining balance of their loans forgiven.
