Savannah Britt owes about $27,000 on loans she took out to attend college at Rutgers University, a debt she was hoping to see reduced by President Joe Biden鈥檚 efforts.
Her payments are currently on hold while courts untangle challenges to the loan forgiveness program. But as the weeks tick down on Biden's time in office, she could soon face a monthly payment of up to $250.
"With this , the dream is gone. It鈥檚 shot,鈥� said Britt, 30, who runs her own communications agency. 鈥淚 was hopeful before Tuesday. I was waiting out the process. Even my mom has a loan that she took out to support me. She owes about $18,000, and she was in the process of it being forgiven, but it鈥檚 at a standstill.鈥�
President-elect and his fellow Republicans have criticized Biden's loan forgiveness efforts, and lawsuits by GOP-led states have held up plans for widespread debt cancellation. Trump has not said what he would do on loan forgiveness, leaving millions of borrowers facing uncertainty over their personal finances.
The was an important issue in the election, helping to propel Trump to victory. But for borrowers, concerns about their finances extend beyond inflation to include their student debt, said Persis Yu, managing counsel for the Student Borrower Protection Center.
鈥淭hat鈥檚 a big part of what is making life unaffordable for them is this burden of expenses that they can鈥檛 seem to get out from under,鈥� Yu said.
Student loan cancellation was not a focus of the campaign for either Trump or Vice President , who steered clear of the issue at her political events. The issue came up just once in the September presidential debate, when Trump hammered Harris and Biden for failing to deliver their promise of widespread forgiveness. Trump called it a 鈥渢otal catastrophe鈥� that 鈥渢aunted young people.鈥�
Biden promised the student loan cancellation program during his run for the presidency. From its launch, Biden's loan forgiveness faced relentless pushback from opponents who said it heaped advantage on elites and came at the expense of those who repaid their loans or did not attend college.
Biden鈥檚 first plan to cancel up to $20,000 for millions of people was last year. A has been halted by a federal judge after Republican-led states sued. A separate policy intended to lower loan payments for struggling borrowers has been paused by a judge, also after Republican-controlled states challenged it.
Bob Eitel, who served during the first Trump administration as a senior counselor to the education secretary, said he expects the president-elect will move to rescind the loan cancellation regulations.
鈥淭he Trump administration may pursue different avenues of loan relief, but it will not be the mass, blanket types of forgiveness that the current administration has pursued,鈥� said Eitel, president and co-founder of the Defense of Freedom Institute for Policy Studies.
Overall, Biden's efforts were relatively unpopular, even among those with student loans. Three in 10 U.S. adults said they approved of how Biden had handled student loan debt, according to a this spring from the University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy and . Four in 10 disapproved. The others were neutral or didn鈥檛 know enough to say.
Project 2025, the in American government that , calls for getting the federal government out of the student loan business and doing away with repayment plans that pre-date the Biden administration.
Even without directly addressing student loans, Trump has made promises that would affect them. He has pledged to eliminate the U.S. Department of Education, which manages the $1.6 trillion federal student loan portfolio. It's unclear which entity would take that responsibility if the department were eliminated, which would require approval from Congress.
鈥淭he American people re-elected President Trump by a resounding margin giving him a mandate to implement the promises he made on the campaign trail. He will deliver,鈥� said Karoline Leavitt, a spokesperson for the Trump-Vance transition.
Yu noted the Biden administration managed to cancel student loans for about , even though the signature forgiveness effort has been blocked. The administration did it by leaning into loan cancellation programs already in effect. For example, an existing for public service workers has granted relief to more than 1 million Americans, up from just 7,000 who were approved before it was updated by the Biden administration two years ago.
鈥淎 lot of the cancellation that we saw in the last couple of years was because the Biden administration was committed to making the programs that are actually enshrined in law work for people," Yu said.
Sabrina Calazans, 27, owes about $30,000 on federal student loans from her college days at Arcadia University in Pennsylvania. Her payments also have been on hold, but she could soon face a monthly payment of over $300.
鈥淎s a first-generation American, I live at home with my family, I contribute to our household finances, and that payment is a lot for me and so many others like me,鈥� said Calazans, who is originally from Brazil.
In her role as managing director for Student Debt Crisis Center, Calazans said she has been telling people to stay up to date on developments by using the loan simulator on the and reading updated information on forgiveness qualifications and repayment programs.
鈥淭here鈥檚 a lot of confusion about student loans," Calazans said, and not just among young people. "We鈥檙e seeing a lot of parents take out more debt for their children to be able to go to school. We鈥檙e seeing older folks go back to school and having to take out loans as well.鈥�
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Associated Press education writer Collin Binkley in Washington, D.C.. contributed to this report.
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The Associated Press鈥� education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP鈥檚 for working with philanthropies, a of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.
Cheyanne Mumphrey, The Associated Press
