George Anthony Pratt, 2023 Co-Valedictorian, speaks onstage during the 2023 139th Morehouse College Commencement Ceremony at Morehouse College on May 21, 2023 in Atlanta, Georgia.
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The Debt Collective announced it’s erasing student debt for former Morehouse College students.The group bought debt students owed to the school from fall 2022 and prior.It also called for Biden to do the same for all borrowers with federal student debt.
Thousands of college graduates are now cleared of student debt they owed to their school.
On Monday, the Debt Collective — a debtors union pushing for abolition of all forms of debt — announced it collaborated with Morehouse College to wipe out all outstanding account balances that were in collections for the fall 2022 term and prior. The historically Black college based in Georgia transferred the remaining balances to the Rolling Jubilee Fund, the Debt Collective’s sister organization, eliminating nearly $10 million for 2,777 former students.
“Our nation is defaulting on the promise of education when we burden communities, especially Black HBCU graduates, with crushing amounts of student debt,” Braxton Brewington, spokesperson for the Debt Collective, said in a statement.
“This nearly $10M of student debt cancellation will put thousands of Black folks in a better position to be able to save for retirement, purchase a home or start a small business,” he continued. “President Biden has yet to make good on his campaign promise to eliminate all student debt held by HBCU graduates. We’re doing our part, and it’s time Biden does his. Forty five million Americans need this relief.”
Brewington was referring to a pledge Biden made on the campaign trail to cancel student debt for borrowers from public colleges and universities earning up to $125,000 per year, and from private HBCUs and minority-serving institutions.
The debt that was eliminated is not federal student debt, but rather, institutional debt that a college owns, like unpaid tuition and other school-related expenses. Schools have the power to withhold transcripts and diplomas until that debt is paid off, which could limit students’ post-graduation employment opportunities.
In May of 2022, the Debt Collective took the same action for former Bennett College students, eliminating $1.7 million in college debt for 462 students dating back as far as 1996.
Still, the Debt Collective is calling for Biden to act on federal student debt for all borrowers. Last year, Biden announced up to $20,000 in student debt for federal borrowers making under $125,000 a year, but the Supreme Court struck down the relief in June, saying the president did not have the authority to cancel debt broadly using the HEROES Act of 2003.
The same day as the high court’s decision, the Education Department announced it would be pursuing a new route for relief using the Higher Education Act of 1965. The process takes time because it requires the administration to undergo negotiated rulemaking, which consists of a series of negotiation sessions and public comment, and a department negotiator recently said it’s possible the plan would not be implemented until July 2025.
It’s also likely the final rule will be more narrow than Biden’s first plan because the department said it’s looking at five distinct groups of borrowers for relief, rather than broad debt cancellation for all federal borrowers.
“We are not looking at a broad-based debt cancellation where we are going to wipe off debt in its entirety,” Tamy Abernathy, the department’s negotiator, said during October negotiations.