>> as he approaches his 100th state office president biden will give his first address to a joint session of congress wednesday night. live coverage begins at 8 p.m. eastern with the president's address at 9 p.m. eastern on on c-span, online at , or listen live on the c-span radio app. >> host: danielle douglas-gabriel is a higher education reporter for the "washington post." thanks for being with us. we are dividing our phone lines a little differently as we focus on student student loant forgiveness. if you support the idea of forgiving the student loans -- let's begin with a status report. where do things stand on the issue what is of the debate? >> guest: first thanks for having me. i appreciate it. as where things stand at this

point is the biden administration is reviewing its legal authority to use executive action to cancel up to $50,000. the president has said about $10,000 is where he would be comfortable but recently his chief of staff ron klain said that actually they are reviewing the authority to cancel up to $50,000 which would be in line with what the more progressive liberal wing of the party wants. senator schumer as well as senator warren have been pushing this issue for $50,000 of cancellation since the beginning of the pandemic. legislatively, ? guest: this would be through executive order. there was a time when biden administration wanted congress to take up the issue. at this stage, the senators would like a simple more streamlined approach and having the president addressed the issue rather than trying to go through congress, even with this

majority, is more beneficial. host: part of the debate, for those families who did not take out any loans, is there a sense of this being unfair? guest: this has become a heavily partisan issue. republicans -- no republicans have come out in support of this. there is an issue of fairness and moral hazard, encouraging people to borrow more. there is argument that there are lots of programs and benefits that work as a social safety net that all americans do not benefit from. if you work to eliminate this debt, they can redeploy that money into the economy, purchasing homes and cars.

host: is there an income limit in terms as to who would qualify? guest: not at the moment. there is some discussion. i've heard some people may be people who are making under one out of $25,000. -- $125,000. there is not yet an income cap. i imagine that will be on the table. host: the total student debt amount exceeding $1.7 trillion and that accounts to about 44.7 million americans who have student loan debt. the average monthly payment is about $300. this number pre-pandemic, just over 11% of student loans were delinquent or in default. guest: we are having a repayment problem in this country in the

sense that the current repayment structure is exceedingly complicated. it is easy for people to fall through the cracks. we cannot do this without addressing the problem. the way that people are repaying them. there are lots of folks who have defaulted in the middle of the pandemic. there has to be a way to think about how you address existing problems in the system for people who are in it as well as people coming into it. there are scores of young folks who have not yet graduated who are taking on this debt. they are going to come into a payment system that is really difficult to navigate. host: in terms of that, if you

are about to enter college, taking out loans. four years from now you graduate and you have $75,000 in loan debt, would they qualify for this? or is this a one-time -- >> guest: this is being proposed as a one-time deal. this is meant to alleviate the financial burden for folks as it relates to the pandemic. people with federal loans, 95% of people with federal loans have not had to make payments as a form of relief. democrats would like to extend that and give those folks a clear slate as much as they can. in order to help restart the

economy in a meaningful way to think about what it would mean in terms of house purchases, car purchases, other kinds of economic activity. host: our guest covers higher education for the washington post, danielle douglas-gabriel. her work is available at washingtonpost.com. the idea of student loan forgiveness -- caller: i like the idea of forgiving the loan but i think you should have something a person should pay back. 100 hours of community service for every $10,000 forgiven. a person can accomplish that in two years. host: what about that idea? guest: that is similar to something candidate joe biden

campaigned on. this program is supposed to offer loan forgiveness after 10 years of work within the public sector or the nonprofit space. it has had lots of problems in terms of people thinking they were making qualified payments and finding out they were not. that is what i mean by needing to reform the structure in place. there are different forms of programs that involve some level of debt forgiveness based on service. all of those programs have lots of faults that make it very easy for folks, even the most well-meaning folks to fall through the cracks. host: georgia, all supporting this idea of forgiving student loans. caller: this is timely and needed discussion as it relates

to our innovative economy and future for our young people. and for families. let's get -- the first thing that president biden come within hours, he did suspend student loan debt that was a part of the cares program until september 2021. i support student loan debt and i have young people. they are in a different category because they can pay. we also have merit programs. we have merit programs whereby the student loan forgiveness debt that was part of the trump

-divorce -- trump-betsy devos debacle. we fund the residency through medicaid. not the hospitals, private funding. we also have merit programs. this is political. we are going to have to make a decision about the values in this country. we did it with the g.i. bill. we did not concern ourselves with who could pay. we said doctors, engineers -- we have to create the new future economy. we must make a moral decision. we are creating the foundation for the future for this country.

these are political decisions. they have merit programs. those people, upper middle income children, basing it on tests and gpas, they are receiving student debt forgiveness. they get that that is a political decision. -- that is a political decision. we are saying, that is a moral hazard. i do not consider it moral hazard. host: thank you for the call. let me add two other voices. if they waived the debt, they must also give those who recently paid debt some credit. it will cause much rage that will be amplified in the media.

ann opposes this idea. caller: yes, thank you for taking my call. i oppose paying off someone else's debt. i never hear any discussion -- because this will be taxpayer-funded, i am assuming -- for the people who chose not to go to college, who do not have children in college. forcing them to pay others' debts. i do not even see any discussion of if they are going to move forward with this legislation that people are not even required to pay back the principal on their loans. they already get it subsidized. they do not pay any interest. when they get out of school, we

are supposed to pick up the entire debt. makes no sense. it is there debt and their problem -- their debt and their problem. this is not a comparison to public education. host: what are you hearing from these callers? guest: i am hearing a lot of the arguments folks who are for and against this have raised over the last few months. in the last few years. it is interesting to see this rise to the level of being a potential federal policy where there were activists who have been pressing this idea of debt forgiveness for several years. i think to the caller's point about subsidizing the interest, there are two different types of federal loans offered to students while they are in

undergrad. there are low income students whose loans are often subsidized by the federal government. there are scores of students where that is not the case for them. the other issue is yeah, there are lots of people who will definitely benefit in terms of the earnings they are able to achieve. college graduates, as we do know, are able to weather economic crises. let's be clear that of the 44.7 million people, a lot of folks did not graduate. they went to schools that closed in the middle of that program. they went to predatory schools. i've spoken to borrowers along

that spectrum and there tends to be a narrow narrative about who owes money and what responsibilities they have when it is a lot more nuanced and complicated than that. host: susan ferrechio --danielle douglas-gabriel covers higher education for the washington post. why would you take out a $50,000 loan to get some degree that pays you $12-$15 an hour? caller: good morning. presently, i owe $20,000 in debt to the art institute of pittsburgh. the new york times said it was the biggest fraud in academia when the department of justice suited them for fraud. -- sued them for fraud. the art institute is bankrupt.

they have a supposed repayment and forgiveness program, which i applied for called the debt forgiveness application. borrowers defense to loan repayment. the art institute has a fund that is supposed to make me whole. betsy devos said on my application for 3.5 years -- sat on my application for 3.5 years, and then denied it. i am a victim of a crime. i have paid well over $15,000 on the $12,000 i borrowed and i still owe $20,000. when you have defaulted on a loan and you have established repayment, you first pay on interest, then on fees, collection fees, and then you

pay on the principal. i still owe more than half of the principal. i am 62. i am going into my retirement years and they can still collect on my social security check. host: when did you graduate? caller: 1985 after four years in the military. i was steered towards this college by a recruiter, by my local guidance counselor. the recruiters paid the guidance counselors one dollars -- $100 ahead -- $100 a head. host: you are still paying the loans today at 62? caller: i worked 50 different jobs. i never got a decent job for my

degree at the art institute of pittsburgh even though i attained dean's list four times out of eight quarters. i was an honor student with an awesome portfolio of artwork. this was before the age of computers. i cannot possibly research whether this was a legitimate for-profit college, which they called trade schools back in the 1970's and 1980's. host: thank you for sharing your story with us. your thoughts? guest: certainly, a portion of the debt we are seeing are coming from these sorts of schools. at the time the caller went to school, there was no reason to think that school was not legitimate. the department of education was

offering loan money to be able to go to those schools. i interview lots of people who feel a great amount of shame because of their debt. thinking they should have been smart enough to identify problems in the system, that they should have been smart enough to know that the school was fraudulent. these schools are accredited and supported by the federal government through this program and there is this level of trust . there is an authority to believe the schools are good. why shouldn't i go there? yes, there is this program that is supposed to make whole students defrauded by their schools. for the last several years, there have been 180,000 applications for this. 90% of which are coming from for-profit schools seeking forgiveness.

i feel like this idea of student debt is far more complicated than people characterize it. we live in a country with a very vast and diverse expansive higher education system and everything after college accounts for higher education. there are varying points within that system where people could be led astray or make choices that could affect them the rest of their lives. sometimes they are fully educated about the schools. and certainly, there is personal responsibility. but there are problems within the system that allows for that. i think that has to be addressed within any conversation about debt cancellation. how do we address the problems in the existing system? host: president biden asking his

education secretary to see if he can legally cancel student debt. this tweet says public colleges should charge only a minimal tuition. universities could charge a little more. i have mixed feelings about private universities. i attended state-funded educations. i am to pay for graduates from brown university or vanderbilt. georgia, student loan debt. good morning. caller: good morning. i have student loans. i have $90,000 worth of student loans, what i also have a graduate degree. it was one of the best programs in the nation. however, i feel like student

financial aid overall needs to be revamped. i was also a financial aid advisor after grad school and these kids are taking on loans and they do not understand what it means. something should be done about private loans and parent plus loans because the amount of interest that accumulates on the loans are ridiculous. it is predatory lending. that is it's just predatory lending and i feel that is probably what is going on. you sign up and you don't understandil that, you can't fie bankruptcy on federal loans like private loans. it's just there. it's affecting my finances. i can't buy a house. i can't have kids because it's literally a mortgage payment. >> host: how old are you? >> caller: i am 30. to be honest i've accepted i probably will never pay it back

even though i'm in the public service on forgiveness program because that program is completely flawed. i just think something needs to be done. >> host: thanks for sharing your response and thanks for the call. danielle douglas-gabriel, did you want to respond to that? >> guest: i'm glad there call that brought up the issues come one, plus loans about 3.6 point parents with parent plus loans. is a loans the government gives to parents to help fund their children's education and the loans are interesting. the interest rate can be between six, 7% or so plus origination fees. that is pretty expensive lending even though the terms are probably in terms of the protections are better than what theyec might be you can find in the private market. wete are seeing some of the fastest-growing categories of borrowers 50d and older as well as black borrowers.

black borrowers in part because not having the family resources for note to pay for college. a lot of black folks who do end up going to college borrow more and tend bar more often. that's an important thing to note. i feel like people are making decisions about the financial lies based on the idea that this debt is going to carry with them forever. i want to be clear, student loans are and can be an investment ind your education d the long-term possibilities for yourer career. it's not that the debt is bad pick it isis the system is structured in which we have needs reforms in orderwh to make it manageable for the people who currently have that and people who need to do that in order to obtain a better quality of life and contribute to society in a full and meaningful way. >> host: this from town square on her twitter page @cspanwj. no discussion of forgiving debt can be fair unless it includes discussion of the fact the loans were issued to people regardless

of income and ability to pay. that is what makes a interest on these loans predatory. the priority by the biden administration includehe the following, those borrowers impacted by this pandemic would get a public service loan forgiveness by the federal government, low-income borrowers with a high student loan debt would receive the most assistance. that according to forbes magazine. greenville north carolina. your point of view on this. >> caller: my point of view is -- thank you for taking my call. i'm very concerned because this is a good thing they have proposed. where we stand right now in america, everybody's job is up in thest air. they have artie been to school for work. there is no work. they have to be creative and start with something i knew. why can't everybody start on the same page and just reach out and help onean another? even people come from other

countries get help. you don't expect to pay back. let's help each other. let's help these young people to get a fresh start. thank you very much. >> host: carmel new york your view on this. >> caller: yes. i supported idea of forgiving loans but i think we should do it inhi a way for me how to fix this problem. one of the ways i think we could fix this is if we allow students who are struggling to declare bankruptcy. if weug do that, banking institutions are loaded the so-called kind of free money because the way these loans is like free money, they would be better as to how the students are going to be able to repay the loan. and to me these tuitions are, like, growing so fast. it's because of that. it's just the business of making money.

they are not thinking about the students. i s don't think that tuitions ae any realistic prices. 400 for a credit, 1500 for one class. that doesn't make anyas sense to me. >> host: thank you. let me bring in one more voice. kenny from georgia. go ahead, kenny. >> caller: i think it's an excellent idea because if you think back to 2008, all the banks got bailed out. .. this is a way to make things fair, and you have a lot of these middle-class kids who took out these loans, like somebody tweeted earlier, these kids are working at starbucks. they have degrees that are worthless, and it's the governments fault, the government backed out on l i think the government should do the right thing and do that

that forgiveness up to 50 grand and no stipulations with a one time bill and biden would be the greatest president ever and he's got a lot of democratic kids in the same vote and they would come over to the democratick party so i thank you. >> host: kenny, thank you. danielle douglas gabriel you've heard both sides of the augments let's go back to our initial conversation. where do things stand connect what is the timeline foror thiso be put in place if approved by the white house? >> guest: were fuzzy on the timeline at the stage because the administration has, for lease last two months, been telling us they are reviewing this and they are reviewing the authorities for the president to cancel this much moneyau. >> believe the last minute or so of the washington journal that you can find online on c-span .org. we take you live to a conversation with energy secretary jennifer granholm on the two chilean dollar info structure and climate plan put forward by the biden administration. the discussion hosted by politico playbook.