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The federal government will forgive federal student loan debts for another 78,000 Americans through a program that provides aid to teachers, nurses, firefighters, and other public servants, the government of President Joe Biden announced on Thursday.
The Department of Education is canceling the debts of beneficiaries who have made 10 years of payments while working in public service, making them eligible for relief under the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program.
"These public service workers have dedicated their careers to serving their communities, but due to past administrative failures, they never received the relief they were entitled to under the law," the president indicated in a statement.
Congress created the program in 2007, but rigid rules and errors by student loan administrators caused many beneficiaries to be unable to obtain the forgiveness they had been promised. The Biden administration relaxed some of the rules and retroactively granted forgiveness to many beneficiaries for their 10 years of payments.
Through these actions, the Biden administration has canceled loan debts for more than 871,000 public service workers. Previously, around 7,000 beneficiaries had achieved forgiveness of their loan debts.
The latest round of forgiveness will cancel around $5.8 billion in federal student loans.
Starting next week, those who receive forgiveness will receive an email message from Biden congratulating them on the forgiveness. An email will also be sent from the Democratic president, who is running for re-election, to 380,000 beneficiaries who are two years away from forgiveness under the program.