Trump Signals Aid for Student Loan Borrowers

Inside Higher Ed

Kery Murakami

August 7, 2020

President Trump said in a tweet Thursday that he is looking into using his executive powers to continue providing help for those with student loans during the pandemic. It’s unclear if he has the authority or if it was simply a move to try to break the logjam in congressional negotiations over another coronavirus relief bill.

As congressional leaders have struggled in recent days to resolve differences over unemployment benefits in the next aid package, the president had signaled that he is considering using his executive powers to continue providing help for those without jobs, delay collecting payroll taxes and continue a moratorium on evictions. But he hadn’t mentioned student loan borrowers.

Trump, however, didn’t explicitly say he’d continue to excuse borrowers from making federal student loan payments. The moratorium, created in Congress’s last coronavirus aid package, the CARES Act, is set to expire Oct. 1.

Instead, Trump, on his way to a giving a speech in Cleveland and visiting a Whirlpool plant, tweeted, “Upon departing the Oval Office for Ohio, I’ve notified my staff to continue working on an Executive Order with respect to Payroll Tax Cut, Eviction Protections, Unemployment Extensions, and Student Loan Repayment Options.”

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