Independent Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders announced the ‘College for All Act’ on Monday proposing the cancellation of student debt for all Americans.
Sanders laid out plans to scrub every dollar of outstanding student debt while flanked by other progressive members of Congress, such as Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, and Pramila Jayapal of Washington.
Sanders’ plan proposes that the $1.6 trillion of college tuition loans could be wiped out with $2.2 billion raised by a series of tax increases on things such as stock trades, bonds, and derivatives, among other things. His plan is a level up from the signature plan of Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, which is called the ‘College Affordibility Plan.’ Warren’s plan forgives student loans based on the current income of those in debt, offering less forgiveness for higher earners. She proposed the plan could be funded by levying an additional 2% tax on Americans with fortunes of $50,000 or more.
From the front of the U.S. Capitol, Sanders explained that his plan “completely eliminates student debt in this country and the absurdity of sentencing an entire generation, the millennial generation, to a lifetime of debt for the crime of doing the right thing. And that is going out and getting a higher education.”
Sanders also equated his plan to what he considered similar government bailouts. He said, “If we can bail out Wall Street, we can bail out the middle class.”
