Biden’s Student Loan Forgiveness Gaffe

President Joe Biden wrongly said that he got student debt forgiveness “passed by a vote or two.” There was no vote. Biden simply announced that the Department of Education would provide debt relief, and the plan is facing a legal challenge.

Biden, who once described himself as a “gaffe machine,” made his latest blunder while speaking in a presidential forum sponsored by the media company NowThis. Video of the event, in which the president answered questions about the concerns of young people, was posted Oct. 23.

“What we’ve provided for is, if you went to school, if you qualified for a Pell Grant … you qualify for $20,000 in debt forgiveness,” Biden said. “Secondly, if you don’t have one of those loans, you just get $10,000 written off. It’s passed. I got it passed by a vote or two. And it’s in effect. And already a total of, I think it’s now 13 million people have applied for that service.”

A few minutes later, the college student who had asked Biden about the high cost of higher education followed up with a second question that correctly began, “Your administration moved to cancel billions of dollars in student loan debt through an executive action.”