Ayanna Pressley: Canceling Student Debt Will Ensure ‘Equitable’ Economic Recovery

During an interview with MSNBC, Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-MA) pushed for the cancellation of student debt to help “ensure” an “equitable” economic recovery from the effects of the shutdowns amid the coronavirus pandemic.

Pressley told MSNBC’s “American Voices” that she will push the Joe Biden-Kamala Harris administration to cancel student debt via executive order on day one.

“I’m certainly not going to abdicate my responsibility to continue to fight for [a coronavirus relief package],” Pressley advised. “You know, this Democratic majority-led House has passed multiple bills to meet the scale and scope of this crisis to mitigate the hurt people are feeling, and this callous, and might I add clueless, GOP-led Senate has refused to act. And they have consistently failed the American people. But I’m going to continue to fight for reoccurring stimulus payments, for extended unemployment benefits, for eviction and foreclosure moratoriums, and for the canceling of student debt, you know, all of which I think are critical to meeting the scale and scope of this crisis and ensuring an equitable recovery.”

“I can only tell you what I have continued to advocate for is everything from paid leave, which, you know, these should not be controversial,” she added. “The fact that people need to be able to stay home from work because they’re not feeling well or to take care of ill loved ones, again, canceling rent and mortgages, eviction and foreclosure moratoriums. I mean, I’m getting projections in my district of 60,000 to 100,000 who are vulnerable and on the precipice of eviction right now in the midst of a pandemic, which is surging out of control and, of course, unprecedented food insecurity. And so, first and foremost, we have got to get this pandemic under control, make the robust federal investments for a national testing strategy, the investments for contact tracing, and then once a vaccine is made available, ensure that it is equitably distributed. We are finally turning the page on this dark chapter in our history. But we have been drinking from a fire hose for the last four years, and so on day one, by executive order with the stroke of the pen, canceling student debt is one of the things that I’m appealing to the Biden/Harris administration to do.”

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