Leahy: ‘I Don’t Know’ What to Tell People Who Paid off Loans or Didn’t Go to College about Loan Forgiveness

On Tuesday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “Special Report,” Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) stated that he’s already hearing from people who paid off their student loans or didn’t go to college wondering why we should forgive student loans, “And I don’t know what the answer is.”

Host Bret Baier asked, [relevant exchange begins around 4:15] “We’re getting word right now that it is going to happen tomorrow and there is going to be some kind of cap, $125,000 or something. But even politically, do you worry, from your side of the aisle, that there will be people that say, I paid off my loans or people that don’t go to college saying, why do I forgive this?”

Leahy answered, “No question about it. I’m already hearing that from Vermonters. And I don’t know what the answer is. I would have loved it when I finished college and law school if somebody paid off all my debts. But I realized I was committed to them and I had to pay them off. But that was at a time when college cost nowhere — even in real dollars — nowhere near what it costs today. I think the whole cost is spiraling out of control and it’s discouraging a lot of young people from going to college.”

Earlier, Leahy said he worries that loan forgiveness will tell colleges, “charge whatever you want, we’re going to forgive the loan.”

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