NC Senate candidates Beasley, Budd stake out positions on Biden’s debt forgiveness
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North Carolina U.S. Senate race
With the November election ahead, the candidates campaign across the state.
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Democrat Cheri Beasley praised student loan forgiveness as help for people struggling with higher costs. Republican Ted Budd attacked it as a transfer of wealth that will only make inflation worse.
Beasley and her campaign for Senate stopped short of answering whether she supported President Joe Biden’s announcement last week that the federal government would forgive up to $20,000 in unpaid student loan debt. But she spoke positively about the move during a Durham event Monday to show support for law enforcement.
Beasley told reporters the forgiveness “will make a difference for a lot of people here in North Carolina. We have over a million folks in North Carolina who are saddled with student loan debt.”
Both candidates say they favor enhancing access to education and enacting changes to the current loan system but vary on the specifics.
The positions of Beasley and Budd, who are vying for the seat of Sen. Richard Burr, a Republican who is retiring this year, could affect how voters cast their ballots in November’s election.
Over a dozen current and retired law enforcement officers who are Beasley supporters joined the former state Supreme Court justice at Monday’s event, including Sheriff Clarence Birkhead of Durham County, Sheriff Cleveland Atkinson Jr. of Edgecombe County and Sheriff Kent Winstead of Franklin County.
More than 1.3 million people who live in North Carolina have student loan debt, and the average amount each borrower owes – $37,721 – is significantly higher than in many states, according to EducationData.org, an online resource for statistics about the U.S. education system, as reported last week by The Charlotte Observer.
This disproportionately affects people in rural communities, who then struggle to get mortgages, and “often their occupation and career choices are hindered by student debt,” Beasley said.
Beasley said she’d like to see more transparency in student loans, so that people have an understanding of what they’re agreeing to, and she promised to work to lower the rates available for refinancing their debt. She would like to see more Pell Grants being offered so that people do not require a loan in the first place, Beasley said.
Pell Grants are a form of federal financial aid that typically doesn’t need to be repaid and is awarded to low and moderate-income students based on need.
Pell Grant amounts have changed over the years. For the 2022-23 academic year, the maximum Pell award is $6,895, according to the Education Department. University and college tuition varies across the country but can run as high as $80,000, meaning people who get Pell Grants often still need to get a loan.
Impact on inflation
Asked if she had any concerns about loan forgiveness counteracting efforts to reduce inflation, Beasley said, “it’s really important for us to be thoughtful as we go forward, not just with this legislation, but this has been a tough time for this country.”
“I’m certainly considering not just the cost of this, but making sure that we’re being fiscally responsible, while also making sure that the Senate is upholding its obligation to this country.”
Asked by The News & Observer for clarity on her stance, her campaign provided a statement attributed to Beasley, saying, “We have to address rising costs that are affecting families in many ways and this action can help people afford to buy a home or start a family.”
Budd, a three-term member of the U.S. House, opposes student loan forgiveness. In a written statement to The N&O, Budd wrote that Biden’s agenda, “supported by Cheri Beasley, is crushing family budgets across North Carolina. Already facing $7800 in additional costs this year due to Bidenflation, now the working families of North Carolina are being forced by the Biden administration to foot the bill for someone else’s college degree.”
Republicans across the country have pinned high inflation rates on the Biden administration.
According to a poll by FiveThirtyEight, a data journalism organization owned by ABC News, 53.4% of Americans polled disapprove of Biden, while 42.4% approve. Former President Donald Trump had at the end of his presidency an approval rating of 38.6%. According to another poll by analytics company Gallup, after hitting a personal record low of 38% in July, Biden’s approval rating is 44%, his highest in a year.
At the law enforcement event in Durham, when asked if she’d join Biden if he toured North Carolina, Beasley said she was “glad for him to be here” and that she “certainly would love to have that conversation with his team if he’s on the way.” She did not make clear if she’d join him in events.
Budd said that the “68% of North Carolinians who didn’t go to college now have college loan debt because those folks and everyone who sacrificed to pay off their college loans are now on the hook for everyone else’s college debt. Several prominent Democrats have criticized the plan but not Cheri Beasley. Additionally, economists also believe this action will only make inflation worse when a lot of folks are already having to choose between gas for their car to get to work or food on the table.”
Budd also previously wrote in a statement that the loan forgiveness was a “unilateral executive” action that represents a “wealth transfer” and an “insult to working families and those who responsibly paid off their loans.”
In July, Budd introduced the Federal Employee Student Debt Transparency Act, which did not pass. It would have required all political appointees and Senior Executive Service employees, which would apply to Biden administration employees in political and policy functions, to disclose balances for all federal student loans.
Some defenders of Biden’s policy have pointed to forgivable loans that Congress created early in the pandemic to help businesses keep workers on their payroll – including businesses belonging to some now criticizing student loan forgiveness.
Earlier this month, before Biden’s announcement, Beasley’s campaign said on Twitter that “Budd’s family” received $10 million in Paycheck Protection Program loans.
According to ProPublica, a nonprofit newsroom, which runs a project tracking PPP loans, The Budd Group, a janitorial services business in Winston-Salem that employs about 500 people, had a loan of slightly more than $10 million forgiven in May. A spokesperson told WCNC Charlotte that Budd hadn’t had any ownership in The Budd Group since 2003 “long before he got into politics in 2016.”
Training and apprenticeship
Budd and Beasley both touted their support of training, credential and apprenticeship programs. Both have also taken aim at their opponents’ records on support for these programs.
“While attending college is the right path for some,” Beasley said in the statement from her campaign, “I will also support more access to worker training and credential programs that can help people support their families with a good paying job, but Congressman Budd voted against funding for these training programs.”
Beasley has made campaign stops at Halifax Community College, Durham Tech and Catawba Valley Community College, among others.
As Beasley is not a member of Congress, she has not been able to vote on legislation regarding training programs.
Jonathan Felts, senior adviser to Budd, provided a written statement to The N&O saying that Budd had supported apprenticeships throughout his time in Congress and that Budd had “long believed there are multiple pathways to the American Dream for individuals, not just the pathway of a 4-year college degree.” He also wrote that Beasley had not done anything to support apprenticeships.
Felts highlighted Budd’s sponsorship of a bill that would’ve made the Department of Education report on data collection related to student participation and performance in career and technical education programs, and another bill that would’ve granted employers a business-related tax credit for 30% of the qualified virtual training expenses paid during a taxable year, up to a maximum amount of $2,500. Neither bill passed.
He also highlighted Budd’s support of legislation such as the Propel Act, which did not pass, but looked to expand student eligibility for Pell Grants by allowing students to use the grants for enrollment in educational programs consisting of vocational or technical training, flight training, apprenticeship, or other on-the-job training.
Biden’s loan forgiveness grants up to $20,000 in debt cancellation to Pell Grant recipients with loans held by the Department of Education, and up to $10,000 in debt cancellation to non-Pell Grant recipients. The pause on federal student loan repayments was also extended one final time through Dec. 31, 2022, according to a White House fact sheet.
Borrowers are eligible if they make less than $125,000 individually or $250,000 for married couples.
North Carolina Sens. Burr and Thom Tillis and three other Republican senators, Mitt Romney of Utah, Tim Scott of South Carolina and Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, in May introduced the Student Loan Accountability Act, which did not pass, aimed at prohibiting the Biden administration from canceling student loan debt.
For more North Carolina government and politics news, listen to the Under the Dome politics podcast from The News & Observer and the NC Insider. You can find it at https://campsite.bio/underthedome or wherever you get your podcasts.
This story was originally published August 30, 2022 at 8:00 AM.
