[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 59 (Tuesday, April 24, 2012)]
[House]
[Pages H2052-H2056]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     STAFFORD STUDENT LOAN PROGRAM

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 5, 2011, the gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. Courtney) is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Mr. COURTNEY. Mr. Speaker, we are here today, Tuesday, April 24, to 
talk about an issue which, again, middle class families all across 
America are watching very closely. As the chart next to me indicates, 
in 67 days, the interest rates on the Stafford student loan program, a 
loan program which serves over 7 million college students all across 
America, is slated to increase its interest rate from 3.4 percent to 
6.8 percent.
  This program, which over time today has served roughly about 35 to 40 
million Americans, is a critical component for middle class families to 
provide affordable higher education, which today, in the 21st century, 
is almost as important as having a high school education.
  The Stafford student loan program's interest rate was cut in 2007 as 
a result of the passage of the College Cost Reduction Act, a measure 
which cut the rate from 6.8 percent down to 3.4 percent. Unlike this 
Congress, it was a bipartisan effort--77 House Republicans voted for 
that measure; 35 Republican Senators voted for that measure. George W. 
Bush signed it into law, President Bush, to his credit, and it 
provided, again, great relief for students all across America for an 
issue which we now know from the Federal Reserve Bank threatens, 
really, the financial solvency of America's middle class.
  College student loan debt today now exceeds credit card debt. It 
exceeds car loan debt. One of the few safe harbors that exists in the 
system for students is, in fact, the Stafford student loan program. It 
has great bipartisan genealogy and sources.
  Stafford was actually a Senator, Robert Stafford, from Vermont, a 
Republican, who, again, believed in education and was somebody who 
understood that the cost of college and university education is not 
what it used to be and that we had to give, again, middle class 
families better tools to pay for it.
  Anyone who has dealt with the private student loan market knows that 
the rates today are roughly about 9 to 10 percent. Interest accumulates 
from the day the loan is taken out. If you're a freshman at a 4-year 
university, you accumulate interest for the entire time that you are in 
college using those loans. There is no forbearance. There is no 
timeframe in terms of repayment. Again, it is nondischargeable in 
bankruptcy if a person gets into great financial difficulty.
  The Stafford student loan program, in contrast, has affordable 
rates--3.4 percent. There is a forbearance period, after a student 
graduates, of 6 months before payments commence, and no interest 
accumulates during the time

[[Page H2053]]

that the student is actually in college. If there are financial 
problems that occur, again, there are systems for deferring payments. 
In fact, there is an income-based repayment formula so that no more 
than 10 percent of your income can be devoted to the repayment of 
Stafford student loans.
  So this is really, again, a measure which affects a broad swath of 
America in terms of millions of students, millions of families. It is 
really about the only avenue that young people facing the formidable 
challenge--almost like buying a house when you go to college. Yet we 
stand here today, 67 days away from having these rates increase.
  Now, for those who have been watching this issue, President Obama, 
right from that podium at the State of the Union address, challenged 
this Congress back in January to address this issue to avoid a doubling 
of interest rates. To date, the majority party in this House, the 
Republican majority, has not taken up a single bill. Even though we 
hear some nice words on the other side, there is no measure with which 
they have come forward.

  The chairman of the Education Committee last week was quoted in The 
New York Times as saying that protecting this rate at 3.4 percent was 
bad policy. We have the words of the chairwoman of the House Education 
Subcommittee, from North Carolina, who stated on a radio program a 
couple of weeks ago:

       I have very little tolerance for people who tell me that 
     they graduate with $200,000 of debt or even $80,000 of debt, 
     because there's no reason for that.

  I would challenge that Member to talk to a new dentist or a new 
dental student graduating, or a nurse anesthetist who was in my office 
the other day who was carrying over $80,000 in debt. The fact of the 
matter is, in terms of trying to get, again, skills for this, the 
modern American workforce, that is a reality that students and families 
confront day in and day out.
  Yet the leadership of the majority of this Congress is basically 
turning its back on the bipartisan tradition of the Stafford student 
loan program with its really pioneering Member of the Senate, Robert 
Stafford, with the bipartisan support for the College Cost Reduction 
Act passed with strong bipartisan votes and signed into law by a 
Republican President, George Bush, and basically saying it's bad policy 
and we're not going to do it.
  Since last week--and again we did one of these Special Order 1-hour 
sessions with a countdown clock--some things are starting to change.
  Yesterday, the Republican frontrunner, effective nominee for 
President, Mitt Romney, during the middle of a press conference, 
finished up, turned around, was walking away and turned on his heel and 
said, Oh, by the way, I want to say that I support President Obama's 
proposal to block the increase in interest rates of 3.4 percent. This 
is the leader of the Republican Party, nationally.
  There does seem to be some hope. Now, it may be connected to the fact 
that the President, yesterday, was at the University of North Carolina, 
talking to young people in this country who know exactly what he is 
talking about in terms of higher education costs and the need to 
protect affordable loan programs to pay for college. Later tonight, he 
is going to be at the University of Colorado, talking to students at 
Colorado about exactly the same issue. Tomorrow, he is going to be at 
Iowa State University.
  There is clearly a bit of politics swirling around here, because if 
you look at Mr. Romney's comments on this issue over the last few 
months or so, he has, in fact, said exactly the opposite. Indeed, he 
has come out in support of the Ryan budget, the Republican budget 
resolution, which was passed in this Chamber a few weeks ago. In that 
budget resolution, that 6.8 rate increase is locked in under the Ryan 
budget plan. Not only does it lock in the higher cost of the Stafford 
student loan program, it cuts the Pell Grant program.

                              {time}  1930

  That's the other workhorse of economic affordability in this country, 
named after Senator Claiborne Pell of Rhode Island. Again, it is a 
grant program that helps the most needy students pay for college. It's 
up to $6,000--hardly enough to fully pay for most colleges in the 
country, but nonetheless is essential for college students across this 
country.
  The Ryan budget cuts the grant level for the Pell program down to 
$5,000--unbelievable--at a time when we're seeing college student loan 
debt skyrocket in this country and, sadly, at a time when America's 
graduation rate, which was number one in the 1980s, has now fallen to 
number 12. For the folks who are listening here today, that is a trend 
of mediocrity for this country. That is not a trend of growth. That is 
not a trend of innovation for the future. That is a trend which 
basically says we are basically going to surrender to the forces of 
mediocrity in this country. And that is not acceptable to this country, 
and it's certainly not acceptable to all of us as Americans, and it 
resonates all across America. Again, I come from the Northeast, up in 
Connecticut.
  We're joined here today by a great Congresswoman from the State of 
Texas, Sheila Jackson Lee, and I'd like to yield to Congresswoman Lee 
to talk about her perspective from the great State of Texas.
  Ms. JACKSON LEE of Texas. I want to thank the gentleman from 
Connecticut for his untiring and unceasing work and for the reach that 
he has made to this issue to really touch the hearts and minds of those 
who believe that education is opportunity and it is something for which 
we need to plant the seeds for those who are now following forward with 
their destinies. I'm delighted to be on the floor as well with another 
leader in education, the Honorable Danny Davis.
  I would just say to you that I took the oath. And the whole 4 days 
when I was in my district, everywhere I went I touched the hearts of 
young and old when I reported to them that while their children are 
struggling, working hard trying to get good grades in higher education, 
and when they in good faith took out loans of about 2.8 percent just a 
few years back--somewhere between that and 3.4--now within days this is 
going to double. And we are here fighting in Washington to ensure that 
the doors of opportunity are not closed.
  So I think it is very important. You are absolutely right to take 
note that the potential, or soon-to-be Republican nominee, for 
President has recognized the foolishness, unfortunately, of stalling in 
this House; that we have not simply passed a bipartisan effort, your 
legislation that I am a cosponsor of, that simply indicates that we 
will not see the doubling of those interest rates.
  I have universities--if I don't call them all--from the University of 
Houston to Texas Southern University, Rice University, Houston 
Community College, Lone Star College, Houston Baptist, and St. Thomas 
in and around the 18th Congressional District, the University of Texas, 
Texas A&M, and others around the State; and young people who are 
attempting to achieve the American Dream and individuals who are going 
back to school. Even though our GIs have the GI Bill, some are 
extending their degrees and have had to take out loans.
  So I rise today to join you and my good friend from Chicago to 
indicate that I'm going to join the army, if you will, the band of 
members who truly believes that there is no divide amongst us, 
Republicans and Democrats, when it comes to educating our children. 
Many of us are parents. Many of us have seen our children go through 
college, some having finished, some still in college, and some with 
young children coming into college. And although we are blessed, many 
will have to take out loans for higher education, and doctors and 
lawyers whom we wish for higher education will have to secure those 
loans. I don't want to be in the midst of a ticking time bomb. I don't 
want to be the barrier. I want to be the firewall that protects them 
and allows them to gain an opportunity in this world.
  So let me just thank you for allowing me to be on the floor this 
evening to indicate to my colleagues we speak quietly and softly 
tonight because we're asking you to join us, my Republican friends. 
Take the lead and join us so that in a few days--not 67 days--we can 
finish this up. Let's give them a graduation present. Let's tell every 
student coming out of high school and every college student that's in 
college that we are going to be your firewall and give you an 
opportunity for success in this great country that has always been the 
country that people

[[Page H2054]]

have either come to or people have been proud to be in because of the 
great opportunity to be what you are achieving or seeking to be.
  Mr. COURTNEY. Thank you, Congresswoman Jackson Lee.
  Again, just to follow up on one quick point, which is that there is 
legislation that is now pending in the House, H.R. 3826. A few minutes 
ago, we got our 146th cosponsor. To this date, though, we are still 
waiting for any Members on the majority side to join us in this effort. 
Again, 77 of them voted in 2007 to support this measure to cut the 
interest rates. It's time. It's time for them to listen to what their 
presumptive nominee is saying. It's time to join the Members on this 
side of the aisle and prevent the damage that this would do to middle 
class families.
  And no one knows that issue better than a member of the Education and 
Workforce Committee, who has, again, done great work in terms of 
education issues and higher education affordability. Congressman Davis, 
thank you for joining us here this evening.
  Mr. DAVIS of Illinois. Thank you very much, Representative Courtney. 
I want to not only thank you, but I want to commend you for the 
tremendous leadership that you've displayed on so many issues as I've 
watched you since you've become a Member of this House. I also want to 
thank you for taking on this issue--the issue of trying to ensure that 
young people especially in our country, a country that has been dubbed 
the greatest Nation on the face of the Earth--and it got to be that way 
because of its emphasis on education and providing opportunity for 
individuals to begin in life anywhere in this country and move as a 
result of education to the highest ranks, to the highest levels, to the 
ability to make valuable contributions not only to the development of 
their own lives, but to the lives of others.

  I often think of things that people have said about education and 
something that I'm told that Abraham Lincoln once said: Education makes 
a man easy to lead, but difficult to drive; easy to govern, but 
impossible to enslave.
  College access and success are fundamental stepping stones towards 
economic security and global competitiveness. As policymakers, it is 
imperative that we support students in making college affordable so 
that our citizens can prosper. We face an immediate crisis in college 
costs. Without congressional action, interest rates will get out of the 
box.
  I'm very fortunate to represent a congressional district that has 
what we call an education mecca in terms of the numbers of institutions 
that we have in what we call the South Loop area of Chicago, which is 
only a few blocks long and a few blocks wide. We have more than a 
hundred thousand students just in that area at colleges and 
universities like Loyola, DePaul, Spertus College, East-West 
University. As a matter of fact, I was at the board meeting of East-
West last evening, where we were reviewing our accreditation standards 
and making sure that everything was in order so that the thousands of 
students who attend that university could get the very best.
  But unless we make sure that students can acquire the money, I have 
organized a little scholarship fund in honor of my parents, because 
they believed so much in education--two of the smartest people I've 
ever known. My father finished fourth grade when he was 19 years old. 
We saw his report card. But he was a great reader and he read 
everything that he could get his hands on. My mother was a little more 
fortunate than that. She finished eighth grade and was considered to be 
one of the more educated people in our community. But they pushed for 
education. They knew that if their children were going to have 
opportunities that they did not have that they had to get as much 
education as they possibly could.

                              {time}  1940

  So, when interest rates bar and prevent people, I just know so many 
students and so many families who are wondering if they're going to be 
able to make it. Last year, I had one family who called to ask if we 
could help them find the money just to get to school. They had done all 
of the other things that their daughter needed to do, but they came up 
short with transportation resources, and they were trying to keep from 
borrowing any additional money. And then once they get out of school, 
if your debt is so high when you go to try and find a job that it 
staggers you and pushes you back and works against your will, then it 
becomes even more difficult. So we're trying to make education 
affordable, just trying to give people the chance, the opportunity.
  Something I remember that the fellow named Wolfe said:

       To every man his chance, his golden opportunity to become 
     whatever his manhood, talent, ambitions, and hard work 
     combine to make him, that is the promise of America.

  Of course, if he were saying that today, he wouldn't have just said 
``every man.'' He would have said, every person, every woman, 
everybody, every citizen, everybody who wants to should have that 
opportunity.
  So, again, I commend you for your leadership, I commend you for your 
tenacity, and I just like the way you work. I like what you do. I like 
the issues that you raise. And you mentioned the Pell grants. Senator 
Pell, from the same area of the country that you come from, his 
daughter was in my office not very long ago, saying that she and a 
group of her friends were going to get very active on the whole issue 
of trying to make sure that individuals who were incarcerated had an 
opportunity to pursue the Pell grant in honor of her father and 
remembering the great work that he did. So I remember you for the great 
work that you're doing. I thank you, and I'm pleased to join with you 
this evening.
  Mr. COURTNEY. That is high praise from you, Congressman Davis. When I 
was a freshman, brand new to the Capitol, the Education and Labor 
Committee, which you've been serving on for a number of years, it was a 
great honor to really observe you and to see that the College Cost 
Reduction Act was one of the first things that came out of the chute in 
January of 2007. And, again, your words tonight show that this has been 
a lifelong priority and mission for you to make sure that that happens.
  You mentioned Abraham Lincoln from your great State of Illinois. It 
is interesting to note that the College Land Grant system, the Morrill 
Act, was actually passed in 1862 in the middle of the Civil War, the 
most catastrophic threat to our country's existence ever. And yet we 
had a President from your great State who had the vision to understand 
that every State should have a land grant college, which is what that 
bill did, and created a national commitment to higher education. Again, 
it was committed to agricultural sciences and mechanical engineering.
  What an amazing story about somebody who, gosh knows, could have been 
distracted with whatever was happening in that terrible conflict, and 
yet he still understood that we can never, ever, ever lose sight of the 
importance of investing in our people. That's what has made our country 
great, and you know that better than anyone.
  Mr. DAVIS of Illinois. You are absolutely right, and I thank you 
again because I went to one of those land grant colleges--I, along with 
seven of my brothers and sisters--and I can tell you that, had they not 
existed, none of us ever probably would have gone to a college or 
university. So, thank you, again, as I take my leave.
  Mr. COURTNEY. I look forward to working with you over the next few 
weeks on this issue.
  Now we're joined by a gentleman from the great State of Michigan, 
Congressman Hansen Clarke, who is a relatively new Member but who has, 
again, jumped right in on this issue. Thank you for joining me here 
this evening.
  Mr. CLARKE of Michigan. You're very welcome, Representative Courtney. 
I thank the gentleman from Connecticut for raising this important issue 
and for introducing this important bill, which I'm very honored to 
support.
  We've got to keep interest rates low on student loans. 3.4 percent is 
reasonable. The Federal Government shouldn't be in the business of 
trying to make money or extract more money from student loan borrowers. 
The real problem with these interest rates, if we allow them to go up, 
is that if a borrower, for some reason, can't make a payment because 
they're sick, because they get laid off, maybe they get a divorce, that 
the interest rate would

[[Page H2055]]

then compound. The interest would apply on top of interest, and the 
loan principal will actually start growing as the student loan 
borrower's income drops. So it puts student loan borrowers in a 
position where it could take them decades, if ever, to pay off their 
loans if they're in financial hardship. And that's not right.
  As the gentleman from Illinois said, these loans are to provide 
people with educational opportunities, to give them a chance to get a 
degree where otherwise they wouldn't have the money to be able to do 
so. But instead, Representative Courtney, of these loans providing 
borrowers with a chance of experiencing the American Dream, the debt 
burden is so high on many of our graduates right now that the student 
loan debt has actually turned into a national nightmare. As you 
mentioned, over $1 trillion of debt is owed by student loan borrowers. 
These aren't just the graduates. There are parents that also borrow 
money and take out student loans that help fund the education of their 
kids so their kids can have a better life.
  I've introduced a bill, H.R. 4170, to complement your efforts. It's 
the Student Loan Forgiveness Act of 2012. In that bill, I adopt your 
position on keeping the interest rates on student loans, Federal 
student loans, at 3.4 percent. Then I also want to make student loan 
repayment fairer and simpler by allowing every student loan borrower to 
get a second chance. Yes, you may have fallen behind on your payments--
you may even be in default--but I want you to have a second chance to 
pay off your loans and to continue your education.

  So, under my bill, every student loan borrower who is currently in 
repayment right now or has already taken out a loan will be able to 
repay that loan based on their income, 10 percent of their 
discretionary income. They make those payments for 10 years, and 
they'll be eligible to have the balance of their student loans, if 
there is anything outstanding, to be forgiven. But if you pay 10 
percent of your discretionary income for 10 years, more than likely, 
you'll pay off a substantial amount of your loans if not the entire 
loan balance.
  But for those who have had to borrow a lot of money because you 
decided to get a graduate education or maybe you came from a family 
that didn't have much money so that your only chance to get an 
education was to borrow student loans, you won't be saddled with those 
loans for decades. You'll be able to pay them off over 10 years, which 
is the standard term for student loan repayment.
  One thing I'd like to add, though, about the bill is this: that 
forgiving the balance of these student loans is not just to help the 
borrower. It's also to help our country. Cutting student loan debt, 
keeping the interest rates down, and forgiving student loans that pose 
an excessive burden on Americans, that's the most effective, one of the 
most effective, ways to stimulate our economy to create jobs.
  Think about it. A student loan borrower, instead of having to pay 
hundreds of dollars a month, maybe even $1,000 a month, that after 
they've paid it according to their income, according to their means, 
for 10 years, to have the balance of that forgiven so now they have 
this money available to use as they choose it, to invest, to start 
their own business. And think about it: our graduates, those are the 
ones that were disciplined enough to go to school. They were ambitious 
enough to set their sights on a goal and achieve it. Those are 
precisely the folks that we want to encourage to go into business 
because it's through private business, free enterprise, that we really 
create jobs in a sustainable way in this country. Let's free up 
people's money so they can start their own businesses and realize the 
American Dream, not just for themselves, but for everyone else.
  I'm from the city of Detroit. We've always been a tough place, but 
we've had great entrepreneurs who risked everything, like Henry Ford, 
to create and expand the automobile industry in this country, which 
created jobs for millions of Americans for generations. We have so many 
young people right now who are ready to work and ready to start their 
own businesses, but they're not going to take any risk like that 
because they're too much in debt. They won't even buy a house because 
they can't afford it. Many student loan borrowers even postpone 
probably the most precious thing that anyone could get involved in--our 
great institution of marriage--and they put that off.

                              {time}  1950

  So, the student loan debt, it's not only a burden on the borrowers, 
on the parents, it's costing our society jobs and economic growth; and 
we're costing the global market the opportunity to be benefited by the 
great products that our country could produce, the great services that 
we could provide, the great technology that we could develop and create 
and sell globally. We are depriving the world of that because many of 
our budding entrepreneurs can't take the risk of starting their own 
businesses because they're in the hock of student loan debt, which is 
outrageous.
  So, I want to thank you again for your leadership, for your 
persistent leadership on keeping student loan interest rates down at a 
reasonable level. As you can see, everyone around the country, 
including Members of the other party, they understand the commonsense 
notion of that.
  See, these loans, again--essentially I'm talking to the American 
people because they understand this. These loans that the government 
provides you, it's not just for your benefit, it's to make our country 
stronger. There's a reason why we had the GI Bill after World War II. 
The more educated, the more trained, the more that we're able to 
develop our skills to our fullest potential, we're able to do more for 
ourselves and our community and for our country. See, that's what 
America is all about.
  The reason this is such a big deal for me is that my dad immigrated 
to this country during the midst of the Great Depression, the midst of 
the Great Depression, the roughest time economically for this country, 
because he saw America as a land of opportunity. My mother, who was 
African American, had to struggle for years under discrimination and 
segregation in Detroit in the thirties and the forties and fifties. She 
was a school crossing guard and a cleaning lady who saved up all of her 
money so I could get a chance to get an education. But after I dropped 
out of school and after my parents died, the only way I could return to 
college is I had to borrow student loans. I thank this country for 
having those loans available as an opportunity for me to get an 
education, to come here and to be able to effectively represent the 
people of this country.
  But you know what the problem is now, Representative, is that 
students who want to get the same education that I did decades ago, 
they may not be able to afford to do it. Even if they could borrow the 
money, they can't afford the costs that they'll have to endure in 
trying to pay off that debt year after year, decade after decade. 
That's not right. The Federal Government shouldn't have that kind of 
power to press people, robbing them of their money--because it's our 
money that we're using to pay off these loans--and robbing us of our 
job and economic potential.
  So thank you again for your leadership. I'm very honored to join you 
in your endeavor to make student loan financing fairer for our country, 
but also, too, to let you know my bill, H.R. 4170, the Student Loan 
Forgiveness Act, I offer to complement your efforts to provide equal 
opportunity for education for all of us here in this country.
  Mr. COURTNEY. Thank you, Congressman Clarke, and thank you for 
sharing your personal story.
  What has been sort of extraordinary to me is that over the last few 
months, as we've been working on H.R. 3826, our office has received 
communications from all over the country from folks talking about the 
importance of the Stafford program in terms of really transforming 
their lives. I'll be at Chamber of Commerce meetings; I'll be at Rotary 
Club meetings; I will have people who are not on my side of the aisle 
politically but coming up to me afterwards and saying this is something 
that the Congress absolutely has to pay attention to, that it has to 
protect that lower rate, and thank God this person had the Stafford 
loan program available to him just like you did.

[[Page H2056]]

  To see that rate go up to 6.8 percent at a time when our economy--
Treasury bonds are being sold at a 2 percent yield. You can get a 30-
year fixed mortgage for, really, under 4 percent right now, 
variabilities at much lower. When you tell people that this rate is 
going to double to 6.8 percent for this one segment of the population, 
young Americans who really are doing it for the purpose of improving 
their own situations, it's greeted by just absolute utter disbelief.
  At a time when, as you point out, debt levels--and I've got a little 
chart here from the Federal Reserve which shows where we're headed 
right now in this country. We have got to, number one, not make the 
condition worse by increasing the interest rate--and again, we've run 
the numbers.
  Over a 5-year period of time, somebody who has got a Stafford loan 
portfolio is looking at an additional $5,000 in interest payments. It's 
$11,000 for over a 10-year period, which is quite normal, as you said, 
for people paying back their student loans. We are compounding the 
trend lines for which the Federal Reserve Bank has, again, put up the 
warning flags to tell us that we're just creating crushing debt.
  The Wall Street Journal had a story, which I was thinking of it as 
you were speaking earlier, about a young couple with student loan debts 
who basically were putting off starting a family and buying a house 
because of the debt levels, that they were basically just working to 
pay for every month in terms of their burdens there.
  We need to be, frankly, A, dealing with the issue of the rate 
increase obviously in the next 67 days; but, secondly, we need to have 
a much bigger national conversation to talk about measures like your 
bill to create, again, a system that rewards people who are current 
with their payments, who are making progress in their lives but that 
are not going to have a ball and chain around their necks in terms of 
debt levels that, again, as you point out, at the end of the day really 
inhibit creativity and investment and innovation for people at a time 
in life when they really should be just spreading their wings, not 
dragging these huge burdens of debt that really hold them back and hold 
our country back.
  So, again, I really appreciate your contributions here this evening. 
The clock is ticking, 67 days and counting.
  Mr. Romney yesterday basically put up a strong signal to the 
congressional majority in the House here, the Republican congressional 
majority, that this is something that we must do. And we're still 
waiting. 146 cosponsors on H.R. 3826.
  I'm not somebody who has a big ego. If somebody has a counterproposal 
to come up with a different way to do this, we're all ears. But what we 
don't need are the comments of the chairwoman of the Higher Education 
Subcommittee basically saying she has no tolerance for students with 
$80,000 in student loan debt. That is a Congress which is out of touch 
with the reality that young people are confronting these days, who are 
really trying to improve themselves and fill the workforce needs of 
this country.
  We cannot afford that type of leadership here in this Congress. We 
need to have people who are focused on the real condition of the middle 
class in this country, but also really focused, like Abraham Lincoln 
was back in 1862, about what's important in terms of the future of this 
country.
  Mr. CLARKE of Michigan. Your request for us to keep interest rates at 
3.4 percent is so reasonable that we need to act on that right now. The 
point that you mention, that we need to have these loans available for 
our students so they can get the training that they need to be hired 
into jobs that are going unfilled right now, in metropolitan Detroit, 
which is known for having a high unemployment rate, where people really 
want to go to work, there are thousands of jobs that are available in 
metro Detroit that are not being filled because employers can't find 
the folks that have the training in the information technology area for 
software engineering.
  So, we want to encourage people to go to school even if they don't 
have the money. We want them to be able to borrow loans without having 
to go into this type of debt.
  My final point is this, too: that if we allow borrowers to be 
burdened by student loan debt to such a degree that they can't pay off 
their debt, we, as taxpayers, are on the hook for this debt. Probably 
one-half trillion of it is taxpayer backed. So we're on the hook for 
this one way or the other. We should give our borrowers a helping hand 
so they can manage their student loan repayments, pay this debt down, 
and then get on with their lives and help us create jobs throughout 
this country and throughout this world by selling the best products 
that metro Detroit knows how to do.
  Mr. COURTNEY. Thank you, Mr. Clarke.
  In closing, I just want to end where we began, which is that it's 67 
days and counting.
  Today, all across America, there are high school seniors who are 
experiencing probably one of the most exciting moments in their lives, 
which is that they're going to the mailbox to find out whether or not 
they've been accepted to a 2-year school or a 4-year school. I remember 
those days. I have a son who just finished up college--and remember how 
exciting that was--and a daughter who's in high school and who's 
hopefully going to hear soon when her turn comes. But the fact of the 
matter is they need to have some horizon, some predictability at this 
critical moment to make sure that they can plan and budget to pay for 
college.

                              {time}  2000

  Financial Aid offices all across the country are putting up warning 
flags for students and their families that interest rates are going to 
double unless Congress acts. And the fact of the matter is that creates 
an instability about planning for what college to go to, what kind of 
budget a family can really accommodate in terms of paying for student 
loan debt. And that's wrong.
  I mean, we can do better than that as a Congress. We can do better 
than that as a Nation.
  Again, we're glad to see that Mr. Romney finally came around, even 
though he had sent out signals in opposition to this type of approach 
by supporting the Ryan budget which locks in the 6.8 percent interest 
rate.
  But you know what, this issue is too important to get sucked into 
sort of partisanship here. It is time to move forward, just like we did 
in 2007, when 77 Republicans voted in favor of the College Cost 
Reduction Act; 35 Republican Senators supported it. President George 
Bush signed it into law, a program named after Republican Senator 
Robert Stafford from Vermont.
  I mean, come on. You know, people are sick and tired of the fact that 
every single issue, whether it's a highway bill, a payroll tax cut 
extension, or education assistance for middle class families gets 
sucked into this partisan maelstrom in Washington, DC.
  And the fact of the matter is there's 146 Members on our side that 
have cosponsored H.R. 3826 that are looking for a signal from the 
Republican majority to say, you know what, it's time to look at our 
history. It's time to look at the genealogy of the Stafford student 
loan program and the great bipartisan support to cut those rates 5 
years ago.
  Let's come up with a solution. Let's move. Let's help those families 
whose students are being accepted into college and those financial aid 
offices that are trying to help families budget and plan for the next 
academic school year.
  Sixty-seven days is really not enough time, even today, but we should 
at least not compound it by delay and, hopefully, not compound it by 
letting just a totally unacceptable increase in interest rates for 
Stafford student loans to go into effect.
  And I look forward to working with you, again, in the next hours and 
minutes and days to make sure that that doesn't happen. Thank you for 
joining me here, Congressman Clarke.
  I yield back the balance of my time.

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