St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Despite pressure from the Democratic Party’s hard-left fringe, President Joe Biden is correctly slow-walking proposals to grant relief for college graduates mired in student-loan debt. But one loan-forgiveness decision he took recently was spot on: to grant full relief to the 560,000 students defrauded by the for-profit Corinthian University.
Students who were scammed by Corinthian’s diploma factory deserve to have their grievances addressed separately from others who knowingly immersed themselves in debt and got a legitimate college education in return. Someone who is swindled into buying a junk car with no engine is not equivalent to someone who buys a new car on credit then realizes the monthly payments are too high for the income the buyer is earning.
The $5.8 billion forgiveness program for former Corinthian students acknowledges that the university fabricated performance records, including job-placement rates. Corinthian far oversold the value of its diploma. Around 560,000 students took out federally backed loans between 1995 and 2015. Corinthian once boasted 105 campuses and had a peak enrollment of 110,000 students.
The scam came to an end after then-California Attorney General Kamala Harris sued in 2013. Now students will be able to get all remaining debt to Corinthian canceled, but they still must apply for…
