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“To the extent we have had baby boomers running for president for the past few decades, they got an education in a world when you did not have to take on debt."

"Regardless of dollar amount, the existence of debt is far riskier for low-income and middle-income households."

"The justification for student debt as the primary way we pay for college has been in part based on the assumption that we’ll have consumer protections in place, and we’ll try to make it as painless as possible for people."

The dramatic rise in student loan debt has placed unacceptable risk on working-class families and on people of color, who must take on more debt for the same degree as white students.

"The potential of this plan is that it increases public investment back to levels we saw when college was much more affordable, and it pegs it to a price for students."

“The health and inclusiveness of our democracy are at the center of the debate right now.”

“In today’s decision, the court recognized that Spanish-speaking voters are not second-class citizens and should not have to wait for their voting rights to be fully protected.”

There is an ideal pathway for knocking down a barrier that has kept so many voting-eligible citizens away from the polls: automatic voter registration.

“For democratic participation to have any meaning, voters must be able to exercise their right to vote in a language they understand.”

"The bill that the governor is expected to sign into law establishes blatant wealth discrimination in the restoration of rights process. The bill will create two classes of returning citizens… [and] under this bill your ability to pay will govern whether you can participate in democracy.”

“If you compare this to some of the other gifts given in higher education, it’s incredibly stark, and I would hope points us to a smarter, better model of philanthropy where people’s lives are genuinely being transformed.”

“Your income or your family’s wealth is extremely predictive of whether you’re going to go college at all and certainly what program you’re going to do."

With the country’s total student loan debt amounting to about $1.5 trillion, borrowers lose an average of $208,000 in lifetime wealth accumulation that could have come from retirement savings, investments or home purchases, according to studies from Washington, D.C.-based think tank Demos. 

“Public policy created the racial economic gap and only public policy can solve it.”

“We are used to doing our homework and having to show up.”

“Not only are students of color more likely to borrow more for a degree, and borrow in higher amounts for the same degree, but they’re more likely to struggle to repay student loans than white students."

"State governments have disinvested from public colleges and universities for a few decades now, and we need to reverse those trends."

Tired of politicians talking at, about, but never to, black people, a bevy of organizations joined to conduct the largest survey of black people in the United States since Reconstruction, entitled More Black than Blue: Politics + Power in the 2019 Black Census.

A debt-free plan “changes the target."

The counter to this neoliberal vision involves, then, a more thorough moral critique—and a more transformative policy agenda—that tackles the underlying forces of corporate power, market inequities, structural racism, and anti-democratic political institutions. That progressives are finally talking in these expansive terms represents a potentially transformative inflection point in American politics.