To leave a lasting impression before the Trump administration takes over, the Biden administration is making the most of its remaining days in office.
It declared on Friday that it will cancel an additional $4.28 billion in student loans for 54,900 borrowers who choose to become public servants. This would bring Biden's total debt forgiveness to over $180 billion, the highest amount ever forgiven by a president in American history.
The administration also said that it will not pursue any more forgiveness proposals from the U.S. Department of Education, citing "uncertainty around the implementation" in light of Trump's upcoming inauguration.
“The Department at this time intends to commit its limited operational resources to helping at-risk borrowers return to repayment successfully,” Education Secretary Migual Cardona wrote in official notices.
The Education Department also announced it would give up on a proposed rule from 2023 that would punish schools which prevented transgender athletes from competing in women’s sports.
Twenty-three states have such policies in place, and the Biden administration has already faced legal challenges over discrimination policy, after declaring the Title IX ban on sex discrimination at federally funded educational institutions includes differential treatment based on gender identity, sexual orientation, or pregnancy and related conditions.
Despite these cancellations, Biden is also reportedly mulling a few final, high-profile moves on campaign priorities.
The president, the first to openly oppose capital punishment, is reportedly considering commuting the sentences of most or all 40 people on federal death row into life sentences.
Attorney General Merrick Garland has reportedly recommended such a move for most detainees, other than for those involved in terror and hate attacks, including Boston Bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev and Charleston church shooter Dylann Roof, according to The Wall Street Journal.
Rep. Ayanna Pressley told The Independent there’s “absolutely” a chance Biden will follow through on the commutations.
“We remain in ongoing communication with the White House and we’ll be pushing to the very end,” she said.
The Biden administration paused federal executions, and the Department of Justice commenced a review of capital punishment policies, but the DOJ and military has continued seeking death sentences in some cases, including for the 9/11 plotters at Guantánamo.
The Trump administration is expected to restart federal killings.
The previous Trump term saw 13 executions, more than four times as many federal executions than occured over the previous 50 years.
Biden is also considering extending Temporary Protect Status protections for migrants in the U.S. from unstable countries, including Haiti, El Salvador, Honduras, and Nicaragua.
There are currently an estimated 1 million TPS beneficiaries in the U.S. form 17 nations.
The program became a target of the Trump-Vance campaign, which latched onto unfounded, racist rumors that Haitian migrants in Ohio, many of them who had TPS, were eating neighborhood pets.
At the same time as Biden may increase some migrant protections, new data shows the Biden deported more migrants in fiscal year 2024 than at any time since 2014, when he was serving in the Obama administration.
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