WASHINGTON D.C. – On Friday, the Biden-Harris Administration released data showing the number of people in each state who applied for student debt relief or were automatically eligible for relief. In the less than four weeks that the application was available, 26 million people either applied or had already provided sufficient information to be eligible for relief.
In total, over 16 million of those applications were fully approved by the Department of Education and sent to loan service providers.
In August, President Biden announced his Adminstration’s plan to provide up to $20,000 in debt relief for borrowers earning less than $125,000 per year. However in November of 2022, less than a month after the application was first released, the Department was forced to stop accepting applications as a result of lawsuits brought by opponents of the program.
Below is a full breakdown of how many people applied for debt relief and whose applications were approved by the Department before the Administration was blocked from discharging debt, rounded to the nearest thousand.
StateNumber of people who
applied or were deemed
automatically eligible for reliefNumber of fully-approved
applications sent to loan servicers
for dischargeAlabama373,000238,000Alaska38,00024,000Arizona496,000314,000Arkansas222,000144,000California2,315,0001,473,000Colorado471,000295,000Connecticut321,000208,000Delaware81,00052,000District of Columbia72,00046,000Florida1,598,0001,047,000Georgia1,012,000642,000Hawaii74,00046,000Idaho126,00079,000Illinois1,044,000679,000Indiana542,000348,000Iowa264,000169,000Kansas228,000143,000Kentucky362,000241,000Louisiana381,000242,000Maine116,00074,000Maryland522,000323,000Massachusetts593,000380,000Michigan864,000566,000Minnesota507,000327,000Mississippi248,000160,000Missouri484,000305,000Montana75,00046,000Nebraska154,00097,000Nevada198,000128,000New Hampshire121,00077,000New Jersey759,000493,000New Mexico125,00077,000New York1,549,000998,000North Carolina812,000522,000North Dakota53,00032,000Ohio1,079,000702,000Oklahoma270,000172,000Oregon329,000211,000Pennsylvania1,157,000743,000Puerto Rico204,000145,000Rhode Island96,00063,000South Carolina442,000282,000South Dakota73,00046,000Tennessee517,000336,000Texas2,163,0001,391,000Utah191,000121,000Vermont52,00033,000Virginia685,000429,000Washington486,000308,000West Virginia131,00085,000Wisconsin465,000302,000Wyoming30,00018,000All Other Locations*58,00033,000State Not Identified**632,00031,000Total26,260,00016,486,000