Apple Corps and Universal Music have confirmed The Beatles‘ 1966 album Revolver is next in line to to get a remix and bonus-filled box set, according to Variety.
An official announcement is not expected to come until sometime in September, along with details on the deluxe package’s contents and release date. As with previous Beatles box sets, the Revolver collection reportedly will include remixes by George Martin‘s son, Giles Martin.
There was wide speculation that Revolver — considered by many to be the band’s best work — would be the next to get the deluxe treatment, following 1967’s Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band and continuing chronologically with 1968’s The Beatles — a.k.a. The White Album — 1969’s Abbey Road and 1970’s Let It Be.
However, producing remixes of the tracks on Revolver could prove to be a tricky task, since The Beatles’ pre-1967 albums were recorded with two-track tape machines that combined multiple instruments or vocals onto a single track, making the separation of those elements technically challenging.
Also, unlike later Fab Four projects, not many outtakes from Revolver have been made available via bootlegs, leaving fans to wonder what bonus tracks might be included.
“You know, we have to look into what technology we can do to make things de-mixed and all this kind of stuff, which I’m looking into. So I’m looking for the technology to do it with,” Giles told Variety in 2021. about how he might approach remixing pre-Sgt. Pepper Beatles material. “I think we’re getting there with technology. I think we are. I’m not doing it at the moment, though, I can tell you that much. But hopefully. So, yeah — watch this space.”
A day after a jury awarded Vanessa Bryant $16 million in her invasion of privacy trial against Los Angeles County over photos taken at the scene of the 2020 helicopter crash that killed her husband, basketball star Kobe Bryant, and their 13-year-old daughter, her lawyer revealed she’ll be donating the proceeds to her Mamba and Mambacita Foundation.
“From the beginning, Vanessa Bryant has sought only accountability, but our legal system does not permit her to force better policies, more training or officer discipline. Those measures are the responsibility of the Sheriffs and Fire Departments — responsibilities that Mrs. Bryant’s efforts have exposed as woefully deficient, even giving amnesty to the wrongdoers, her lawyer wrote in a statement on Wednesday.
“Mrs. Bryant was courageous and never faltered, even when the County attempted to force her to submit to an involuntary psychiatric examination. She is deeply grateful to Ralph Mendez and Luella Weireter, the good Samaritans who brought to light the decades old practice of taking and sharing photos of accident and crime victims for no legitimate purpose,” the statement continued. “It is Mrs. Bryant’s hope that this important civil rights case will put to a stop this abhorrent and callous behavior.”
“Mrs. Bryant intends that proceeds from this judgment will go to the Mamba and Mambacita foundation to shine a light on Kobe and Gigi’s legacy,” it concluded.
Kobe Bryant and their daughter, Gianna, were headed to a basketball game at his Mamba Sports Academy in Thousand Oaks along with others connected to the basketball program on Jan. 26, 2020, when the helicopter they were traveling in crashed in Calabasas. All nine people on board were killed.
(NEW YORK) — Here are the scores from Thursday’s sports events:
MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL
AMERICAN LEAGUE
Tampa Bay 8, LA Angels 3
Seattle 3, Cleveland 1
Baltimore 4, Chi White Sox 3
Toronto 6, Boston 5
Houston 6, Minnesota 3
NY Yankees, 13 Oakland 4
NATIONAL LEAGUE
St. Louis 8, Chi Cubs 3
Philadelphia 4, Cincinnati 0
NY Mets 3, Colorado 1
NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE PRESEASON
Kansas City 17, Green Bay 10
Houston 17, San Francisco 0
(SACRAMENTO, Calif.) — California Gov. Gavin Newsom told ABC News that his state’s historic vote Thursday to ban the sale of new gas engine vehicles by 2035 is a game changer in the country’s goals to curb its dependency on fossil fuels.
The California Air Resources Board approved the new regulations Thursday afternoon following a long public comment process. California became the first state in the nation to issue such a direct phase-out of gas-powered vehicles, and Newsom told ABC News he is confident other states around the country will follow suit.
“There’s nothing else that will move the needle on greenhouse gases more than tailpipe emissions,” he told ABC News.
Under the new rules, automakers cannot sell any car, pickup truck, minivan, SUV or other passenger vehicles that emit greenhouse gasses.
Motorists can continue driving gas-fueled vehicles that were bought prior to the 2035 deadline, according to regulation. They will also be allowed to purchase used gas-powered vehicles after the rules take effect.
The state will allow for one-fifth of new car sales after 2035 to be plug-in hybrids that run on batteries and gas.
The plan sets targets for the number of new non-gas powered cars sold of 35% by 2026 and 68% four years later.
Newsom said he pushed for this strict deadline, not only because of the increasing effects of climate change in the state, such as droughts and increased wildfires, but also because the market for EVs and other zero-emissions vehicles is on the rise.
Roughly 16% of cars sold in the state are electric, hybrid or hydrogen-fueled, he said.
“It’s the world we invented that in so many ways is accelerating this trend,” Newsom said. “And so we thought, [the] policy is the accelerator, can we accelerate this even further.”
Newsom acknowledged that there are still some hurdles to achieving the benchmarks, including the high cost of EVs and the nation’s charging infrastructure. Still, he noted that those costs have been coming down and his state is making investments to assist those drivers.
He also noted more automakers are committing to selling more zero-emissions vehicles.
At least one automaker has given its approval to the state’s new plan. Ford called the new rule “a landmark standard that will define clean transportation,” in a statement to ABC News.
During Thursday’s hearing, a representative from Kia said they supported a transition to electric vehicles but called California’s timeline “extremely challenging.”
Newsom said he was confident that more automakers would get on board with the California plan and so will other locations. He noted that 17 other states have already adopted California’s tailpipe emission standards, which are stricter than the federal government, and they are poised to emulate the ban on gas-powered cars as well.
“California automobile manufacturers that are forced to comply, all of a sudden, [and] have to create or decide to create one car or multiple cars for multiple markets. They’d rather invest in one car one technology and if you get these other 17 states, you’re getting close to over a third of all vehicle sales in the country. Now all of a sudden you’re at a tipping point. And that changes going forward,” he said.
Republican governors have previously criticized Newsom over his policies on emissions, but Newsom predicted that they will soon see the benefits of a faster transition to zero-emission vehicles. He noted that Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has welcomed Tesla and provided the company with tax breaks for their manufacturing facilities in the state.
“This is an opportunity that presents itself for all these other governors,” he said.
(ZAPORIZHZHIA, Ukraine) — Plus, the latest on the fight to unseal the affidavit behind the FBI search at Mar-a-Lago, and more state abortion bans go into effect after the overturning of Roe v. Wade.
At a camp in Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine, for people displaced by the war, two siblings recounted the harrowing journey they’d made from their village, which was being bombed by Russian forces.
Maria Zalata, 14, and her brother Dymtro Zalata, 17, traveled for two days from their village of Vesele to reach the Ukrainian-controlled area of Zaporizhzhia.
The trip was “terrifying,” Dymtro told ABC News reporter Britt Clennett. Their father stayed behind to guard the family’s home, pets and garden against the Russian soldiers.
The war in Ukraine, which hit its six-month mark on Wednesday, has devastated the lives and aspirations of millions of young people like Maria and Dymtro. UNICEF estimates that 5 million Ukrainian children both inside the country and living as refugees abroad are in need of humanitarian aid.
In order to reach Zaporizhzhia, Maria and Dymtro slept in a car and had to be very careful about their movements. They bought groceries at a store that sold Russian products, they said.
They went through a checkpoint where their phones were examined, and they had to erase all photos that had Ukrainian symbols.
When they finally arrived in Zaporizhzhia and saw the Ukrainian flag, they cheered.
“I am so happy to be here with our soldiers,” Maria said. “I am crying now.” She said her mother, and another woman they were with, also broke down in tears. “It’s such a big happiness that we can be in Ukrainian free territory.”
“I feel like I found my home,” she said.
Being in her village was very uncomfortable, she said, because of the constant presence of Russian soldiers. “We are so upset,” she said, about the occupation.
She wishes her village can be liberated soon, so that her family can return. She told ABC News she wants to see the colors of the Ukrainian flag, yellow and blue, and their symbols, returned to the village.
The future is still uncertain. They dream of freedom, and of reuniting with their father.
“We hope all people can stay strong, and that we will defeat Russia,” she said.
They plan to go to Kiev and then move to the western part of Ukraine, where they have family. Maria plans to start school in September, as her school in Vesele has been occupied by the Russians.
But first, they will stay at the volunteer-run camp for another couple days.
“We are so, so happy people are helping us. We are so grateful,” Maria said.
(ATLANTA) — A multi-state E. coli outbreak associated with romaine lettuce in sandwiches from Wendy’s has grown, with dozens more infections reported in the past week, according to federal health officials.
Since Aug. 17, when the outbreak was first publicized, 47 more illnesses in the outbreak have been reported to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — bringing the total number of reported infections to 84, the agency said Thursday.
Among those, 38 people have been hospitalized, including eight people in Michigan who have a type of kidney failure called hemolytic uremic syndrome, the CDC said. No deaths have been reported so far.
The infections have been reported to the CDC from four states: Michigan (53); Ohio (23); Indiana (six); and Pennsylvania (two).
CDC investigators are working to confirm the source of the outbreak, though many of those who became sick reported eating at Wendy’s, the CDC said.
“A specific food has not yet been confirmed as the source of this outbreak, but many sick people reported eating sandwiches with romaine lettuce at Wendy’s restaurants in Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, and Pennsylvania before getting sick,” the CDC said in its notice.
Among 62 people interviewed by investigators, 52 of them (84%) reported eating at a Wendy’s the week before they became sick, the CDC said. Of 17 people with detailed information about what they ate there, 15 (88%) reported eating romaine lettuce served on burgers and sandwiches.
As a precaution, the fast food chain has removed the romaine lettuce used in sandwiches from restaurants in that region. A different type of romaine lettuce is used in salads.
In a statement on its website Friday, Wendy’s confirmed that it was “fully cooperating with public health authorities on their ongoing investigation of the regional E. coli outbreak reported in certain midwestern states,” adding that it was “taking the precaution of discarding and replacing the sandwich lettuce at some restaurants in that region.”
“The lettuce that we use in our salads is different, and is not affected by this action. As a company, we are committed to upholding our high standards of food safety and quality,” the statement read.
The CDC is not advising that people stop eating at Wendy’s or to stop eating romaine lettuce in general.
“At this time, there is no evidence to indicate that romaine lettuce sold in grocery stores, served in other restaurants, or in people’s homes is linked to this outbreak,” the CDC said.
Most people infected with E. coli experience severe stomach cramps, vomiting and often bloody diarrhea, which typically start three to four days after ingesting the bacteria.
The CDC is urging people to call their health care provider immediately if they have severe symptoms, such as diarrhea for more than three days, diarrhea and a fever higher than 102 degrees, vomiting to the point where you can’t keep liquids down and signs of dehydration.
Most recover without treatment within a week, though some people may develop kidney failure.
ABC News’ Eric Strauss contributed to this report.
(LOS ANGELES) — A lawsuit filed in California alleges that professional boxer and former heavyweight champion George Foreman sexually assaulted at least two women in the 1970s, when they were teenagers and below the age of consent.
The lawsuit, filed Wednesday in the Los Angeles Superior Court, does not identify Foreman by name, but identifies the alleged abuser as a former professional heavyweight boxer who defeated Joe Frazier in 1973 to become the heavyweight champion of the world. Foreman became champion after he defeated Frazier on Jan. 22, 1973.
Foreman has denied the allegations in a statement to ABC News, alleging people are “trying to extort millions of dollars each from me and my family.”
The lawsuit, filed by a woman identified as Denise S., alleges Foreman started “grooming” her at an early age by taking her out for ice cream and allowing her to sit in his lap as he drove his car, according to the suit.
According to the lawsuit, Denise S. is the daughter of an Oakland-based boxer who trained with Foreman in the early 1970s. She allegedly met Forman when she was around 8 years old.
According to the suit, the alleged sexual assault and misconduct occurred when Denise S. was 13 to 16 years old, below the legal age of consent. Foreman was over the age of 23, the suit said.
Foreman and Denise S. allegedly had sexual intercourse several times when she was 15 years old and she alleges she was sexually abused by Foreman in a San Francisco hotel on at least one occasion, according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit is filed under a new California law that increases the limit for when someone can bring a legal action to recover damages from childhood sexual assault.
The law allows accusers to bring a suit 22 years from the date the plaintiff reaches the age of majority, 18 in California, or within five years of the date the plaintiff discovers or reasonably should have discovered that psychological injury or illness after the age of 18 was the caused by the sexual assault, whichever is later.
Denise S. alleges she suffered injuries, including physical and mental pain and suffering, past and future costs of medical care and treatment and past and future loss of earnings and earning capacity, “in an amount not yet ascertained, but which exceeds the minimum jurisdictional limits of this Court,” according to the lawsuit.
She is asking for a jury trial and an unspecified amount of damages.
Denise S. alleges in the suit that she disclosed the abuse to a friend and business associate of Foreman, identified as “Ron,” who allegedly said he was aware of at least one other victim that Foreman sexually abused when she was a minor, according to the lawsuit.
According to the suit, Ron confronted Foreman about the abuse of the two minors on at least one occasion, and Foreman allegedly did not deny the allegations.
According to the New York Times, a second lawsuit was filed by a woman using the pseudonym Gwen H. who alleges she met Foreman when she was under the age of 10 and was groomed by him.
It’s unclear if “Gwen H” is the other teenager Ron allegedly knew Foreman abused.
In a statement to ABC News, Foreman said he will work with his lawyers to “fully and truthfully expose my accusers’ scheme and defend myself in court. I don’t pick fights, but I don’t run away from them either.”
“They are falsely claiming that I sexually abused them over 45 years ago in the 1970s. I adamantly and categorically deny these allegations. The pride I take in my reputation means as much to me as my sports accomplishments, and I will not be intimidated by baseless threats and lies,” Foreman said.
(WASHINGTON) — Some of the Americans who qualify for the Biden administration’s federal student loan forgiveness plan may not see relief before payments are due again in January, officials acknowledged on Thursday.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told ABC News at a briefing that the forgiveness policy is something that the administration wants to make sure “happens right away” — but she stopped short of a specific timeline commitment to borrowers, deferring to the Department of Education (DOE).
“I don’t have a timeline for you. That is something that the Department of Education is going to work on,” Jean-Pierre said. “That is something, again, that the Department of Education is going to focus on. It is important. We want this to happen for these individuals.”
Politico in July obtained a DOE memo that senior officials prepared for Education Secretary Miguel Cardona which stated that the forgiveness plan potentially allowed “immediate eligibility determination for millions of borrowers, the first cancellations within 45 days of announcement and millions of cancellations within 90 days.”
Jean-Pierre on Thursday stressed that the administration wants to be certain that debt forgiveness is enacted in tandem with the restart of student loan payments, something the DOE will “be focused on.”
A key provision of the White House plan is that about 8 million borrowers may be eligible for automatic loan forgiveness because their income data is readily available to the DOE.
But for the rest of those with federal loans, debt balances may not shrink before repayments begin on Dec. 31 — which is the deadline for the latest extension of the pandemic-era student loan pause enacted by Biden on Wednesday.
His announcement that Pell grant recipients will receive up to $20,000 in federal loan forgiveness and non-Pell borrowers will owe up to $10,000 less on their loans — if they make under $125,000 per year — came just a week before the restart of payments for America’s $1.7 trillion in federal student loans after a two-year COVID-19 freeze.
The White House has also confirmed that the application forms some of the borrowers will need to use for the debt cancellation are not yet ready, with no timeline for their disbursement. (Officials are referring borrowers to studentaid.gov for more information.)
At Thursday’s White House briefing, Jean-Pierre struggled to answer rounds of questioning about exactly how the federal government will foot the bill if this trillion-dollar promise.
“Let’s see who actually takes advantage of this, then we’ll have a better sense of what this is actually going to cost,” she said, noting that Biden’s work to lower the deficit during his time in office and that lifting the student loan payment pause would help bring $50 billion into the Treasury.
Even without a price tag, she added, “We do believe this will be fully paid for because of the work this president has done with the economy.”
A recent study by the University of Pennsylvania’s business school found that erasing $10,000 in student loan debt will cost about $300 billion. If the program continues for 10 years, the cost becomes $330 billion, or $344 billion if there is no income limit, per the report.
Because the federal government backs many student loans, U.S. taxpayers will likely foot the bill — something Biden addressed directly on Wednesday, comparing the debt cancellation to the Paycheck Protection Program, a loan forgiveness program during the pandemic.
“No one complained that those loans caused inflation. A lot of these folks in small businesses are working in middle-class families. They needed help,” he said. “It was the right thing to do,” Biden said.
ABC News’ Gabe Ferris and Cheyenne Haslett contributed to this report.
(ROCKVILLE, Md.) — President Joe Biden will hit the campaign trail on Thursday to highlight a series of policy wins as Democrats look to keep their narrow majorities in Congress during this fall’s elections.
Biden will “lay out the choice before Americans” when he speaks at a Democratic National Committee rally in Rockville, Maryland, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters.
Biden’s appearance, happening exactly 75 days out from Election Day, comes after a string of summer legislative victories: the first major piece of gun reform in decades, Democrats’ landmark health care and climate change law and a bipartisan effort to boost semiconductor production in the U.S.
“He’ll highlight how he and congressional Democrats have delivered results for working families,” Jean-Pierre said as she teased his speech tonight. “Creating nearly 10 million jobs and record low unemployment, lowering health care costs and energy costs, passing a new gun safety law, which we hadn’t seen in decades.”
“And he’ll say that they have taken on special interest and won, that’s what Democrats have done,” Jean-Pierre added.
Earlier this week, the administration announced a plan to cancel thousands of dollars of student loan debt for millions of borrowers — fulfilling one pledge Biden made as a 2020 presidential candidate.
The policy has been lambasted by Republicans as unfair, and while many Democrats have celebrated the plan, some lawmakers in tough reelection races have distanced themselves from it.
Rep. Tim Ryan, a Democratic Senate nominee in Ohio, was critical of the move as sending “the wrong message to millions of Ohioans without a degree working just as hard to make ends meet.”
“Are you guys worried that you might have put more vulnerable Democrats in a tough spot? That you could have risked some of these races in November,” ABC News White House Correspondent MaryAlice Parks asked Jean-Pierre.
“I’m not going to get into politics and to what the next several weeks are going to look like,” Jean-Pierre responded. “But I can speak to the popularity of what we did, the importance of what we did, how this is going to help struggling families, and that has always been the plan of this president, especially as we look at the economy and making sure that we do not leave anybody behind.”
Biden will also warn about what his Republican in Congress would do if they are able to regain majority control — drawing on statements prominent GOP leaders have made about abortion access and gun rights.
Since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade — the landmark decision legalizing abortion access nationwide — at least 15 states (many led by Republicans) have ceased nearly all abortion services. Some Republicans in Congress, including House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, have floated the idea of a national ban on abortion.
“He’ll say what they are still fighting for is protecting a woman’s right to choose, not a national ban on abortion, which we have seen from the other side,” Jean-Pierre said. “The safety of kids in school, not protecting the NRA, as we’ve seen from the Republicans and the right to vote and have the — that vote counted, which is so incredibly important as we talk about our democracy.”
ABC News’ Justin Gomez contributed to this report.
(NEW YORK) — Ameshia Cross, 35, spent the past two years of the coronavirus pandemic worried about how she would pay off her nearly $90,000 in student loan debt once the freeze on federal student loan payments ended.
Now, she said she will have $20,000 less to pay off starting in January, after President Joe Biden on Wednesday announced a long-awaited plan to cancel federal student debt for a subset of Americans.
Cross qualifies for $20,000 in loan forgiveness under Biden’s plan as a recipient of a Pell Grant — scholarships reserved for students with the highest financial need — and someone making less than $125,000 per year.
She said that while she is extremely grateful for having a portion of her debt canceled, she remains anxious about how she will pay off the rest of her loans when payments resume in January.
Cross — who worked two jobs and cared for her three siblings while in college — said the $20,000 that will be forgiven is less than the interest that has accrued on her loans over the past decade.
“Money only goes so far and it’s not like your salary increases or the money you have incoming increases at the rate of cost of living,” Cross, assistant director of communications for The Education Trust, a nonprofit focused on student equity, told “Good Morning America.” “Hopefully we will be in a different place come January, but right now the costs of groceries, the cost of basic necessities is just really, really high, and I think that makes it extremely difficult.”
As a Black woman, Cross is part of a population that stands to benefit the most from Biden’s student debt relief plan.
Black women carry a disproportionate burden of student debt. Overall, women hold nearly two-thirds of the nearly $2 trillion outstanding student debt in the U.S., and Black women are the most likely of any gender group to have student loans, with around 1 in 4 Black women holding student debt, according to data from the Census Bureau and the American Association of University Women.
Black women graduate college with an average of nearly $38,000 in student debt, according to the American Association of University Women, a number that grows at a faster rate over time than for other populations, data shows. Just over a decade after starting college, Black women, on average, owe 13% more than they borrowed, while white men, on average, have paid off 44% of their debt, according to The Education Trust.
“When I became a borrower, I didn’t think about the repayment, I thought about degree completion, and then the economic mobility that would come,” said Brittani Williams, a senior policy analyst in higher education at The Education Trust. “I figured I would graduate, get a job and pay those student loans back, and the reality for me was that I graduated, got a job and went back to school a couple of times.”
Williams, a mom of three, said payments on the tens of thousands of dollars of loan debt she still owes are on pause as she pursues a doctorate degree, which she expects to finish in 2024.
Though she too qualifies for $20,000 in loan forgiveness under Biden’s plan, Williams said she sees it as “just a start” and is already worried about restarting payments in the future.
“I’ve already begun to create in my head a scenario for repayment and what does that look like,” she said. “I’m enrolled in public service loan forgiveness and I work for an eligible nonprofit but what does that mean for my forgiveness personally moving forward, and what does that mean for the planning of these next nearly two academic years that I have?”
Under Biden’s plan, people who went to school on a Pell Grant can qualify for up to $20,000 in debt forgiveness, while other student loan borrowers who didn’t go to school on a Pell Grant will still have loans forgiven up to $10,000.
Both forgiveness options are for people who earn less than $125,000 per year, or $250,000 as a household, in either the 2020 or 2021 tax year.
When Biden announced the plan on Wednesday, he spoke of a generation of people “saddled with unsustainable debt” that impacts whether they can buy homes or start families, among other life choices.
That debt is especially harmful to Black women, who face both racial and gender discrimination on top of everything else. Even after entering the workforce, where they might ostensibly earn the money to pay off their student loans, Black women are paid less than their white male counterparts, earning just 63 cents for every dollar earned by white men on average, according to the Labor Department.
Gloria Blackwell, CEO of the American Association of University Woman, said Black women face the “perfect storm” of both a racial wealth gap and gender pay gap, which she said combine to keep them further behind their peers both before and during college, and then exponentially so afterward, when they graduate with debt.
“When you are a Black woman and you have this burden of student loans, it impacts every aspect of your life,” said Blackwell. “It impacts whether you can pay for basic living expenses, whether you can afford transportation or even the rent in order to have a decent place to live, let alone save for a house or be able to start a family or take care of your family. It’s a burden on Black women on whether they can save for retirement or afford rent or be able to move to a better neighborhood.”
Kristin McGuire, 40, said the past two decades of her life have been structured around her responsibility to pay back the more than $20,000 she borrowed to attend a four-year public college in California, an amount she said has increased to over $50,000 due to interest.
Now, as she pays for her oldest daughter to attend college, also in California, McGuire, the executive director of Young Invincibles, a youth advocacy organization, said she is preparing to resume payments on her loans in January, when the pause ends.
McGuire said she did not qualify for loan forgiveness under Biden’s plan, which she said she hoped would not include means testing.
“The president’s wording has been no one who makes a high income will be eligible for this relief, but $125,000 doesn’t really weigh in for regional differences or inflation,” said McGuire. “So because of that, a lot of coastal borrowers or folks who live on the coast or in major metropolitan areas will be excluded from this.”
Still, McGuire said she is “very, very grateful” that Biden took action because she knows so many people who are impacted by student debt for whom the loan forgiveness will help.
“I’m not exaggerating when I say every single person I know who went to college and is a Black person is overwhelmed with the burden of student debt,” she said. “And it’s all for the very same reasons, that we were all first-generation, we were all low-income and the cost of us attending college was more expensive because we had zero expected family contribution, which means we had to borrow the money.”
“That impacted everyone in my social circle in a different way, so these wins are more of a communal win for me,” she added. “I don’t have to view it as a personal win or loss.”
McGuire’s sentiment is one echoed by Corazon Eaton, of Columbus, Ohio, who paid off her remaining loan balance of more than $130,000 within the past year, but said she is still very happy with Biden’s loan forgiveness plan.
“I went into [paying off my student loans] knowing that it could potentially down the road end up getting forgiven or a portion of it getting forgiven [for others], and being at peace with that,” said Eaton. “I think the changes are going to propel and impact a lot of people.”
Still, Eaton, McGuire and the other women “GMA” spoke with all said they believe Biden’s action on student loan forgiveness should be only a first step and that more needs to be done to help Black women, including capping the rising cost of higher education and introducing greater debt cancellation options.
They also said they are proud that it was Black women who led the call — and who will continue to do so — for changes to student debt policy.
On the 2020 campaign trail, Biden pledged to approve $10,000 in student loan forgiveness for every federal borrower.
“Black women came out and Black women voted and Black women said, ‘This is what we need,'” said Blackwell. “The call is to be more deeply responsive to the very specifically articulated needs that would have an impact on improving the economic security of Black women, and those calls are not going to stop, and that advocacy is not going to stop.”
