DAVIS: “Congresswoman, I want to show some data from last year that shows students of color were more likely to have student loans with 33% of borrowers identifying as black, 23% identifying as Hispanic or Latino, and just 15% identifying as white. Given that fact and what we saw yesterday with the Supreme Court striking down affirmative action, what does it mean for students of color moving forward? What does it mean for student bodies? What does it mean for the student experience?”

Omar: “What it means, you know, if you take all of these cases together, if you think about all the grievances that are brought about the Trump election, what you are seeing is severe backlash in the sense that people do not want to see black and brown people excel in this country. I think it’s really something that is unfortunate that we have to pay attention to. And allowing the courts to legitimize licensed discrimination in this kind of way really makes this country not the country that we want it to be, not the kind of future that we want to push forward. Think about 70% of student debt holders being poor and working people. We know that, disproportionally, black women are going to be impact. We know that the wealthy, the billionaires and the millionaires have never been able to carry student debt. The burden is with the families that we all represent, that are struggling to make ends meet. This now will mean that so many people who had this excitement about starting a family, this excitement about starting a small business, all of that is now eroded. But I find solace in something that President Biden said yesterday about the fact that this decision is not going to be the end of it. We know that this promise was made to millions of Americans in the last election, the president followed through with that, and I hope that they will find other ways to carry through this promise and make sure that 40 million people that are now disenfranchised will get the relief that they deserve, that they’ve been promised.”

[So why didn’t Omar and her party do something about it in Congress? They could have proposed this at any time, especially when Democrats controlled both chambers of Congress and Biden was president. Should we conclude that Omar, Nancy Pelosi, and Chuck Schumer are racists? That’s the logic Omar employs here. — Ed]