As the Joe Biden-Kamala Harris administration comes to a close in five months, and three months before an electoral ticket that includes Harris and Tim Walz, now is the perfect time to reflect on what the Biden-Harris administration has done to address issues affecting the Black community.
Thanks to the administration’s Building Back Together organization, a non-partisan group, a lot of these issues stayed in the forefront for the past three years. During the 2024 National Association of Black Journalists Convention in Chicago, Building Back Together hosted an event and rolling out caught up with executive director Mayra Macías to discuss how the group has benefitted the Black community.
What is Building Back Together?
Building Back Together is a nonprofit organization that was started after the Biden-Harris administration took office to pass all of the ambitious policy agenda [items] they campaigned on, and then, tell the story of what that policy means for everyday people.
We started three and a half years ago, right after Biden-Harris took office, and part of our job has been storytelling. We’ve invested over $40 million in ads to communicate to folks what policy means to remind people that the government can work for them, and to do it culturally-competently, focusing on reaching Latinos, Black audiences and young people.
What has the Biden-Harris administration done for Black and Brown people?
Student debt relief is a huge one. There was a program called the Public Service Loan Forgiveness. … So that means, if you’ve been in public service like government, several branches [qualify for loan forgiveness after] 10 years … [The fund has relieved 871,000 borrowers of $62.5 billion in loans since October 2021. Prior to the Biden-Harris administration, only about 7,000 borrowers had ever received forgiveness, according to the Department of Education.]
That’s only the beginning. We know this administration tried to relieve folks of student debt, and the Supreme Court blocked it, but they’re not done. Just last week, 35,000 individuals had their student loans forgiven. There are several different pieces of work being done under the Department of Education by Secretary [Miguel] Cardona, a Latino secretary, to make sure folks, who are burdened by student debt, have a little bit more wiggle room [financially]. This is because of the intense intentionality of the Biden-Harris administration, and working with advocates to make sure this is an issue that is top of mind for folks, especially after the economic turmoil we were in with COVID-19.
Work is being done to make sure we’re lowering costs for folks. I’m Latina; there are a lot of folks in my family who have diabetes, and under this administration, insulin was capped at $35 a month. We went from paying hundreds of dollars for insulin monthly to $35. That is a huge relief, especially for communities of color, who are predisposed to diabetes.
There are also ways to lower your energy bills, especially in communities of color. If you think about Atlanta, Miami, L.A., cities where there are a lot of Black and Brown folks with high-energy costs and a lot of climate change, this administration passed the Inflation Reduction Act to make sure that we’re giving folks energy credits to install solar panels in their home.
We’re creating infrastructure to prevent water floods up to your car when driving because of potential hurricanes, climate change or high levels of heat like we saw in Houston.
