{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.heitkamp.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases?ContentRecord_id=f04fdd5f-86ec-4fa6-93d8-10b527c2442d", "Heitkamp Statement on Senate Proposal on Student Loan Interest Rates", "2013-06-06", "2013", "2013-06", "Democrat", "House", "ND", "Heidi Heitkamp", "H001069", "www.heitkamp.senate.gov", null, null, "legacy", "Contact: Whitney Phillips, 202-224-2043 \n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\tWashington, DC- U.S. Senator Heidi Heitkamp released the following statement today after her vote against S. 1003, (Student Loan Protection Act) the Republican plan on student loan interest rates:\u00a0\r\n\u201cI\u2019m disappointed the Senate has yet again chosen to kick the can down the road at the expense of our students. We need long-term systemic reform in order to address the serious issue of student loan debt,\u201d said Heitkamp. \u201cI know firsthand the importance of investing in our young people \u2014 I attended college with the help of federal Pell grants and student loans. Under the plan presented today, low-income students struggling to pay the substantial costs of post-secondary education would be saddled with even greater costs. This is an issue of fairness; we need to get our fiscal house in order, but\u00a0it should not be done on the backs of students paying for their education.\u201d\r\nAccording to the Department of Education, there are 20,041 subsidized Stafford loan borrowers in North Dakota.\r\nThe Student Loan Protection Act (S. 1003) would move the student loan interest rate to a variable rate with no cap starting on July 1. The proposal would take $15.6 billion from students by charging them higher interest rates over ten years and use it for deficit reduction.\r\nSenator Heitkamp voted in favor of S. 953, the Student Loan Affordability Act. That bill, which was fully paid for, would freeze the interest rate on federally subsidized student loans at the current rate of 3.4 percent for the next two years. Preventing rates from doubling would keep an average of $900 in the pockets of North Dakota\u2019s students.\u00a0 \r\n\u00a0\r\n###", 1, "2026-03-30T12:14:52Z", "2026-03-30T12:14:52Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://www.heitkamp.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases?ContentRecord_id=f04fdd5f-86ec-4fa6-93d8-10b527c2442d"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 0.7981681264936924, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}