It was always a bit of a stretch to have this work. I think Biden understood that there were two ways this could go. One possibility was that if his plan passed muster, a lot of young people saved money and were happy and would credit that directly to Biden. And if it got shot down (particularly if the SCOTUS did it), he knew the blame for that would go to Republicans. He wins either way.

I happen to think decreasing the debt load on students is a good idea, because there’s no way they can establish themselves if they have crushing debt when they start. But let’s make no mistake about it, Biden is using the Federal Treasury to buy votes. It’s been done before, though. I’m old enough to remember that George W Bush did a lot of vote buying, in the form of “tax rebate” checks directly to taxpayers. I think I bought a dryer with one of mine. I never did vote for him, though. I guess the vote buying doesn’t always work.