Rep. Luke Messer (R-IN) believes young people should assume responsibility for their student loans and support the GOP’s student loan bill because, as he told MSNBC’s “The Daily Rundown” on Friday, “personal responsibility is pretty cool.”
Student loan interest rates are set to double from 3.4 percent to 6.8 percent on July 1. Two proposals, one put forth by House Republicans and another by President Barack Obama, both peg interest rates to the U.S. Treasury rate to avoid that increase. The proposals differ in the surcharges added to federally subsidized loans, however.
When “Daily Rundown” host Luke Russert asked Messer how he would reconcile the fact that Republicans are in favor of letting student loan rates rise up to 8.5 percent while it appears the president wants to keep rates between 3 and 4 percent, Messer said the GOP has a communication problem.
“Republicans have to do a better job of explaining how our ideas apply to young people,” Messer said. “Sometimes it sounds like he is selling ice cream and we’re selling spinach. I think personal responsibility is pretty cool. There is nothing out of date about freedom, and we have the policies that get this budget back in line, stop the explosive growth of spending. Spending that will be paid for by this generation. We’ve got to do a better job of explaining that.”
[h/t Raw Story]
