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Senator Bernie Sanders, the Vermont Independent who is running for president, on Tuesday unveiled more details about his plan to make public higher education debt-free for students.
Sanders introduced legislation that calls for the federal government to dole out $47 billion per year to states that agree to eliminate undergraduate tuition and fees at their public colleges and universities.
The federal government, according to his office, would pick up the tab nationwide for about two-thirds of the cost of eliminating tuition, and states would have to chip in the remaining third.
Sanders proposes to pay for the debt-free college program by raising taxes on the financial transactions of large investment firms.
The debt-free-college proposal, which goes beyond the Obama administration’s free community college plan announced earlier this year, has increasingly caught on among liberal lawmakers and progressive groups. Hillary Clinton’s campaign manager gave a nod to the idea earlier this month.
