The blacklisting is interesting, but a 1% default rate doesn’t seem particularly high. E.g. the US default rate has possiblity never been that low (graph only goes back to 1991): https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/DRSFRMACBS

Debtors prisons are still illegal and don't exist in the US. It's all explained in the article, but the issue is really that poor people have bad legal representation, local judges aren't all great, and private debt collection is out of control.

In the US, your creditors should generally only be able to garnish your wages up to legal maximums. You can't get prison sentences in civil trials.

Arrests are a last-resort way for a court to force someone to appear. The other jail time is basically contempt of court for failing to comply with court orders. These should probably exist in general, but they are likely misapplied for the above reasons in these cases.

Write to you representatives about the above stuff, not debtors prisons, since they won't know what you are talking about.

They could potentially bring a related criminal suit later. I'm not an attorney, and there are a lot of specific rules about, but the stakes are lower in a civil case (i.e. no prison) and the burden of proof is easier, so you can more easily prove things or get the defense to admit things in a civil case that can sometimes make a criminal case easier.

Even if you can't cite the civil case from the criminal case, just the fact that the civil case ruled one way gives the prosecution confidence to commit to a criminal case and leverage if they negotiate a settlement.

They didn’t actually win. It had the some procedural non-decision that the Colorado bakery case had (i.e. the regulator failed to be sufficiently neutral). They got fined again and that is being appealed. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klein_v._Oregon_Bureau_of_Labor_and_Industries

If the next president reverses the order, then all these people are in the same position and might owe additional interest. Banks know this, so they will hold it against anyone seeking credit. Congress doesn’t even have to vote.

With the income based repayment, they aren’t considered delinquent on their loans, interest doesn’t build, and there is a path towards having the debt forgiven eventually.

You can look up historical interest rates for federal loans. They have never been that high. https://studentaid.gov/understand-aid/types/loans/interest-rates#older-rates