Senators call for answers on stalled student dept relief

Days after Education Department deadline, still no sign of relief for many defrauded students already approved for discharges and refunds

WASHINGTON – Following reports that the Trump Administration has stopped granting relief to student loan borrowers defrauded by for-profit colleges, U.S. Senators Dick Durbin (D-IL), Chuck Schumer (D-NY), Patty Murray (D-WA), Sherrod Brown (D-OH), and Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) demanded answers regarding the delay of payment on tens of thousands of student loan discharges and refunds approved under the “borrower defense” authority.

On January 13^th, the U.S. Department of Education announced that it had notified 23,000 defrauded students that they would receive discharges and refunds within 60 and 120 days. In recent weeks, Politico and the New York Times have reported that the new Administration has essentially halted the processing of tens of thousands of pending borrower defense applications from former students of Corinthian, ITT Tech, and other schools. In addition, many previously approved applicants have yet to receive relief despite being assured their discharges would be completed within 120 days – a deadline which for many has now come and gone.

“Although the maximum 120 day timeline has already passed or will soon for these borrowers, it appears many of these students have still not received the discharges they were promised by the Department, and many are still in repayment or collections. These borrowers are thus being billed for unnecessary principal, interest, and even collection fees. In short, they continue to face significant financial burden without the debt relief they are entitled to and have been told to expect,” the senators wrote in a letter to Education Secretary Betsy DeVos. “The Department must uphold its responsibility to provide relief for the students whose lives were disrupted by fraudulent institutions.”

Full text of the letter is available here.

More like this: