Washington, DC—Today, Rep. Ron Kind voted to overturn Department of Education Secretary Betsy DeVos’s rewritten borrower defense rule which gutted essential protections for student borrowers and taxpayers.
In 2016, following the collapse of two major for-profit college chains that consistently defrauded students, President Obama issued the Borrower Defense rule, creating a streamlined process to help defrauded borrowers access relief and move forward with their lives. Since the start of the current administration, Secretary DeVos has openly refused to implement the established Borrower Defense rule, which has left hundreds of thousands of defrauded borrowers waiting for relief, including thousands of Wisconsinites. Secretary DeVos has rewritten the rule to make it harder for borrowers to get debt relief, severely restrict how much relief borrowers can receive, and shift the cost of providing debt relief from predatory schools to taxpayers.
“Over the last few years, predatory colleges have abruptly shut down, leaving students with crushing debt and none of the job opportunities they were promised. These students were defrauded and deserve relief, but Secretary Devos is turning them away,” said Rep. Ron Kind. “Instead of holding these predatory institutions accountable and helping these borrowers, DeVos is making it harder for students to seek relief and shifting the costs onto the taxpayers.”
Rep. Kind is a co-sponsor of the resolution. It passed through the House with bipartisan support.
