Eighteen States Are Suing Betsy DeVos Over Student Loan Law
Serving her pals in the for-profit school industry.
July 6, 2017

Last year the Obama administration said 'enough' to those for-profit colleges engaged in predatory recruitment of students.

Some colleges signed up students who then got federally guaranteed student loans to pay tuition. Those colleges that took the money and went belly up left the students on the hook for the loan repayment. And if the students then defaulted on the loan the taxpayer was responsible for the loan to the bank.

This Ponzi scheme left for-profit colleges and banks with a guaranteed rate of return, and students and taxpayers punished for valuing education. A law allowing students to engage in class actions against the schools regardless of fine print contracts, was to go into effect on July 1.

Guess which totally unqualified, bought her cabinet seat, billionaire Secretary of Education decided she was entitled to delay implementation of the law?

“Since day one, Secretary DeVos has sided with for-profit school executives against students and families drowning in unaffordable student loans,” Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey said in a statement Thursday. “Her decision to cancel vital protections for students and taxpayers is a betrayal of her office’s responsibility and a violation of federal law. We call on Secretary DeVos and the U.S. Department of Education to restore these rules immediately."

DeVos announced last month that her department was planning to re-do both the borrower defense rule and the Gainful Employment Rule, which requires schools to ensure their career training programs actually prepare students for well-paying jobs that allow them to pay back their student loans.

Consumer advocacy groups have also filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, accusing DeVos of having violated the Administrative Procedure Act by postponing the Borrower Defense to Repaying rule, which was set to take effect on July 1.

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