Trump signs executive action aimed at the Public Services Program

President Donald Trump has signed an executive action that dedicates the American education department to exclude certain federal borrowers from student loans from the Public Service Loan Forgivence Program.

The promotion says that “people employed by organizations whose activities have a significant illegal goal” are no longer eligible for the program, known as PSLF. It comes three weeks after education secretary Linda McMahon said during her confirmation from the Senate that she would keep the program intact.

Made by Congress, PSLF forgives the federal loans of borrowers who work in jobs in the public sector, including non -profit organizations, after they have made 10 years of payments while working for their qualifying employer.

The executive action commissioned McMahon to redefine “public service” in a way that excludes “organizations that undertake activities that have a considerably illegal goal”.

Among the activities mentioned are: support for terrorism; child abuse, including “the chemical and surgical castration or mutilation of children or the trade of children to so -called transgender sanctuary”; “Control help and illegal discrimination”; violating federal immigration laws; and state law violations such as “entering disorderly behavior, public nuisance, vandalism and obstruction of highways.”

Critics say that this is an attack on the freedom of expression of borrowers, and on organizations that enter into activities that are contrary to the agenda of the administration.

“What happens is that guilt is used to frighten hard -working public service providers to serve the most vulnerable members of our society, or to speak out against the radical agenda of the Trump government,” says Persis Yu, deputy director and adviser of the LoWer Protection Center student.

Written in the PSLF Act, signed by President George W. Bush in 2007, is a description of the types of public employees who are eligible. Yu says it would cost a long -term federal regulation process to change those suitability requirements.

Secretary McMahon and the White House could Take steps to regulate the law. That is what the Biden administration did in 2021, when it the rules extended from PSLF.

A result of those changes was a tree in loan. In January, towards the end of the term of office of Biden, the Department announced in a statement That the “total number of borrowers approved for PSLF is now 1,069,000 and $ 78.46 billion. On the other hand, only 7,000 borrowers had received PSLF at the start of the Biden-Harris administration.”

Although there are roads for the Trump administration to regulate the way in which PSLF is managed, YU says that the president cannot redefine the law and whoever is eligible for this with an executive action.

“These borrowers have signed contracts [with the Department of Education] Who embedded this right to forgiveness of public services, “says Yu, adding that he expects legal challenges for the executive action.

PSLF has a troubled history. In one 2018 reviewwas from the US Government Accountability Office that when borrowers called the company to manage PSLF to ensure that their job was qualified, they sometimes did not get an answer – because the education department had not given the company a list of eligible employers.

That same year, NPR reported The fact that federal data showed 99% of the applications for loan enhancement via PSLF was refused.