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The Trump White House Is Trying to Price Law Students Out of Public Service - Balls and Strikes
Balls and StrikesThe Department of Education is currently accepting public comments on a proposed rule change that would prevent thousands of public interest attorneys, among many other public servants, from receiving the public service loan forgiveness benefits to which they are entitled. Why? The Trump administration has decided that if one’s public interest work or the work of their colleagues conflicts with the Trump administration’s policy agenda, their education should be entirely on their own dime. (Well, millions of dimes.)
Congress created the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program in 2007 to spare public servants from lifelong federal student loan debt. Under existing law, people who work full-time at qualifying employers and make 120 qualifying monthly payments are eligible to have their remaining loan balances canceled.
Because of confusing eligibility standards, complicated forms, and other hurdles, fo years, most people who tried to get PSLF did not succeed: At the time President Joe Biden took office, less than 7,000 borrowers, representing fewer than 3 percent of applicants, had been approved for PSLF. Thanks to reforms enacted by the Biden administration, though, over 1 million public service workers had their debt discharged by October 2024.
But in March 2025, the Trump White House issued an executive order declaring that the program has “misdirected tax dollars into activist organizations” that “harm our national security and American values, sometimes through criminal means.” Pursuant to this directive, the Department of Education proposed a rule last month that would exclude borrowers from loan forgiveness if the Secretary of Education determines “by a preponderance of the evidence” that their employers “engage in activities that have a substantial illegal purpose.”
Congress created the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program in 2007 to spare public servants from lifelong federal student loan debt. Under existing law, people who work full-time at qualifying employers and make 120 qualifying monthly payments are eligible to have their remaining loan balances canceled.
Because of confusing eligibility standards, complicated forms, and other hurdles, fo years, most people who tried to get PSLF did not succeed: At the time President Joe Biden took office, less than 7,000 borrowers, representing fewer than 3 percent of applicants, had been approved for PSLF. Thanks to reforms enacted by the Biden administration, though, over 1 million public service workers had their debt discharged by October 2024.
But in March 2025, the Trump White House issued an executive order declaring that the program has “misdirected tax dollars into activist organizations” that “harm our national security and American values, sometimes through criminal means.” Pursuant to this directive, the Department of Education proposed a rule last month that would exclude borrowers from loan forgiveness if the Secretary of Education determines “by a preponderance of the evidence” that their employers “engage in activities that have a substantial illegal purpose.”
The Trump administration wants to make it functionally impossible for law students to take public interest jobs that don't align with the Trump administration's policy agenda
— Balls & Strikes (@ballsandstrikes.org) 2025-09-15T16:26:37.819Z
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