WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), a member of the U.S. Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee, released a statement following U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos’ proposal to rescind a regulation put in place by the Obama administration to protect students who were defrauded by for-profit colleges.

On Wednesday, the U.S. Department of Education proposed a significant rollback of the “borrower defense“ rule, which protects students who were defrauded by predatory for-profit colleges. This proposed rule will make it much harder for those students, saddled with debt but no legitimate education, to receive the relief they deserve. This is the latest step in a pattern of concerning actions by Secretary DeVos to put for-profit colleges and corporations’ bottom line ahead of debt relief for students.

“I don’t get it. Why would anyone deliberately hurt students who have been screwed over by scam schools? This is exactly why I was so worried about having the Department of Education run by a billionaire investor in for-profit schools,” said Murphy.

“People in Connecticut believe our schools and colleges should stay focused on educating students, not cashing in. Secretary DeVos and President Trump would allow for-profit schools to run as moneymaking machines that can bilk students out of tuition dollars and hang them out to dry when a worthless degree won’t get them a job. I will work to reinstate this $13 billion in debt relief for students and fight to pass my Students Before Profits Act to hold bad actors accountable,” Murphy added.

Murphy introduced the Students Before Profits Act, a bill to protect students from deceptive practices and bad actors in the for-profit college sector. The bill would authorize enhanced civil penalties on institutions and their executives, improve oversight of default rate manipulation, make college executives share the risk, and prevent “repeat offenders.” 

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