The AFT, AFT President Randi Weingarten and eight individual AFT member plaintiffs have reached a landmark settlement with the U.S. Department of Education in the case Weingarten v. DeVos, and as a result tens of thousands of student loan borrowers can expect imminent relief from their student debt. The suit, originally filed in July 2019, addresses the Education Department’s utter failure to deliver on its own Public Service Loan Forgiveness program.
Plaintiffs in the lawsuit, from left: Peter Huk, Jessica Saint-Paul, Randi Weingarten and Debbie Baker.
Under the historic agreement, all PSLF applicants who were denied relief will have an opportunity for their cases to be reviewed by the department, setting public employees across the country, including teachers, nurses and firefighters, on a path to a life-changing reduction or elimination of their crushing student debt burden.
PSLF guarantees that those who work in public service and consistently pay their monthly student loan bills will have the balance of their loans forgiven after 10 years. But since the program’s inception in 2007, fewer than 2 percent of applicants have received the relief they were promised. Instead, borrowers faced rampant servicer misconduct, were issued confusing and sometimes contradictory guidance about the status of their applications, and had no clear process for contesting erroneous decisions.
The settlement allows for an official review for those denied the forgiveness they believed they were owed. It will help borrowers receive credit for years of past payments, putting them that much closer to full forgiveness.
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