Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul joined 21 other attorneys general in suing the Trump administration over changes to the way public servants have their student loans forgiven.
The U.S. Education Department issued a new rule Friday threatening to deem employers, including state governments, as having “substantial illegal purpose,” and revoking them from the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program. According to the lawsuit, the Trump administration is going after its usual targets in organizations that “support for immigrants, gender affirming care, DEI initiatives, and political protest.”
The loan forgiveness program would wipe out student loans for anyone working an eligible job in public service after they had made 120 monthly loan payments at said job, which would take 10 years.
The suit, filed in Massachusetts District Court, said the Education Department is acting without authority needed from Congress. The coalition accuses the Trump administration of making “arbitrary and capricious” rules rooted in ideology, as it has done — at times successfully — in other cases.
“The Department of Education’s new rule is an unlawful attempt to punish states like Illinois that are successfully fighting the Trump administration’s illegal actions,” Raoul said in a statement. “I will continue to stand with my fellow attorneys general to protect essential programs that help the students in Illinois and across the country afford continued education, and also allow states to attract workers to careers in critical fields of public service.”
The Education Department didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
The attorneys general called the Education Department’s attempted rule change “antithetical to the basic principles of federalism” and designed to “chill the activities of public service employers.”
Per the new rule, organizations whose employees show a “pattern” of being cited for trespassing, disorderly conduct, public nuisance, vandalism or obstruction of highways — charges often associated with protest and civil disobedience — could have their loan forgiveness status revoked, though “pattern” isn’t defined in the rule change, according to the suit.
Employers who provide gender-affirming care to minors also run the risk of being yanked from the loan forgiveness program under the new rule, which cites previous Trump executive orders targeting trans health care.
“In providing justification for the [new rule], the department also repeatedly blurs the line between activity that is in fact “illegal,” activity that is contrary to “public policy,” and activity that is merely contrary to this administration’s political preferences,” the suit reads. “Put simply, the [new rule] is nothing more than a laundry list of this administration’s policy priorities designed to attack lawful conduct it does not agree with.”