Re: Human Rights First Comment on the Department of Education’s Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, William D. Ford Federal Direct Loan (Direct Loan) Program, Docket No. ED-2025-OPE-0016
Dear Secretary McMahon,
Human Rights First submits this comment in opposition to the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking promulgated by the Department of Education, Office of Postsecondary Education, titled William D. Ford Federal Direct Loan (Direct Loan) Program. The NPRM proposes to amend the federal regulations on the Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) program at 34 CFR 685.219. Human Rights First recommends that the proposed rule be withdrawn in its entirety.
I. Overview
Human Rights First strongly opposes the Department of Education’s proposed rule amending the regulations governing the PSLF program. The proposed rule targets nonprofit organizations that provide entirely lawful pro bono legal services to immigrants and other vulnerable populations. If implemented, the administration would likely attempt to use it to strip PSLF eligibility for people providing legal services to immigrants, which would deny immigrants the ability to access legal protections that they are entitled to under U.S. law, accelerate their unlawful detention and deportation, and prevent people from seeking remedies for harms caused by immigration agents.
The rule also threatens the broader, Constitutionally-protected work of human rights advocates, legal monitors, and public interest lawyers, many of whom rely on PSLF to sustain careers in the public interest, in service of vulnerable populations. For decades, Human Rights First has relied on PSLF to recruit and retain skilled attorneys committed to serving asylum-seekers and other vulnerable populations. Eliminating this pathway would jeopardize the financial stability of public interest lawyers with reliance interests in the program and drastically reduce the availability of qualified legal counsel, leaving countless immigrants without representation in proceedings that have life-or-death consequences. The proposed rule should be withdrawn in its entirety.
