Republicans in the House of Representatives have blocked a Democratic-led effort to restore student loan protections for borrowers defrauded by their schools.

the Borrower defense program until repayment is a student loan exemption program originally adopted by the Obama administration to provide student debt relief to students who have been misled, defrauded, or otherwise harmed by predatory colleges and universities – often for-profit schools.

The Trump administration has been trying to rewrite the rules governing the borrower defense agenda since 2017, weakening the relief given to student loan borrowers and increasing the burden of proof required to prevail. Education Secretary Betsy DeVos finalized a new rule last year that would require student loan borrowers to prove their college made a misleading statement “with knowledge of its false, deceptive or deceptive nature or with contempt. heedless of the truth ”. It would be a difficult standard for borrowers to meet. Borrowers would also have to prove that they relied on the false statement (which would also be difficult) and suffered financial harm as a result. The new rule would also impose a three-year statute of limitations on filing a borrower defense claim, effectively stopping thousands of borrowers who were defrauded years ago but still struggle with student debt. .

In a rare bipartisan moment, Democrats and Republicans in Congress banded together and passed a bill that overturned Devos’ new rule and restored Obama-era borrower defense regulations. But in May, President Trump sided with DeVos and vetoed this bipartite legislation.

The House voted on Friday to overturn President Trump’s veto. While the majority of House members supported the waiver, they failed to achieve the two-thirds majority required to overturn Trump’s veto. Republican members of the House effectively blocked the effort, leaving Trump’s veto – and DeVos’ more restrictive borrower defense rules – intact for now.

However, student loan borrowers are sue DeVos again, arguing that the new borrower defense rules are an illegal attempt to deny relief to student loan borrowers under the program. “These students were lied to and deceived by predatory schools, and every dollar in federal student loans was based on these lies. They have the legal right to write off every dollar of those loans, ”said Toby Merrill, director of Project on Predatory Student Lending, an organization representing borrowers in this lawsuit.