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WASHINGTON, DC - MARCH 31: U.S. President Donald Trump takes a question from a reporter during an ... More executive order signing event in the Oval Office of the White House on March 31, 2025 in Washington, DC. Trump signed an executive order earlier this month to limit student loan forgiveness eligibility under the PSLF program. (Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)
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As the Trump administration moves forward to create new rules that could significantly narrow eligibility for a popular federal student loan forgiveness program, millions of borrowers could wind up getting denied relief.
Last week, the Department of Education announced that it was initiating a formal rulemaking process, in part to begin drafting regulations to put President Donald Trump’s recent executive order targeting Public Service Loan Forgiveness into effect. PSLF offers federal student loan forgiveness to borrowers who work for nonprofit or government employers for at least 10 years while making payments on their loans under qualifying plans. When Congress enacted PSLF in 2007 under President George W. Bush, lawmakers placed few restrictions on organizational eligibility – nearly any 501(c)(3) nonprofit or public organizations qualify.
But President Trump’s executive order, and the Education Department’s recent moves to implement that order through rulemaking, could upend PSLF and deny relief to broad cohorts of borrowers. Advocates and legal experts have warned that such attempts to restrict student loan forgiveness under PSLF are likely illegal. But that doesn’t mean the administration isn’t going to try, anyway. Here’s what borrowers should know.
What Trump’s PSLF Order Says About Restricting Student Loan Forgiveness
Trump argued (without evidence) in his executive order issued in March that the PSLF program was benefiting organizations that were engaging in unlawful or improper activities, at taxpayer expense.
“The PSLF Program has misdirected tax dollars into activist organizations that not only fail to serve the public interest, but actually harm our national security and American values, sometimes through criminal means,” said Trump in the order. The order did not provide any specific examples of these allegations.
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