Courtney Slams Big Ugly Bill’s Student Loan Caps for Nurses & Calls Out Banks for Lobbying in Support of Caps

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Today, Congressman Joe Courtney (CT-02), a senior Member of the House Education and Workforce Committee, slammed the Department of Education's new student loan caps, a result of the Big Ugly Bill (H.R. 1), which will cut in half the available graduate level student loans for nursing students and other critical professions. Courtney also called out banks for lobbying in support of the caps that will raise the cost of graduate education.

Last November, the Department of Education proposed a new rule which classifies graduate level nursing positions, such as nurse practitioners and nurse anesthesiologists, as non-professional.

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"The fantasy that we hear from some of these witnesses today, particularly from the American Enterprise Institute, that [the student loan cap] is somehow going to introduce market discipline in terms of tuition, I mean, the fact of the matter is banks know better because they were lobbying for these caps because they understand that the limits are going to force student borrowers into the private market," Courtney said.

"And of course, with private loans, there's always an underwriting component in terms of trying to qualify for a loan, whether it's a collateral requirement or a financial position where the bank can certify that it's a low-risk loan. Banks, again, have sort of recognized that this going to be an issue for a lot of students because they're now talking about coming to Congress to ask for loan guarantees, which is really just a trip back in time in terms of just the rip off that was in the student loan space where banks were getting total government guarantees as well as higher interest rates," Courtney continued.

"On January 29^th, the comment period started for people on this new rule out of the Department of Education. Honestly, I think every Member of Congress should be standing up for the health care providers, the caring professions. The fact that we have a shortage of critical people in our health care system, which is only going to get worse, is being aggravated by H.R. 1's loan caps that, again, are just going to really hit one of the most critical sectors of our economy," Courtney closed.