Senators Maggie Hassan (D-NH) and Dick Durbin (D-IL) today introduced the Preventing Risky Operations from Threatening the Education and Career Trajectories of Students (PROTECT Students) Act of 2019, a bill that would enshrine in law many key reforms sought by advocates for veterans and other students in order to prevent predatory practices by for-profit colleges.
Many in the for-profit higher education industry, aided by hordes of well-paid Washington lobbyists, have fought to oppose these very reforms. Given the industry’s deep ties to the Trump administration, especially the Betsy DeVos Department of Education, and to campaign contribution recipients in Congress, many of the bill’s provisions may never make it into the next Higher Education Act, even if somehow Congress manages to enact one. But the bill makes a powerful statement about what the federal government should be doing to protect low- and middle-income students from predatory practices — and to protect the taxpayer investment in higher education. And it puts renewed pressure on industry backers and lobbyists to defend the indefensible: deceptive advertising and recruiting, financial aid fraud, low-quality instruction, astronomical prices, and fiscal irresponsibility among many for-profit schools.