Merkley, Whitehouse, Warren, Kaine Sound the Alarm Over Trump Administration’s Plan to End Affordable Student Loan Repayment Program

Washington, D.C. – Oregon’s U.S. Senator Jeff Merkley, Rhode Island’s U.S. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, Massachusetts’ U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren, and Virginia’s U.S. Senator Tim Kaine today led their Senate colleagues to demand answers from U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon about the Trump Administration’s proposal to eliminate affordable student loan repayment options for millions of Americans.
Their letter follows the Trump Administration’s Education Department (ED) reaching a proposed settlement with the State of Missouri to abandon the Saving on a Valuable Education (SAVE) Plan and its affordable payments in response to a lawsuit from Republican attorneys general from multiple states. The SAVE Plan was created by President Biden in 2023 to help student loan borrowers nationwide by creating a new income-driven repayment (IDR) plan—which links payments to a borrower’s income and family size. In 2025, Republicans also passed a ‘Big, Ugly Betrayal’ of a budget bill that requires the SAVE Plan and other IDR plans to be eliminated by July 2028, and this proposed settlement significantly speeds up the timeline.
“Pending court approval, the settlement would require ED to stop enrolling borrowers in SAVE, deny all pending SAVE applications from borrowers that may have been waiting years for a response, and move the more than 7 million borrowers currently enrolled in SAVE into other less affordable repayment plans,”the Senators wrote to Secretary McMahon.
“Unfortunately, ED’s proposed settlement provides little direction or transparency for borrowers who will be forced into new repayment plans through no fault of their own,”they continued.“Namely, the proposed settlement provides no information on what, if any, resources or guidance ED will provide to borrowers as they make these significant changes, or how much time borrowers will be provided to switch plans. The settlement also lacks clarity on the timeline for when these changes will be operationalized and when ED and other federal loan servicers will communicate these changes to borrowers. Troublingly, ED’s own public communications have conflicting information on the timeline in which borrowers can expect to receive information from the Department, ranging from ‘in the coming weeks’ to ‘in the coming months.’”
The Senators also highlighted the harmful changes coming to student loan repayments following the passage of Republicans’ budget reconciliation bill in 2025, “Without clear information or guidance, borrowers could be unknowingly placed in the standard repayment plan. Further, as a result of the ‘One Big Beautiful Bill Act,’ ED is in the process of sunsetting ICR and PAYE while preparing to implement the Repayment Assistance Plan. These significant shifts in repayment options will only exacerbate confusion for borrowers, increasing the likelihood that borrowers will fall into the standard repayment option. This would result in significantly higher monthly payments for millions of borrowers. Many borrowers in SAVE would be unable to afford the high monthly payments in the standard plan, and as a result, these borrowers would likely fall into delinquency and default, which would have dire economic consequences for borrowers and their families.”
“To date, more than 5 million borrowers are in default and 5 million more are behind on their monthly payments. Ten million borrowers are on track to enter default on their student loans in 2026, more than in the years prior to the pandemic. As such, it is imperative the Department take every action possible to ensure the 7 million borrowers currently enrolled in SAVE are provided with the information and resources necessary to avoid delinquency or default in order to avoid an even bigger default crisis,”they emphasized.
Merkley has been a leading voice in Congressto ensure students have a much-needed path to student debt relief. He leads theSOAR Actwith Kaine to better protect borrowers from unaffordable payments and runaway balances due to rapidly accruing interest, while offering a clearer path to debt relief after at least a decade of payments.
In addition to Merkley, Whitehouse, Warren, and Kaine, the letter was signed by U.S. Senators Ben Ray Luján (D-NM), Martin Heinrich (D-NM), Jack Reed (D-RI), Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Ron Wyden (D-OR), Alex Padilla (D-CA), Tina Smith (D-MN), Raphael Warnock (D-GA), Ed Markey (D-MA), and Chuck Schumer (D-NY).
Full text of the letter can be found by clickinghereand follows below:
Dear Secretary McMahon,
We write to express our serious concerns with and ask questions about the proposed settlement reached in December 2025 with the state of Missouri to end the Saving on a Valuable Education (SAVE) Plan, a student loan repayment plan that has helped more than 8 million individuals across the country access affordable monthly payments. Specifically, we request additional information from the U.S. Department of Education (ED) regarding the proposed settlement’s requirement that the more than 7 million people who remain enrolled in SAVE switch to a different repayment plan. For the last several months, borrowers in SAVE have faced an onslaught of uncertainty and misinformation, and countless borrowers are likely to face significant hurdles in selecting and enrolling in a new repayment plan. As such, we urge the Department to provide borrowers in SAVE at least six months to apply to switch into new repayment plans before their next billing date.
First announced in July 2023 as the latest income-driven repayment (IDR) plan, the SAVE Plan seeks to better protect borrowers from unaffordable payments and runaway balances due to rapidly accruing interest and offers a clearer path to debt relief. According to Protect Borrowers, of the more than 8 million borrowers who enrolled in the SAVE plan, 4.6 million individuals had their monthly payments lowered to $0 and nearly half a million borrowers would have been provided with immediate debt relief, had the plan been allowed to take full effect. Unfortunately, due to court challenges, the plan has been enjoined since the summer of 2024. Rather than uphold the SAVE Plan, this settlement eliminates the plan and all of its benefits, which in turn will significantly hinder the ability of low-income Americans to access higher education or afford basic needs.
Pending court approval, the settlement would require ED to stop enrolling borrowers in SAVE, deny all pending SAVE applications from borrowers that may have been waiting years for a response, and move the more than 7 million borrowers currently enrolled in SAVE into other less affordable repayment plans.
Unfortunately, ED’s proposed settlement provides little direction or transparency for borrowers who will be forced into new repayment plans through no fault of their own. Namely, the proposed settlement provides no information on what, if any, resources or guidance ED will provide to borrowers as they make these significant changes, or how much time borrowers will be provided to switch plans. The settlement also lacks clarity on the timeline for when these changes will be operationalized and when ED and other federal loan servicers will communicate these changes to borrowers. Troublingly, ED’s own public communications have conflicting information on the timeline in which borrowers can expect to receive information from the Department, ranging from “in the coming weeks” to “in the coming months.”
Without clear information or guidance, borrowers could be unknowingly placed in the standard repayment plan. Further, as a result of the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,” ED is in the process of sunsetting ICR and PAYE while preparing to implement the Repayment Assistance Plan. These significant shifts in repayment options will only exacerbate confusion for borrowers, increasing the likelihood that borrowers will fall into the standard repayment option. This would result in significantly higher monthly payments for millions of borrowers. Many borrowers in SAVE would be unable to afford the high monthly payments in the standard plan, and as a result, these borrowers would likely fall into delinquency and default, which would have dire economic consequences for borrowers and their families.
Obliging borrowers to exit the SAVE Plan will also have particularly severe consequences for public service workers. Many government and nonprofit employees pursuing Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) deliberately enrolled in SAVE to ensure their payments remained affordable while completing the required 120 qualifying payments to access loan forgiveness. PSLF borrowers—including teachers, nurses, social workers, first responders, and other public servants—rely on income-driven repayment plans to maintain qualifying payment status without sacrificing their financial stability. While the time borrowers have been stuck in the SAVE forbearance has not counted towards PSLF credit, forcing these borrowers to transition out of SAVE with little guidance risks further lost time to debt relief and payment increases that could render continued public service untenable.
Finally, the settlement forces existing borrowers to leave their current plan, and switch into repayment plans with higher monthly payments much sooner than the July 2028 date required under the recently enacted One Big Beautiful Bill Act, with no clear rationale for the expedited timeline. This settlement now risks adding even further uncertainty within the student loan system and will exacerbate current application backlogs and delays across student loan servicers.
To date, more than 5 million borrowers are in default and 5 million more are behind on their monthly payments. Ten million borrowers are on track to enter default on their student loans in 2026, more than in the years prior to the pandemic. As such, it is imperative the Department take every action possible to ensure the 7 million borrowers currently enrolled in SAVE are provided with the information and resources necessary to avoid delinquency or default in order to avoid an even bigger default crisis.
As such, we request you provide answers to the following question by no later than February 6:

In addition to answering these questions, given the operational and logistical challenges raised by this settlement, we also request that the Department give borrowers at least six months to apply to switch into new repayment plans and hold borrowers harmless in the meantime by placing them in a processing forbearance that counts towards forgiveness, including PSLF. We also request the Department provide Congress with a comprehensive communications plan that details how the Department plans to work with servicers to provide updated, accurate information to SAVE borrowers as quickly as possible.
We believe these materials and steps are necessary to ensure transparency, accountability, and fairness for borrowers who are currently enrolled in SAVE.
Thank you for your prompt attention to this matter.
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