VIDEO: Capito Chairs Labor-H Subcommittee Hearing on Department of Education Budget

To watch Chairman Capito’s opening remarks click here or the image above. WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, U.S. Senator Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.), Chairman of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies (Labor-HHS), chaired a hearing with U.S. Department of Education Secretary Linda McMahon to consider President Trump’s Fiscal Year 2027 (FY27) budget request, as well as the many priorities of the agency. HIGHLIGHTS: ON DEPARTMENT OF LABOR AND DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION MERGER: “You mentioned how many states have been seeking or gotten their money through the Department of Labor, and what are the metrics that you're using to determine whether this is a successful merger? Is it how many students are more self-aware when they come out of school? Do they want to go into apprenticeship? Do they want to go into a skilled skill? Do they want to go to higher ed? Because I think there's obviously, we have so many workforce programs throughout the whole government and all different aspects of it that I do think consolidating these and matching it with education is a natural, is a natural fit.” ON STUDENT LOAN REPAYMENT Chairman Capito: “A lot of student loan borrowers were put into the SAVE program, which was deemed illegal by a federal appeals court and lots of legal disputes. So, I mean, total confusion from student borrowers as to, do they owe, do they have to pay what? So, I, you know, many borrowers are currently enrolled in a forbearance plan, but they're getting, they're going to get instructed that they need to get into a legal repayment plan. How is that going? Is it eliminating the confusion? And I’m wondering, that’s a big thing to tackle, what is it, $1 trillion or something, that is owed on this plan?” Secretary McMahon: “It is a huge portfolio. $1.7 trillion in outstanding debt and only about 40% of those payers are now trying any kind of repayment at all and who can blame them?... So what happened under… the Working Families Tax Cuts Act is the consolidation now of loans, so that there would be 2 repayment plans put in place.” # # #