EDITORS' CORNER
OPINION
Nonprofits and their activists that seek to undermine the rule of law will no longer be able to qualify for “Public Service Loan Forgiveness.”
The program shifts the burden of student loans away from teachers and social workers onto the backs of other American taxpayers. However, it can also be used by nonprofits that promote a variety of activities, including crossing the border illegally and removing healthy reproductive organs from gender-confused girls.
The loan forgiveness acts essentially as a subsidy program for professional activists – someone with $100,000 in student loans for their gender studies degree gets away with paying the full amount if they work for ten years at a left-wing group and make payments.
Under the rule, finalized on Friday, people who work for nonprofits that promote these activities will no longer qualify for the benefits.
“These regulations ensure that taxpayer dollars are not misused by preventing PSLF benefits from going to individuals employed by organizations that have a substantial illegal purpose,” the federal government announced. “The revisions strengthen accountability, enhance program integrity, and protect hardworking taxpayers from shouldering the cost of improper subsidies granted to employees of organizations that undermine national security and American values through criminal activity.”
Several economists previously told The Fix that the larger problem is the program itself, and that Trump should move to eliminate it or vastly restrict it.
“I would like to see Congress take action to narrow eligibility for PSLF–not just to exclude the organizations the president mentioned, but potentially all private nonprofit organizations,” Preston Cooper, an economist with the American Enterprise Institute, said in April.
He correctly predicted legal challenges – Democratic states quickly filed a federal lawsuit to stop the changes.
“If I were Trump, I would eliminate the whole thing all at once,” Richard Vedder previously told The Fix.
The changes are positive for several reasons. One, they restrict the taxpayer’s obligation to take over other people’s student loans. This is a victory for limited government and fiscal responsibility.
Second, they show how Trump is tactfully using all the levers of government to enact his agenda on important topics such as immigration and transgender drugs and surgeries.
He is right to put pressure on nonprofits to stop promoting those activities, or to at least ensure taxpayers are not subsidizing the activist class.
MORE: Duke University plans to push climate change in every discipline
