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Debunking the Republican claim that the budget bill "helps students."

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One of the more misleading claims emerging from the recently passed Republican Budget Bill is that it “supports students.” A closer examination reveals a very different reality: the bill dismantles key student loan forgiveness programs, narrows repayment options, and removes borrower protections at a time when more Americans than ever are struggling with the cost of higher education.

Among its most consequential provisions, the bill:

• Eliminates all current income-driven repayment (IDR) plans, replacing them with two more limited alternatives;

• Ends the SAVE plan, a centerpiece of the Biden administration’s loan forgiveness policy;

• Removes economic hardship deferments, stripping away protections for borrowers facing unemployment or financial crisis;

• Terminates the graduate PLUS loan program, while capping parent PLUS loans at $65,000 total — a significant restriction on access to funding.

The first of the new repayment options — the Repayment Assistance Plan — sets monthly payments at 1% to 10% of income, with a $10 monthly minimum. Interest is waived on unpaid balances, and loans are forgiven after 30 years. While that sounds reasonable at a glance, it offers far less relief than the SAVE plan it replaces.

Under SAVE, borrowers with initial balances of $12,000 or less would qualify for forgiveness after just 10 years of payments. It also cut monthly payments on undergraduate loans from 10% to 5% of discretionary income — offering meaningful breathing room for millions of borrowers. That plan, however, is now blocked in court, and this budget bill would codify its elimination. The 8 million borrowers currently enrolled in SAVE would have until 2026–2028 to transition to a new plan.

The second repayment plan created by the bill is a restructured standard plan, which ties repayment duration to the borrower’s original loan amount — ranging from 10 to 25 years. Crucially, this model ignores the borrower’s income or ability to pay, potentially locking lower-income Americans into decades of repayment.

Other provisions in the bill further restrict flexibility for struggling borrowers. Economic hardship and unemployment deferments would be eliminated entirely, leaving only forbearance — a stopgap measure that allows payments to pause but continues to accrue interest, deepening long-term debt burdens.

Additionally, the bill ends the federal graduate PLUS loan program, which currently allows graduate and professional students to borrow up to the full cost of attendance. While the parent PLUS program remains in place, it would be capped at $65,000 — a lifetime limit that many families may hit well before their child completes a four-year degree.

The cumulative effect is a bill that doesn’t offer solutions to the student debt crisis — it compounds it.

At a moment when the rising cost of education has already priced many Americans out of opportunity, this bill would take away key tools designed to soften the blow. And for the millions of borrowers who have already enrolled in forgiveness plans, it would pull the rug out from under them.

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— Aaron