Biden Administration’s Overhaul of PSLF Program Includes Johnson and Courtney Bill for Active-Duty Military

Washington, D.C. – Today the U.S. Department of Education (ED) announced an overhaul of the federal Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program (PSLF). The changes included the Recognizing Military Service in PSLF Act (H.R. 3684), a bill introduced by U.S. Representatives Dusty Johnson (R-S.D.) and Joe Courtney (D-CT-02), to allow active-duty servicemembers to count months spent on active duty toward PSLF, even if the servicemember's loans were on a deferment or forbearance rather than in active repayment.

"Allowing all deployed servicemembers to receive credit toward student loan repayment is only fair," said Johnson. "I'm glad the administration has looked to our bill for this solution, and I thank Congressman Courtney for his leadership."

"For the 10,000 active-duty servicemembers who are deployed overseas at any given time while placing their student loans in military service deferment, these new changes mean that their full period of deployment will now be counted towards their student loan forgiveness," said Courtney. "Just this week, 60 Minutes reported that only 350 members of the armed services have been able to take advantage of PSLF so far—a minute fraction compared the 180,000 who are eligible. Our public service workers entered into an agreement where they were promised these benefits, and no one deserves it more than our uniformed, active-duty servicemembers deployed far away from home. This is a correction we've worked hard to bring about, and it couldn't have happened without the strong, consistent support of servicemembers and veterans in Connecticut and across the country."

Background:

Currently, servicemembers are eligible for PSLF, which means they can enroll in income-driven repayment plans that will result in student loan forgiveness after ten years of qualifying service. Servicemembers also have access to student loan deferment and forbearance periods during military deployments. These loan deferment and forbearance periods are intended to account for the unique financial impacts of deployment on a servicemember's family, but currently those periods do not count as PSLF qualifying payments—meaning that if a servicemember chooses to put their loans into deferment or forbearance during a deployment, they will need to complete a longer overall period of service before qualifying for student loan forgiveness.

Reps. Johnson and Courtney's bipartisan Recognizing Military Service in PSLF Act would count military student loan deferment or forbearance as qualifying payments to PSLF so that servicemembers who deploy have their full time of service appropriately counted towards their loan forgiveness. The bill would extend the new coverage to:

• Active-duty service members deployed overseas on a combat tour;
• Active-duty service members deployed away from their families and home station to support a Department of Defense mission;
• National Guard and Reserve members brought onto active duty orders for more than 30 days to support a federal mission, such as an overseas deployment or U.S. disaster relief;
• National Guard members brought on to state active duty orders to support a state mission, which includes those members who have been supporting the COVID-19 pandemic response.

Click here to read ED's full announcement.