While other student loan servicers have engaged in forbearance steering and other predatory practices, Navient has a particularly disturbing history of abuse and misbehavior

• Senator Van Hollen co-sponsored S.Res. 46, introduced by Senator Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), requesting that the administration cancel up to $50,000 in federal student loan debt through executive authority and encouraging the administration, in taking such action, to ensure administrative debt cancellation helps close racial wealth gaps and avoids the bulk of Federal student loan debt cancellation benefits accruing to the wealthiest borrowers.
• Senator Van Hollen joined a letter, led by Senator Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii), to the Biden administration in support of the doubling the Pell Grant.
• Senator Van Hollen joined a letter, led by Senator Tim Kaine (D-Va.), urging Secretary Cardona to use administrative flexibilities to fix the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program.
• Senator Van Hollen joined a letter, led by Senator Warnock, requesting ED to continue suspending interest on federal student loans for the duration of the COVID-19 national emergency.
• Senator Van Hollen joined a letter by Senator Booker urging ED to continue to suspend wage garnishment and other forced collections of student loan borrowers in default for the duration of the COVID-19 public health emergency.
• Senator Van Hollen co-led a bicameral letter with Rep. John Garamendi (D-Calif.) and Senator Ben Cardin (D-Md.) to ED to allow Returned Peace Corps Volunteers to credit their full service overseas toward PSLF or Temporary Expanded Public Service Loan Forgiveness. Specifically, this letter requests that ED count months of service toward PSLF even for Volunteers whose federal student loans were in deferment bad credit car loans or forbearance status during their service.

For years, Navient engaged in widespread unfair and deceptive student loan servicing practices and abuses in originating predatory student loans while the Department of Education (ED) turned a blind eye

85 billion multi-state settlement against Navient for its decades-long record of cheating and misleading borrowers. ED has a responsibility to all borrowers harmed by Navient’s abusive practices and we urge you to move quickly to supplement the settlement against Navient with additional relief for borrowers.

The settlement, which was secured by a bipartisan group of 39 state attorneys general, follows dozens of lawsuits alleging that Navient deceptively steered distressed federal loan borrowers into costly long-term forbearances instead of informing them about the benefits of income-driven repayment plans, made predatory subprime loans to students attending for-profit schools and colleges…even though it knew that borrowers would be unable to repay the loans, and engaged in a variety of other unfair and deceptive servicing practices, including misallocating payments and asking delinquent borrowers to pay more than the amount necessary to bring their accounts current. Apart from being sued by the states, Navient has been cited by the Department of Justice, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and other federal agencies for failing to report and address borrower complaints while overcharging borrowers, servicemembers, and the federal government.

The settlement requires Navient to cancel $1.7 billion in delinquent private student loan debts and pay $95 million in restitution. While this agreement provides critical and long overdue relief to borrowers across the country, millions of Navient’s borrowers will not be eligible under the settlement terms, and those who are may not receive relief that provides appropriate compensation for the harms they suffered under Navient. Debt cancellation will primarily cover borrowers who hold subprime private student loans and meet additional eligibility requirements, including that the loans were disbursed between 2002 and 2014; have been delinquent for at least seven months; are within a statute of limitations period or still subject to credit reporting as of ; were used at certain for-profit institutions; that borrowers live in one of the 39 states that participated in the settlement; and have a mailing address on file with Navient as of . In total, about 66,000 borrowers 0.55% of all student loan borrowers whose loans were serviced by Navient will be eligible for loan forgiveness under the terms of the settlement.