Restoring Public Service Loan Forgiveness

Executive Order 14235 of March 7, 2025

Restoring Public Service Loan Forgiveness

By the authority vested in me as President by the
Constitution and the laws of the United States of
America, it is hereby ordered:

Section 1. Purpose. In 2007, the Congress established
the Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) Program to
encourage Americans to enter the public service sector
by promising to forgive their remaining student loans
after they completed 10 years of service in those jobs
while making 10 years of minimum payments.

The prior administration abused the PSLF Program
through a waiver process, using taxpayer funds to pay
off loans for employees still years away from the
statutorily required number of payments. Moreover,
instead of alleviating worker shortages in necessary
occupations, the PSLF Program has misdirected tax
dollars into activist organizations that not only fail
to serve the public interest, but actually harm our
national security and American values, sometimes
through criminal means. The PSLF Program also creates
perverse incentives that can increase the cost of
tuition, can load students in low-need majors with
unsustainable debt, and may push students into
organizations that hide under the umbrella of a non-
profit designation and degrade our national interest,
thus requiring additional Federal funding to correct
the negative societal effects caused by these
organizations' federally subsidized wrongdoing.

As President of the United States, I have a duty to
protect, preserve, and defend the Constitution and our
national security, which includes ending the
subsidization of illegal activities, including illegal
immigration, human smuggling, child trafficking,
pervasive damage to public property, and disruption of
the public order, which threaten the security and
stability of the United States. Accordingly, it is the
policy of my Administration that individuals employed
by organizations whose activities have a substantial
illegal purpose shall not be eligible for public
service loan forgiveness.

Sec. 2. Restoring Public Service Loan Forgiveness. The
Secretary of Education shall propose revisions to 34
CFR 685.219, Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program,
in coordination with the Secretary of the Treasury as
appropriate, that ensure the definition of “public
service” excludes organizations that engage in
activities that have a substantial illegal purpose,
including:

    (a) aiding or abetting violations of 8 U.S.C. 1325
or other Federal immigration laws;
    (b) supporting terrorism, including by facilitating
funding to, or the operations of, cartels designated as
Foreign Terrorist Organizations consistent with 8
U.S.C. 1189, or by engaging in violence for the purpose
of obstructing or influencing Federal Government
policy;
    (c) child abuse, including the chemical and
surgical castration or mutilation of children or the
trafficking of children to so-called transgender
sanctuary States for purposes of emancipation from
their lawful parents, in violation of applicable law;
    (d) engaging in a pattern of aiding and abetting
illegal discrimination; or
    (e) engaging in a pattern of violating State tort
laws, including laws against trespassing, disorderly
conduct, public nuisance, vandalism, and obstruction of
highways.

Sec. 3. General Provisions. (a) Nothing in this order
shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect:

(i) the authority granted by law to an executive department or agency, or
the head thereof; or

(ii) the functions of the Director of the Office of Management and Budget
relating to budgetary, administrative, or legislative proposals.

    (b) This order shall be implemented consistent with
applicable law and subject to the availability of
appropriations.
    (c) This order is not intended to, and does not,
create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural,
enforceable at law or in equity by any party against
the United States, its departments, agencies, or
entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any
other person.

    (Presidential Sig.)

THE WHITE HOUSE,

    March 7, 2025.