Chair Cassidy Releases Historic HELP Committee Reconciliation Bill Text, Fixing America’s Broken Higher Education System

WASHINGTON – Today, U.S. Senator Bill Cassidy, M.D. (R-LA), chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee, released historic legislation to fix the broken higher education system that continues to fail students and trap them in a cycle of overwhelming college debt. 

“American higher education has lost its purpose. Students are graduating with degrees that won’t get them a job and insurmountable debt that they can’t pay back,” said Dr. Cassidy.  

“We need to fix our broken higher education system, so it prioritizes student success and ensures Americans have the skills to compete in a 21^st century economy. President Trump and Senate Republicans are focused on delivering results for American families and this bill does just that,” continued Dr. Cassidy. “While Biden and Democrats unfairly attempted to shift student debt onto taxpayers that chose not to go to college, Republicans are taking on the root causes of the student debt crisis to lower the cost of tuition and improve Americans’ access to opportunities that set them up for success.” 

Key Wins for Students and Taxpayers

• Makes higher education more affordable by eliminating inflationary loan programs that have resulted in higher tuition costs.  

• Prevents taxpayer-subsidized loans for degrees that leave students worse off than if they never went to college. 

• Ends Biden’s student loan schemes that transfer debt onto the 87 percent of Americans who chose to not go to college or already paid off their loans. Also prevents future Democrat administrations from implementing schemes. 

• Ensures low-income Americans can access higher education by strengthening Pell Grants and addressing the program’s budget shortfall. As it currently stands, the Pell Grant program faces a mounting budget shortfall that threatens its future. 

• Increases access to career or technical-based education for low-income students by establishing Workforce Pell Grants. This is crucial to achieving President Trump’s goal of bringing skilled jobs back to America from China and Mexico. 

• Saves American taxpayers at least $300 billion.

In addition to fixing America’s education system, this legislation decreases health insurance premiums for patients by addressing silver loading by insurance companies. 

Click here for the full bill text.  

Click here for the section-by-section.

Click here for the one-pager.

###

For all news and updates from HELP Republicans, visit our website or Twitter at @GOPHELP. Click here to unsubscribe.