Senators blame ‘inexcusable failure of leadership’ for Biden’s college aid fiasco

Republican senators excoriated the Biden administration Tuesday for wasting time on legally dubious student loan forgiveness schemes while ignoring the mismanaged college financial aid process that has left hundreds of thousands of students in the lurch.

The government uses the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, or FAFSA, to decide how much families can pay toward college and to help schools decide how much financial assistance to offer. The decision can affect whether a poor or middle-class student attends college.

The administration rolled out what was supposed to be a simplified system for this year, but students have struggled to complete applications and schools have complained that they are receiving junky federal data.

Completed applications are running about 30% behind last year, and schools are way off schedule telling students what sort of help they can expect. Many schools have pushed back their traditional Decision Day, when students commit, by as much as a month.

“This has been an unmitigated disaster caused by an inexcusable failure of leadership,” Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, West Virginia Republican, told Education Secretary Miguel Cardona on Tuesday.

Democrats also proclaimed themselves “troubled” and “deeply concerned” with the administration’s handling.

“The department has to get this right, and fast,” said Sen. Tammy Baldwin, Wisconsin Democrat.

Mr. Cardona insisted his department is working hard to resolve the problems.

“We’re doing everything every day to make it right,” he said. He said the department is in constant communication with colleges, is sponsoring clinics across the country for families to get assistance, and is offering webinars.

The bungle could have political implications. It hurts the same young voters Mr. Biden hopes to attract with his repeated attempts at student loan forgiveness.

One head has already rolled.

Richard Cordray, chief operating officer of FAFSA, has said he will step down in June.

Sen. Susan M. Collins, Maine Republican, said Mr. Cardona and his department owed students an apology.

“This was inexcusable,” she said. “This wasn’t something that was dropped on the department at the last moment. It goes back four years, so there was plenty of time to get this right.”

Mr. Cardona tepidly acknowledged the bungles and blamed “coding” problems. He told lawmakers that his department conducted preliminary tests but the system was riddled with errors when it went live.

“There’s no excuse. Our students deserve better,” he said. “This is going to have an impact for generations.”

Senators were not mollified.

“The problem is that the ineptitude here has real-life consequences,” Ms. Collins said.

Republicans said the department spent too much time focusing on the loans while allowing the problems within the financial aid system to fester.

“Instead of prioritizing this important work, the political leadership of the Department of Ed chose to spend time, resources and personnel to advance the administration’s priorities around canceling student debt,” said Ms. Capito. “That is indefensible.”

Congress ordered the Education Department to streamline FAFSA in December 2020 legislation.

Lawmakers said it was so complicated and time-consuming that some eligible students never applied. Mr. Cardona said he could relate to those students.

Despite three years of preparation time, the rollout has been rough.

It went live months later than planned and struggled to handle some types of applications, such as those from students whose parents are in the country illegally.

In March, the program acknowledged it would need to reprocess many applications because of bad data from a vendor. A week later, the Education Department said it discovered another error involving IRS data and would have to reprocess some applications.

The National College Attainment Network said FAFSA submissions, as of April 19, were running 23% behind last year and completions were 29% off the pace.

The FAFSA snafu is the latest in a string of high-profile setbacks for Mr. Cordray.

He used to run the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the “Wall Street cop” set up after the 2008 financial collapse. He created a constitutional showdown with the Trump administration when he tried to pick his successor, defying President Trump. The courts sided with Mr. Trump.

Mr. Cordray became the Democratic nominee for governor in Ohio in 2018 but lost to Republican Mike DeWine.