Trump's education secretary befriends student loan shark.
Answer:
Betsy DeVos. She’s Donald Trump’s multi-billionaire education secretary, who
hates public education and loves the plutocratic idea of corporate rule over
democracy.
DeVos
is so bad that she’s winning the contest for worst member of Trump’s cabinet —
a little like winning the title of ugliest toad in the swamp. She’s been a
shameless shill for one of the ugliest parts of the financial services
industry: the Wall Street-backed network of for-profit colleges, rip-off
lenders, and ruthless collection agencies.
Some
5 million students — largely single moms, veterans, and other low-income people
— have been forced to default on their student loan debt. They’ve had their
credit ratings and job improvement prospects destroyed by this profiteering
private education system that DeVos carelessly promotes.
Her
latest favor for the industry was to assert unilaterally that her agency can
pre-empt any state laws designed to stop the blatant lies and abuses of this
predatory network of corporate education.
Her bureaucratic claim is that state efforts to protect student borrowers undermine the “uniform administration” of student loans.
Her bureaucratic claim is that state efforts to protect student borrowers undermine the “uniform administration” of student loans.
In
her shriveled world of laissez-fairyland values, you see, the uniform gouging
of students trumps such basic human values as economic fairness and social
justice.
Heavens
to Betsy, what’s wrong with this lady?
Our
nation’s student loan debt has ballooned to $1.4 trillion, threatening to blow
another big hole in our economy, yet she’s conspiring in her department’s back
rooms to enrich Wall Street’s fast-buck educational exploiters at the expense
of students, taxpayers, and the public interest.
DeVos
is the one who needs an education — both in economics and ethics.
OtherWords
columnist Jim Hightower is a radio commentator, writer, public speaker, and
editor of the populist newsletter, The Hightower Lowdown. Distributed by
OtherWords.org.