No Aid for Ghost Students Act of 2026

Floor Speech

Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to H.R. 7892, the so-called No Aid for Ghost Students Act.

Let me say at the outset that protecting taxpayer dollars and preventing fraud in our student Federal aid program is always a good idea. As stewards of public funds, we should all agree that fraud should be identified, investigated, and stopped, but this bill is not about a thoughtful, evidence-based solution as its supporters claim.

The bill would direct the Department of Education to create an identity fraud detection system within the Free Application for Federal Student Aid process and authorize the Department to open accelerated program reviews against colleges.

Mr. Speaker, I have got to point out that the Department of Education just recently, this past April, launched a new identity fraud detection system as part of the FAFSA process. That system is still being tested, and Congress has not seen any meaningful evidence about its effectiveness or its impact upon students. Yet, this legislation would rush to codify requirements and penalties before we know whether the Department's current efforts are even working.

Federal student aid helps nearly 13 million students every year who are pursuing higher education and economic opportunity. However, the bill's creation of vague enforcement standards and punitive mandates, without clear guidance for students and institutions, risk making it harder for legitimate students to access the aid they need to attend colleges.

For example, we don't have evaluations on the effect this bill may have on legitimate students who are incorrectly flagged as suspicious. The bill prohibits colleges from distributing funds to those students until the suspicion is cleared up. These students could face hardships obtaining housing, transportation, or even buying books for who knows how long.

Mr. Speaker, we should allow the Department's new antifraud system to operate and wait for the Department to evaluate the results. The Department should work with colleges, financial aid administrators, and fraud experts to determine what additional tools and guardrails may be necessary. Codifying this new system without assessing its effectiveness just doesn't make any sense.

Moreover, H.R. 7892 could reasonably be viewed as part of a broader strategy to weaponize student aid. The Trump administration has issued numerous threats and made efforts to withhold title IV funding as a weapon to enforce ideological control over educational institutions.

Already, this administration has rewritten the accreditation handbook, threatened funding to select institutions that violate its legally dubious executive orders, and embedded ideological conditions into annual participation agreements.

The bill would give the administration another tool to further target colleges by allowing the Department to initiate and conduct program reviews based on little evidence. In fact, during the committee's debate on the bill, the committee Democrats sought to have a clear definition of what ``reasonable suspicion of identity fraud'' actually means in the legislation.

Regrettably, the bill has made its way to the floor without addressing this concern. As a result, the vague language in the bill would enable the Trump administration and future administrations to weaponize fraud investigations to target certain colleges or States.

Fraud prevention and student access to affordable college education are not competing goals. We can achieve both. Unfortunately, this bill does not strike that balance.

For that reason, I urge my colleagues to vote ``no,'' and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record a letter in opposition to the bill from the American Federation of Teachers. AFT, June 3, 2026. House of Representatives, Washington, DC.

Dear Representative: I write on behalf of the AFT's 1.8 million members working in education, healthcare and public services. Our members decry fraud; we fight for federal funding for the work we do, and none of us wants that funding diverted for corrupt or fraudulent purposes. We write in opposition to three bills on the House floor this week because they are about weaponizing the federal government against states and institutions of higher education the Trump administration views as political enemies. The AFT supports efforts to address fraud where it exists, but these bills do not do that. Instead, they would harm marginalized households, create significant administrative barriers, and discourage eligible people from seeking assistance.

H.R. 7726, the Stop Child Care Scams Act of 2026; H.R. 7892, the No Aid for Ghost Students Act of 2026; and H.R. 8872, the Preventing Waste, Fraud, and Abuse in TANF Act simply give additional authority to an administration that makes a habit of weaponizing charges of fraud in federal healthcare, childcare and higher education programs by cutting research grants, targeting free speech and restricting classroom materials.

For example, H.R. 7892, the No Aid for Ghost Students Act, is seemingly about cracking down on the real concern about fraud in the federal financial aid system. However, according to the secretary of education's own recent congressional testimony, that fraud is already being successfully addressed with existing tools at the Department of Education's disposal. The main impact of this bill would be to provide the secretary with a wide-ranging authority to subject colleges to additional review for failing to meet vague and ill-defined metrics around ``suspected fraud.''

Similarly, H.R. 7726, the Stop Child Care Scams Act, and H.R. 8872, the Preventing Waste, Fraud and Abuse in TANF Act, would add additional layers of red tape to the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program and childcare programs in states, while granting sweeping powers to administration officials to withhold that funding, without meaningfully addressing fraud. We've seen this administration's playbook in Minnesota, Maine, California and elsewhere; fraud is simply a smokescreen to attack Americans who are not politically aligned with the president.

These bills would further empower the administration to use accusations of fraud to attack perceived political enemies. The Trump administration has already withheld federal funding for ``blue'' states on allegations of fraud--ironically at the same time it has pardoned those convicted of stealing billions of dollars from Medicare and Medicaid and wiped out the imposed penalities on Mississippi for criminal TANF fund.

Meanwhile, Americans across the country are struggling to pay their bills, and everyday costs continue to rise. Congress should be focused on helping Americans access affordable food and healthcare, not make the childcare affordability crisis worse or use access to Pell grants as a political cudgel. Congress must reject these bills that aim to weaponize federal funds and should instead turn its focus to helping students and families afford life's necessities.

Thank you for considering our views on this matter. Sincerely, Randi Weingarten, President, AFT.

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Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. It says, in part: ``H.R. 7892, the No Aid for Ghost Students Act, is seemingly about cracking down on the real concern about fraud in the Federal financial aid system. However, according to the Secretary of Education's own recent congressional testimony, that fraud is already being successfully addressed with existing tools at the Department of Education's disposal. The main impact of this bill would be to provide the Secretary with a wide- ranging authority to subject colleges to additional review for failing to meet vague and ill-defined metrics around `suspected fraud.' ''

Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record a link to another article titled: ``The Hidden Power Grab in `Fraud Prevention'--and the Students Who Will Pay,'' from the Alliance for Higher Education and The Hope Center: https://hope.temple.edu/newsroom/hope-blog/hidden-power-grab- fraud- prevention-students-who-will-pay.

It says, in part, ``The bill's operative trigger . . . `reasonable suspicion of identify fraud,' is a broad legalistic term with little history in Federal financial aid policy. This term has typically been used only when referring potential matters to the Department's inspector general, where facts and evidence could be carefully gathered by career employees with experience in fraud investigations. This bill radically expands the agency's powers to make the Secretary the judge, jury, and executioner.''

It goes on further to say that the reasonable suspicion standard ``should require articulable, credible grounds to believe fraud has occurred, not an unexamined `hunch.' It is also critical that such powers cannot be weaponized against perceived political enemies-- perhaps a State or college that isn't politically aligned with the administration.''

Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record another article that is titled: ``Stop Fraud, Not Students: A Balancing Act for Financial Aid Offices and Administrators,'' from the Institute for College Access and Success. [April 27, 2026] Stop Fraud, Not Students: A Balancing Act for Financial Aid Offices and Administrators (Author: Emmanuel Rodriguez)

AI-driven application fraud is rising fast, but without adequate staffing and resources, prevention efforts risk blocking the very students aid is meant to serve.

Applying for financial aid is one of the most critical actions a low-income student can take to make their postsecondary education a reality. Completing the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) unlocks federal, state, and institutional resources that can bring the coAts of college within reach. Each year, the U.S. Department of Education (the Department) selects millions of student applications for a taxpayer safeguard and compliance process known as verification. Financial aid verification is split into three main categories--V1, V4, and V5--all of which are used to confirm that the income, household size, and identity information reported by a student on their FAFSA is accurate. This process can involve submitting tax records, identification documents, or other materials to resolve potential discrepancies. While the goal is to ensure that limited financial aid resources are distributed appropriately, verification creates a real tension: trying to safeguard public taxpayer dollars without introducing delays, confusion, or additional barriers that disproportionately impact the students who can least afford them, and potentially pushing them out of the educational pipeline.

Across the nation, college and financial aid administrators have warned that the rate of financial aid fraud has surpassed anything they've seen in the past, with ``ghost students'' emerging as a major concern. These bad actors are using stolen or synthetic identities to apply for aid and enroll in colleges with no intent to attend, instead seeking to collect financial aid and then disappear. Community colleges, which often have more open-access admissions and higher volumes of aid applicants, have been disproportionately affected by this trend. While this problem has long existed, the use of advancing technology to scale fraudulent aid applications has surged as it facilitates mass enrollment and can even generate coursework that can appear legitimate.

This is not isolated to one or even a few states. In Minnesota, colleges flagged more than 7,000 fraudulent or suspicious applications in a single year. In Nevada, one college reported over $7 million lost in a single semester due to fraudulent enrollments. And nationally, federal investigators have examined more than $350 million in ghost student fraud cases over the past five years. Unfortunately, the most staggering numbers are coming out of California, where colleges have reported roughly 900,000 fraudulent college applications in 2024 and more than $11 million lost in aid. While the total money lost remains very small compared to total aid, the rise in this activity is swamping limited aid administration capacity and can undermine trust in the program for key stakeholders, including policymakers who allocate the funds for aid.

In response, both states and institutions are acting. Colleges are deploying AI-powered detection tools, implementing stricter identity verification, or front-loading identity verification through their application process, amongst other measures. At the federal level, the Department is reinstating fraud detection protocols, including identity screenings and cross-agency data checks. Even Congress has begun to respond through the recent introduction of the Student Aid Fraud Oversight and Accountability Act of 2026 (H.R. 7891), the No Aid for Ghost Students Act of 2026 (H.R. 7892), and the FAFSA Verification Efficiency Act (H.R. 7893). Taken together, these efforts signal a growing recognition that fraud prevention must be strengthened. But how it's done matters for students. A lot. The California Case Study

For the past few years, the California Community Colleges (CCC) have been fighting an uphill battle against ghost students who are getting their hands on federal, state, and even institutional aid by taking advantage of the community college mission to provide open access to all students no matter when they start their educational journey.

TICAS has learned from financial aid administrators that the AI tools they are using to combat this problem are getting better and increasing detection. Online verification platforms and methods have replaced paper-based systems, allowing students to more easily submit required documents rather than coming in person. And staff at many colleges are proactive in their student outreach to offer support in navigating this process, even with limited resources.

Compliance and protective measures taken by California's colleges, no matter how thoughtfully designed and implemented, are just one side of this equation. On the other side, we need to track and center the experiences of students with the processes--especially as the Department is stepping in by expanding V4/V5 verification rates. For undocumented students, students from mixed-status families, formerly incarcerated students, foster youth, and others who already navigate institutions with caution, being told ``show me your ID'' or ``come into the office to prove you're real and that you are as poor as you reported'' can feel threatening. Without careful communication, these processes can feel punitive, invasive, and in today's reality, connected to immigration enforcement or federal data sharing that students fear. This fear is not hypothetical, and addressing it will take time, intentionality, and both fiscal and human resources.

Yet, across California, financial aid offices are being asked to do more with less. Adding identity verification on top of their normal duties of helping students file a FAFSA or CADAA or navigate processes like Satisfactory Academic Progress and professional judgement requests are heavy lifts. The CCC system and its financial aid administrators cannot sufficiently carry out increased, more complex, and student- centered verification practices along with their other work without sufficient resources.

If California wants to protect taxpayer dollars as well as students' access to an affordable education, the state must adequately fund financial aid offices to do both well and in an equitable way. Widely supported budget requests reflect this reality, such as an existing ask for an additional $10 million ongoing CA Proposition 98 funds to support the Student Financial Aid Administration (SFAA), which many advocates support and the Chancellor's Office has uplifted. Alternatively, California could implement a reoccurring cost- of-living adjustment to the SFAA base or ensure they earmark a portion of any Student Support Block Grant investments for this purpose.

Regardless of the approach, California has the opportunity to create a national model for balancing program integrity with student access. To do so, it must begin with a sustained state investment in financial aid offices to augment resources that support vital counseling and advising, clear communication, and secure technology. Looking Ahead

As policymakers and institutions respond across the country, it's critical that they all intentionally balance program integrity with student access. TICAS offers the following high-level principles to help guide decision-makers grappling with how to address this issue:

Ensure all verification processes are clear, transparent, and student-centered, with strong communication to all affected parties about why verification is happening.

Center the experiences of students--particularly those from vulnerable populations--who may experience verification as confusing, intimidating, or even unsafe.

Prepare multilingual outreach materials for students and families whom English is a second language to clearly explain the reasons for verification, next steps, and other supports.

Avoid unnecessarily expanding verification requirements beyond the student applying for aid--especially towards dependents or family members.

Protect student privacy and data security, especially as new technologies like AI are introduced and used to mine or filter sensitive data.

Provide adequate funding and staffing so financial aid offices can have training to understand these processes and implement them effectively.

If colleges choose to build systems that front-load documentation and identity verification through their applications, invest in that infrastructure early and test it thoroughly to ensure it is as simple and easy as possible to complete.

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Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. It says, in part: ``While the goal is to ensure that limited financial aid resources are distributed appropriately, verification creates a real tension: trying to safeguard public taxpayer dollars without introducing delays, confusion, or additional barriers that disproportionately impact the students who can least afford them, and potentially pushing them out of the educational pipeline.''

Mr. Speaker, finally, I include in the Record an article from StateScoop with a letter from Al Sharpton of the National Action Network, outlining many issues involved in identity verification done by artificial intelligence. [From STATESCOOP, Aug. 1, 2024] New York lawmaker questions state's use of identity-verification vendor (By Keely Quinlan)

In a letter to the state chief information officer, New York state Sen. Jeremy Cooney raises concerns with the state's use of AI-powered software from the identity- verification firm Socure. The company says many of the claims are false.

In a letter penned this month to Dru Rai, New York state's chief information officer, state Sen. Jeremy Cooney raised concerns regarding Socure, a fraud prevention and identity verification firm used by the state, citing the vendor's data practices and how it uses artificial intelligence.

The letter from Cooney, dated July 10, asks Rai how the state's Office of Information Technology Services has vetted Socure, which in addition to more than 20 state government agencies and multiple federal agencies, provides New York state with identity verification services. In an interview with StateScoop, though, Socure executives said many of Cooney's claims are simply false and that he misunderstands how the company's technology works.

Socure's technology relies on AI and machine learning to analyze several thousand data points to predict fraudulent identity activity. For governments, it predicts fraud for resident services, such as by scanning benefits applications. Fraud is a growing concern for state agencies, which since the COVID-19 pandemic have seen heightened levels of fraud across many government functions.

Cooney, who also chairs the Senate Procurement and Contracts Committee, said how Socure obtains and uses those data points--many of which would be considered personally identifiable data--is concerning.

Referring to the company as a data broker, Cooney said the company ``collects, purchases and stores billions of data points, including sensitive personal identifiable information, on New Yorkers without their consent to confirm their identities.'' While noting that identity verification ``is critical for ensuring equitable access to public services,'' Cooney said that the potential risks associated with using AI include preventing people from accessing critical government services.

``Innovation should never come at the cost of good governance and transparency,'' Cooney wrote in an email to StateScoop. ``Given the widespread concerns around Socure's business practices and the growing recognition of AI's risks, it is important to scrutinize any work they are doing for New York state agencies. I deeply appreciate the hard work and ongoing efforts of the State CIO's office to make sure our state's digital systems grant every New Yorker secure, equitable access to state services and uphold personal privacy.''

In the letter, Cooney also asked Rai whether the state requires that Socure include a human review of algorithmic output to ensure it's accurate and not discriminatory, and whether the state has tested Socure's fraud prediction models for bias.

``Has the state confirmed whether Socure's practices fully comply with NY state privacy law, specifically related to its mass collection of sensitive PII, partnership with data brokers, and use of social media data?'' Cooney asked in the letter. `we are not a data broker'

Jordan Burris, vice president of public sector strategy for Socure and the former chief of staff in the White House's Office of the Federal CIO, told StateScoop that portions of the letter fundamentally misunderstand what the company does, noting that Socure is not a data broker. Additionally, New York state has yet to pass a comprehensive data privacy law that would legally define within the state what constitutes a data broker. Its data privacy act is still in committee for the second year in a row.

``We do not sell data to third parties, we do not use it for marketing. We do not use it to run a marketplace, offering online discounts for e-commerce, like other companies in the space,'' Burris told StateScoop. ``We are only focused on verifying identity and rooting out fraud, and ultimately, under looking at what is exactly New York State law today, we are not a data broker, and to suggest otherwise is simply false.''

Cooney's letter follows at least two other instances this year in which New York state leaders have levied concerns regarding Socure and its data practices. Rep. Ritchie Torres, D-N.Y., in February wrote a letter to Socure CEO Johnny Ayers over concerns that his company's digital identity verification software might lead to discrimination.

``You claim your product, `fuses personal identifiable information (PID validated by thousands of data sources' in order to prevent fraud,'' Torres' letter read. ``Companies' abuse of private data can also lead to the unwanted tracking and sale of people's sensitive health data, genetic information, religious participation, and location. Given the lack of transparency around your services, constituents in my district have expressed legitimate privacy concerns and demand to know how you source their data, how it is used, and whether it is equitable for all American communities.''

While Cooney's recent letter claims Torres' letter went unanswered, Socure told StateScoop it met with Torres' office to review some of its complaints. StateScoop contacted Torres' office for comment, but did not hear back before publication. data sources

In March, Rev. Al Sharpton of the National Action Network, wrote a letter to New York State Attorney General Letitia James citing concerns with Socure's lack of transparency regarding the types of data it uses to perform identity verification.

``Socure also collects data from thousands of data sources, including personally identifiable information (PII), without providing any meaningful transparency regarding how that data is acquired, stored, and used,'' Sharpton's letter read. ``Socure scrapes social media, utilizes geolocation technology, and deploys artificial intelligence technology to conduct its business. They have no help line, and people have no recourse should their identity be denied mistakenly. These practices have historically and consistently hurt marginalized communities.''

When asked how Socure obtains data to perform identity verification, Burris said the company buys and otherwise obtains data from a variety of public and private sources to ``bring in house.'' These sources include public records, mobile network operators--like Verizon and AT&T--and higher education institutions, Burris said. He added that Socure's data scientists evaluate the ``authoritativeness of that data.''

``I'm not looking to buy data for data's sake. I'm looking at data for the purpose of what we can do with it,'' Burris said. ``The only purpose for us having it is to help with identity verification in particular. . . . And then we even have a proprietary database that we've built of known fraudulent identity identities that we've identified over our 12-year existence.'' `pressure testing'

As far as concerns of effects on marginalized communities, Burris said the company is ``pressure testing'' its AI models by testing for bias across demographics like age, race, gender and other protected classes.

On the topic of human review in the identity verification process, Burris said ``humans are involved all throughout the process.''

``The question of are human reviewers evaluating every identity decision fundamentally misunderstands the challenges that exist with verifying identity today,'' Burris said. ``We are going backwards if we heavily rely on human reviews to verify identity. The cost is long wait times, backlogs and good people who ultimately will continue to be underserved.''

In an email, a spokesperson for the New York Office of Information Technology Services said: ``We take our responsibility to protect the privacy of every single resident accessing state programs or services very seriously, and have implemented the strongest possible security measures to ensure it.'' ____ Wednesday, May 13, 2026. From The Desk of Rev. Al Sharpton Hon. Elizabeth Warren, U.S. Senate, Washington, D.C. Hon. Richard Blumenthal, U.S. Senate, Washington, D.C. Hon. Tammy Duckworth, U.S. Senate, Washington, D.C. Hon. Mazie K. Hirono, U.S. Senate, Washington, D.C.

Dear Senators Warren, Blumenthal, Duckworth, and Hirono: I write in strong support of your May 4, 2026 letters to the heads of Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion regarding how Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) data is being incorporated into Americans' credit files. In your letters, you correctly observed that the credit reporting industry has been ``very secretive about its scoring models'' and that credit reporting companies ``are also now performing the functions of data harvesters themselves.'' The integration of a BNPL credit vendor like Qlarifi into a massive data aggregator and harvester like Socure, presents a new and dangerous threat to consumer data and fairness. I write to urge you to expand the scope of this inquiry to include Socure and Qlarifi, given that Socure is quietly building what amounts to a fourth credit bureau, one that sits entirely outside the regulatory perimeter you are working to hold to account.

In December 2025, Socure acquired Qlarifi and announced the creation of what it called ``the First Real-Time BNPL Credit System.'' Socure, via Qlarifi, now aggregates loan-level BNPL data on millions of American consumers, runs it through blackbox AI risk-scoring models, and sells the resulting credit determinations back into the lending ecosystem. It does this without the consumer notice, dispute, accuracy, or fairness obligations that the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) imposes on Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion. It is concerning for many consumers, particularly consumers of color, that a fourth consumer rating agency is being constructed in plain sight. Socure's business effectively provides the same function as a credit rating agency, coupled with an absence of accountability, along with a business model built on the very data harvesting practices your letters identified as a core consumer protection problem.

This matters profoundly for the communities I represent. BNPL is concentrated among consumers who already face structural barriers in the financial system. Black consumers are over twice as likely than White consumers to use BNPL products, and Hispanic consumers are about 91 percent more likely. As you note in your letters, even one misreported missed payment can ripple through a consumer's credit score and limit their access to a mortgage, an auto loan, an apartment, or even a checking account. When the data feeding those decisions flows through an unregulated AI scoring layer at Socure before it ever reaches a traditional bureau, or worse, when lenders bypass the bureaus entirely and rely on Socure's scores directly, the risk of digital redlining is no longer theoretical. It is being engineered into the architecture of consumer credit.

Your letters also flag a related dynamic that deserves to be drawn out more fully. As you observe, ``alternative data'' such as bank account cash flow is increasingly being collected on consumers, ``particularly for consumers with limited credit histories, which tend to be lower-income consumers.'' That observation cannot be separated from race. The CFPB has long documented that Black and Hispanic Americans are significantly overrepresented among the so- called ``credit invisible'' and consumers with limited credit files, the very population on which alternative data and AI- driven scoring are most aggressively deployed. The result is a two-tier system in which the consumers with the least margin for error are the ones whose creditworthiness is most likely to be determined by experimental, opaque, AI-driven inputs assembled from commercial data sources--the inputs Socure aggregates and sells. The Senators' question about alternative data is, in practice, also a question about racial equity in credit.

That brings me to the broader concern about racial bias inherent in AI and algorithmic decision-making systems, the kind often inherent in BNPL credit scoring, and of the kind Socure builds and sells. AI-driven risk models are only as fair as the data on which they are trained, and the commercial and alternative data underlying these systems systematically underrepresent and misrepresent communities of color. Independent researchers at Northeastern University have found that data broker records on White non-Hispanic Americans were 25 percent more likely to be accurate than records on Hispanic Americans, and that only 32 percent of Hispanic individuals under age 26 were correctly represented in those records at all. Because vendors like Socure, who are now providing credit scoring for BNPL companies, train their models on this same commercial data, those structural gaps are not corrected by the algorithm, they are encoded into it.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) has likewise documented disparities in credit underwriting and pricing outcomes for Black and Hispanic applicants, and has warned that algorithmic models present a serious challenge in identifying ``variables that may be proxies for prohibited bases'' of discrimination. Your letters to the bureaus end with Question 7, which asks whether each bureau has studied the impact of BNPL data on consumer credit scores. The more urgent question, and the one I respectfully urge you to add, is whether anyone, at any of these companies or at Socure, has studied the impact of BNPL credit reporting and alternative data inputs on consumers by race, ethnicity, age, and income.

Socure also collects data from thousands of sources, including personally identifiable information, social media activity, and geolocation data, without providing meaningful transparency about how that data is acquired, stored, combined, or used. Consumers have no recourse if they are wrongfully scored, flagged, or denied because of an inaccurate or biased record buried inside Socure's models. For a family already living paycheck to paycheck, a single algorithmic misclassification can be the difference between keeping the lights on and falling into crisis. A massive data aggregator must not be permitted to function as de facto credit reporting infrastructure without the corresponding obligations and oversight.

For these reasons, I respectfully urge you to:

Add Socure, the new owners of Qlarifi to the scope of your inquiry. Send a parallel information request to Socure regarding its acquisition of Qlarifi, the categories of consumer data it collects and aggregates, the BNPL providers and lenders that consume its scores, and whether and how it considers itself subject to the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) and the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (ECOA).

Press Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion specifically on Socure and Qlarifi. Ask each bureau whether it receives data from, sells data to, or competes with Socure's real-time BNPL credit product, and whether Qlarifi-sourced data is incorporated, directly or indirectly, into their tradelines or scoring inputs.

Examine whether Socure's real-time BNPL scoring product meets the statutory definition of a ``consumer reporting agency'' under the FCRA, and whether Qlarifi's pre- acquisition operations should have been regulated as such. If existing law does not clearly reach this conduct, that gap is itself a finding worth surfacing.

Expand Question 7 in your follow-up engagement with the bureaus to require demographic impact analysis. Ask whether the bureaus, FICO, VantageScore, or their BNPL data partners have tested how the incorporation of BNPL data affects credit scores by race, ethnicity, age, and income, and request that any such analyses be produced.

Request that Socure disclose any independent demographic audits of its risk-scoring products, and explain how its AI and machine-learning models are tested for disparate impact, the same standard the CFPB has urged on the rest of the credit ecosystem.

The fight against predatory lending has always been, at its core, a civil rights fight. Your letters of May 4 are exactly the kind of oversight this moment requires, and I am grateful for your leadership. I urge you to follow the data where it leads, past the three traditional bureaus and into the unregulated scoring layer being built around them. The American consumer cannot afford a fourth credit bureau that operates in the dark.

Thank you for your continued commitment to protecting American consumers and to ensuring that the financial system works fairly for every community. Sincerely, Reverend Al Sharpton, Founder and President, National Action Network.

Mr. Speaker, this debate is not about whether or not fraud should be stopped. Everybody agrees with that, like when Trump University paid $25 million to settle their fraud investigation. We shouldn't be debating whether or not fraud should be stopped. We should be debating the provisions of the bill, not the merits of the title.

The question before us is not whether or not we should try to reduce fraud, but whether or not Congress should codify into law a process that has barely begun to operate and whose effectiveness has not been evaluated, especially as it affects students who are incorrectly flagged under the bill. It doesn't add anything to what is already being done. It only codifies what is being done before the program can be evaluated.

We should not substitute politics for due diligence. We should wait for that evaluation. As I said in committee, I was willing to work in good faith to improve the legislation. Regrettably, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle chose not to consider the fixes needed to support students and colleges while also addressing the responsibility to defer fraud.

This bill circumvents deliberative processes, imposes new punitive requirements before we have the facts, and risks creating new barriers for students seeking an education. We should pursue smart enforcement, be flexible when honest mistakes occur, and be informed by evidence rather than assumptions.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to oppose the bill, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

The yeas and nays were ordered.

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