Protecting Volunteer Firefighters and Emergency Responders Act -- Continued

Floor Speech

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I thank Senator Carper and Senator
Durbin, two of our most distinguished colleagues who have fought
ceaselessly for the interests of students and veterans. I am very proud
to be here with them today. I do have a very personal interest as the
dad of a veteran and also of a currently serving young man whom I hope
will be a veteran one day.

Nothing is more important than this issue of making sure we keep
faith with our veterans and protect them because the phenomena we have
described today often create incentives for schools to lure veterans
into education deals, and they are often education deals that fail
them, that don't make sense for them, that don't give them the
education and the qualifications they think they are going to receive.
So very often they are failed by these programs, and they fail to
complete their courses and leave with mountains of debt but no degree.

These kinds of abuses that bring us here today involve some for-
profit schools in effect scamming our Nation's veterans.

We all know that for-profit schools are prohibited from receiving
more than 90 percent of their total revenue from Federal student aid,
but, as my colleagues have so well stated, the Department of Defense
and Veterans' Administration education benefits are not counted toward
that 90 percent. That loophole causes the for-profits to target those
servicemembers and veterans, often with predatory marketing practices
that lure them into those deals that make no sense for them.

We need to change that law. We need to change the law so that DOD and
VA benefits count under the 90-percent cap on Federal revenue. That is
really our ultimate goal.

I thank the President for including such a provision in his budget
request for fiscal year 2016. I look forward to working with my
colleagues and with the President in moving that legislative effort
forward.

In the meantime, we need a more accurate picture of this problem
because when it comes to for-profit schools and veterans, there are
some things we definitely need to know and our veterans need to know.

Here is what we do know. We know there are a large number of for-
profit schools that would be in violation of the 90-10 rule if we made
this change today. In fact, a 2013 Department of Education analysis
identified 133 for-profit schools that would be in violation. We also
know that the current loophole in that 90-10 rule creates those
incentives for certain institutions to conduct aggressive, relentless,
often predatory recruitment of veterans.

What we lack and what we need is comprehensive, complete information
on the exact scope of the problem. That part should be easy. The
Department of Education already collects the information we are asking
them to publish. It is a simple task of publishing how much revenue
schools receive from all Federal education programs, including the DOD
and the VA. That would bring accuracy and transparency to the debate
over the 90-10 rule. Disclosure and transparency are part of the
battle. Most importantly, this information and these statistics would
provide veterans themselves and servicemembers better data and
information to make informed choices about higher education.

Let me briefly mention another tool that I think is very important
because it encourages veterans to make informed higher education
choices, and that is the VA's GI bill comparison tool. I am glad--and I
thank Secretary McDonald--the VA has launched this vitally important
resource for veterans in response to the President's Executive order,
which established principles of excellence for schools that serve
veterans. I also think Secretary McDonald can take steps to improve
this tool, specifically by adding a risk index that would highlight
unscrupulous bad actors in the industry.

As our Nation's veterans decide where to spend their taxpayer-funded
education benefits--their money but taxpayer funded--they deserve to
know if the school they are considering is under investigation for
deceptive practices, what its record is on this score, what its
graduates do, what the value is of education and courses there. They
deserve to know if the school they are considering has been placed on
heightened cash monitoring status, a specific status from the
Department of Education. They deserve to have this information. It is
vital not only to them but to their smart use of taxpayer dollars.

Let me finish by saying that for-profit schools have been problematic
in many ways. The Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions,
on which I served during my first 2 years, conducted an investigation.
I was very proud to be a part of the effort to reform for-profit
schools. Our former colleague Tom Harkin worked very hard on this
issue.

We should not tar every for-profit school with too broad a brush. We
should note improvements that have been made. This problem is discrete,
identifiable, critically important, and I thank my colleagues for
giving me the opportunity to talk about it and work with them on it.

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Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I would add one last note. My
colleague Senator Durbin has very appropriately mentioned the
Corinthian debacle. We should note that this debacle is not an innocent
failure. It is not a victimless debacle. Behind that staggering number
of $1.2 billion are thousands of real people with huge debt and no
value in the courses they have taken in terms of a degree that can give
them marketable qualifications. There are real-life stories of huge
debt, no degrees, and people who are tragically trapped in financial
situations really beyond their own fault because of this situation.

So that, too, is a phenomenon we need to keep in mind when we talk
about this 90-10 rule. Those veterans who are failed, who are marketed
to, who are lured into this system are often left in tragic situations
that they don't deserve and that they wouldn't have undertaken if they
had been well-informed, which is what ultimately this Nation owes them.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

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