At EdTrust, we believe that education is not just a pathway to opportunity — it is a civil right. Yesterday, I had the opportunity to testify before U.S. Senators Mazie K. Hirono (D-HI) and Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), along with a few other higher education advocates about the growing barriers students face in accessing and affording college, the real impact of the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” (OBBBA), and the Trump administration’s proposed FY26 federal budget on students. Since January, the Trump administration, along with allies in Congress, have waged an unrelenting campaign to reshape higher education through a series of harmful policies, including congressional legislation, draconian budget proposals, and executive orders. From freezing grant funds to the dismantling of programs that help working- and middle-class families afford college, these cuts threaten to shut the doors of opportunity for millions of students, especially those from low-income backgrounds and communities of color.

Students of color now make up 45% of enrolled college students. Dismantling the programs and services that support their academic success and wellbeing and cutting off the path to higher education will only deepen racial and economic inequities, widen achievement gaps, and weaken the nation’s workforce.

During the hearing, I heard directly from students and borrowers — most of whom were the first in their family to attend college — who wondered how they would pay off their student loans. Among them was Mary, who, after 10 years of teaching, is still waiting back to hear if her Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) that she was promised when entering the teaching workforce would go into effect. But her calls for help go unanswered by a hollowed-out agency that is supposed to be there to help.

The proposed federal budget cuts and policy changes in OBBBA further exacerbate affordability challenges by reducing access to financial aid and increasing borrowing costs for low-income students. This is part of what we at EdTrust call the Great American Heist: policies that divert resources away from students and families, while forcing them to shoulder higher costs and rendering college a place for the wealthy, not the everyday student who’s trying to achieve the American Dream. And for students of color, the hurdles just got higher.

The recent termination last week of $350 million in Title III and Title V grants for minority-serving Institutions — including Hispanic-Serving Institutions, Predominantly Black institutions, Alaska Native and Native Hawaiian-serving institutions, Asian American and Native American Pacific Islander-serving institutions, and more — is going to impact millions of low-income students and students of color.

That action follows the delayed release of Child Care Access Means Parents in School (CCAMPIS) program funds that support student-parents; the wholesale destruction of the Institute of Education Sciences; the withholding of essential funding for programs that improve educational outcomes for low-income, rural, and first-generation students, including the Postsecondary Student Success Grant (PSSG) program and TRIO, which is instrumental in helping transition students to college starting in middle school. The unilateral termination of funds to support teacher preparation is also egregious. These actions weaken colleges’ ability to recruit, enroll, and support students, while undermining academic freedom and efforts to close racial and economic achievement gaps.

Unpopular budget proposals in both the House of Representatives and the White House seek to make these funding freezes and cancellations permanent; they would further gut the Department of Education, including continuing to fire staff, and permanently terminate funding for many of the same programs they are crippling now. The Trump budget proposal would zero out all the programs previously mentioned, in addition to slashing the maximum Pell award, and implementing a 15% overall cut to the federal education budget. The House Labor-H bill takes a similar approach and has proposed double-digit percentage cuts to federal education spending for the last three years. These proposals don’t just cut numbers; they cut opportunity, they kill dreams, and threaten our economic growth.

Public polling repeatedly shows that Americans want more federal spending on education programs, not less. These cuts are widely out of touch with the current realities of today’s students and must be rejected. Budget negotiations should align to the parameters set by the bipartisan Senate Labor-H bill that came out earlier this summer.

In addition to these funding restrictions, the Trump administration is embarking on rulemaking processes to implement new higher education policy contained within OBBBA passed this summer. Changes to student loan repayment will increase monthly payments for the majority of borrowers, placing more financial strain upon them and increasing the risk of default, especially for lower-income borrowers. Furthermore, the OBBBA has weakened important borrower protections that protected millions of students from predatory institutions and practices. I live and breathe higher education policy, and even I’m confused at times—because it’s designed to be confusing. I can only imagine how a young student wanting to attend college, wondering if they can afford it, feels.

What’s more, the new income-based repayment terms mean very few people will ever achieve loan forgiveness, Instead, they will be forced to make several years’ worth of additional payments versus previous plans. Students will be forced to take out riskier loans from private banks with more onerous terms, and some students will forgo graduate education altogether. These changes will result in fewer students moving into fields of specific national need, like various medical professions or teaching — which in turn will hurt our nation’s economy. These policies don’t result in fiscal responsibility, but in generational theft.

Finally, the Trump administration has acted in unprecedented and extremely concerning ways. They have acted to leverage federal research grants via an opaque taskforce operating outside of the parameters of the adjudication process laid out in the Civil Rights Act to undermine academic freedom via onerous settlements. They are also overinterpreting the Supreme Court ruling banning race-conscious college admissions to dramatically burden the recruitment of Black and Latino students, especially those who are undocumented, into higher education. Students of color now make up roughly 45% of student enrollment in colleges and universities. Dismantling the programs and services that support their academic success and wellbeing will only deepen racial and economic inequities, widen achievement gaps, and weaken the nation’s workforce.

We cannot allow these policies to continue unchecked. At EdTrust, we remain committed to amplifying student voices, holding policymakers accountable, and fighting for an education system where every student has the opportunity to succeed, and we stand in opposition to the policies of an administration that seeks to create a system that erects barriers to achievement for millions of students, particularly those most underserved. We also urge leaders to continue the work of promoting popular solutions for affordable and accessible higher education. Students deserve a higher ed system that prepares them for the future, for the workforce, enables them to contribute to their communities and achieve their dreams. The time to act is now, because every rollback and cut closes more doors for students who only want — and deserve — better for themselves and their families.