Saddled with Student Loan Debt? Lawmakers Are Too.

America is drowning in student loan debt. By many metrics, the student loan debt crisis is the worst it has ever been. This is also true on Capitol Hill, where 59 members of Congress together owe millions of dollars — likely more student loan debt than any previous Congress, according to a NOTUS analysis of financial disclosures.

The most recent financial disclosures cover 2024, and liabilities are reported in ranges, so an exact, current amount cannot be calculated. But based on what information is available, the total student debt held by lawmakers is at least $3.4 million, and at most $8.3 million.

That’s a significant jump from 2020, when OpenSecrets reported that House and Senate members owed a maximum of $5.8 million in student debt.

This means many lawmakers are in the same position as millions of Americans, who together carried $1.66 trillion of student loan debt at the end of 2025. Members of Congress are in a position to address the crisis with legislation — but they can’t agree on how.

It’s unclear exactly what is driving the increased lawmaker debt, although lawmakers and experts theorized that it could be due to Congress getting younger, or the fact that lawmakers are more likely to have degrees in fields where education is increasingly expensive, such as law.

Newer members stand out: first-term Republican Del. Kimberly King-Hinds reported the most debt, between $300,003 and $750,000. King-Hinds said her student loan balance currently sits at $220,000 (the most recent filings cover calendar year 2024). In a statement to NOTUS, she wrote that student loans were the bridge to professional opportunities for her and many in her district, the Northern Mariana Islands.

“Accountability should extend not only to borrowers, but to institutions driving costs upward,” she said. “My experience is not unique, it reflects the reality facing millions of Americans, including those from small and remote communities, working to better themselves through education while managing the financial burden that comes with it.”

Some of Congress’ more seasoned members reported debt, too. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries reported between $15,001 and $50,000.

“I have student loan debt,” Republican Rep. David Schweikert, Joint Economic Committee chair, said.

Schweikert incurred the debt in 2004, according to disclosures, and owes between $15,001 and $50,000. He told NOTUS it was for graduate school.

“And I have never asked the government or you as a taxpayer…you know, I knew the deal I got, and I’m paying it,” he said.

Republicans tend to be advocates for personal responsibility when it comes to student loan debt repayment. Still, Schweikert and other Republicans acknowledged that the system is broken.

About 43 million Americans owe some student loans. More than a million borrowers are in default. And millions of people — nearly 10% of borrowers — are delinquent.

Schweikert said universities need to have more of a stake, pointing to research that suggests the students most likely to pay their debt back are the ones who graduate.

“So, that’s why there’s been such a fixation from Virginia Foxx on saying we need universities to have some skin in the game, so they fixate on how to get their populations to graduate because graduation is the ultimate secret for loan repayment,” he said, referring to his Republican colleague.

This differs from Republican talking points on the issue, which blame the universities but say the problem is the profitability of the degree programs.

Republican Rep. Chip Roy, who reported between $15,001 and $50,000 in student loan debt, said he thinks the federal government’s role in student lending should be scaled back. He also said universities should be “on the hook” for a student’s debt if they default on their loans after graduating.

“You want to get history professors trained? Fine. But you’re on the hook for making sure that loan gets paid back,” Roy said. “You don’t need to rack up $300,000 in loans to have somebody go out and make 28 grand.”

The sprawling tax and spending bill passed in 2024 made significant changes to the way the Department of Education administers student loans.

To be eligible for student loans in the first place, lenders must take into account the median earnings of a program’s graduates — though, according to the Brookings Institution’s Office of Economic Studies, that provision will impact roughly 1.8% of current students.

The bill also puts caps on federal Parent PLUS loans and graduate borrowing, which had previously been unlimited. The Department of Education’s Federal Student Aid office previously offered multiple income-based repayment plans — those have been consolidated into one Repayment Assistance Plan.

The changes are the most significant Congress has made in years and will go into effect this summer.

Andrew Gillen, a research fellow at the Cato Institute’s Center for Educational Freedom, described the changes in the bill as an effort to protect both borrowers and the government, which bleeds money on its student loan portfolio.

“You’ve got these horror stories of students ending up with just completely unaffordable debt, and so there was the desire to protect students from borrowing too much,” Gillen said. “But there was also the fact that the government was losing a lot of money.”

Projections from the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget suggest the federal government will lose 4 cents per dollar lent in 2026, down from 18 cents in 2025 — in large part due to the tax bill.

Still, no one NOTUS spoke to thinks the changes do enough to alleviate the crisis.

“The government needs to reduce the rates on student loan debt as well,” Rep. Nick Begich, a first-term Republican who reported between $25,001 and $65,000 of student loan debt, told NOTUS. “What we’ve seen is that the net earnings of student loan debt, in excess of our borrowing costs, becomes a hidden revenue generation for the federal government. In other words, we’re taxing students.”

Democrats accused the Trump administration and Republicans in Congress of making education less accessible and less affordable.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said in 2019 that it was easier for her “to become the youngest woman in American history elected to Congress” than to pay off her student loan debt, which she carries between $15,001 and $50,000 according to disclosures.

Ocasio-Cortez is one of many members of Congress who champion student debt relief. Former President Joe Biden attempted to deliver on this promise, temporarily halting student loan repayment for millions of Americans. But the effort was ultimately struck down by the courts, paving the way for the Trump administration to overhaul the system.

“I think that regardless of who in Congress has it or not, I think that we have to do a lot more to champion secondary education of all kinds,” Ocasio-Cortez told NOTUS. “And it’s not just about student loan forgiveness, but to me, it’s about driving down tuition, and that includes making public colleges and institutions tuition free.”

As Congress mulls a solution, some, including Alan Collinge, founder of Student Loan Justice, think the situation is unsalvageable — the debt far exceeds what many Americans are able to pay. As more and more people fall behind and refuse to pay, he’s predicting collapse.

“There’s no bringing back this lending system,” he said. “People are not going to magically, all of a sudden, start repaying their loans. People are done.”