A group of Republicans is fighting to end the Trump administration’s decision to cap loans for graduate nursing students, a move that sparked widespread anger across the profession.
The provision was laid out in President Donald Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” and set lifetime borrowing caps on student loans for graduate and professional degrees.
Nursing was left off the list of professional degrees deemed eligible to apply for the highest debt limits by the Department of Education, which was set at $200,000. Those pursuing graduate degrees in nursing are limited to borrowing a maximum of $100,000, which no longer covers the full cost of some advanced programs in the field.
The decision “threatened the very foundation of patient care” by limiting student nurses’ access to funding, nursing organizations warned.
GOP Rep. Mike Lawler of New York is supporting legislation with four other Republicans to add nursing to the Education Department’s list of “professional” degrees, along with occupational therapy, social work, audiology and physician assistant, which were also excluded, Politico reports.
There is “a very easy way to solve this,” Lawler told the outlet, whose allies include fellow Republican representatives, Jen Kiggans of Virginia, Don Bacon of Nebraska, Brian Fitzpatrick and Rob Bresnahan of Pennsylvania.
They were among 140 lawmakers to sign a bipartisan letter on December 12 urging the department to reconsider. “At a time when our nation is facing a health care shortage, especially in primary care, now is not the time to cut off the student pipeline to these programs,” the letter said.
Lawler said adding nursing to the list of professional degrees eligible for the higher funding was “vital.”
“I don’t think that this is that controversial,” the lawmaker told Politico.
Kiggans, a nurse practitioner and vice co-chair on the House nursing caucus, said she spoke to Education Undersecretary Nicholas Kent in November.
“I just really drove the point home that this is not inclusive of nurses,” she said of the call.
“It’s disrespectful to nurses,” Kiggans added. “And we have a nursing shortage.”
If the changes move forward with the cap for nursing students, the new measures are due to be implemented starting July 1, 2026.
Following backlash in late November to the decision, the Education Department published a “myth vs fact” news release and claimed “95 percent of nursing students borrow below the annual loan limit and therefore are not affected by the new caps.”
It also said the “professional degree” is an internal definition “used by the Department to distinguish among programs that qualify for higher loan limits, not a value judgement about the importance of programs.”
“Congress chose not to change the existing definition of professional student, but they can amend the law at any time, and the agency will issue responsive regulations,” Ellen Keast, the Education Department’s press secretary for higher education, said in a statement.
Nursing organizations have railed against the move.
“At a time when healthcare in our country faces a historic nurse shortage and rising demands, limiting nurses’ access to funding for graduate education threatens the very foundation of patient care," said Jennifer Mensik Kennedy, president of the American Nurses Association.
“Excluding nursing from the definition of professional degree programs disregards decades of progress toward parity across the health professions and contradicts the Department’s own acknowledgment that professional programs are those leading to licensure and direct practice,” the American Association of Colleges of Nursing said in a statement.
Mary Turner, president of National Nurses United, previously told The Independent that the Trump administration’s priorities were “at odds with the needs of nurses and patients.”
“If the Trump administration truly wanted to support nurses, it would be working to improve working conditions, expanding education opportunities, and ensuring patients can get health care,” Turner said. “Instead, this administration is stripping nurses of their union rights, making education harder to access, and cutting health care for those who need it most.”
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