Former Lobbyist With For-Profit Colleges Quits Department Of Education

[DonViejo]

Source: National Memo



Former Lobbyist With For-Profit Colleges Quits Education Department

Under fire from Sen. Elizabeth Warren, Taylor Hansen quit the department three days after ProPublica revealed his hiring.

by Annie Waldman
March 21, 2017 10:59 pm

A former lobbyist for an association of for-profit colleges resigned last Friday from the Department of Education, where he had worked for about a month.

As ProPublica reported last week, the Trump administration had hired Taylor Hansen to join the department’s “beachhead” team, a group of temporary hires who do not require approval from the U.S. Senate for their appointments.

On the day Hansen resigned, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., sent a letter to Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos, citing ProPublica’s reporting and requesting more information on Hansen’s role.

“Mr. Hansen’s recent employment history clearly calls into question his impartiality in dealing with higher education issues at the Department of Education, and raises alarming conflicts of interest concerns,” she wrote.

Read more: http://www.nationalmemo.com/lobbyist-quits-department-education

[58Sunliner]

1. What other rats are in the woodwork due to temporary hires?

[mahatmakanejeeves]

2. Some background:

Elizabeth Warren questions the hiring of for profit college officials at the Education Department

By Danielle Douglas-Gabrielle March 20

For-Profit Colleges Gain Beachhead in Trump Administration

Taylor Hansen lobbied to weaken regulation of for-profit colleges. Since he joined the Education Department, it’s started doing just that.

by Annie Waldman
ProPublica, March 14, 2017, 8 a.m.

Until June 2016, Taylor Hansen lobbied for the largest trade group of for-profit colleges. At the forefront of its agenda: eliminating a rule known as “gainful employment,” which can take away federal funding from for-profit colleges if their graduates fail to earn enough to repay student loans.

Last week, that goal started to become a reality. The U.S. Department of Education delayed the deadline for colleges to comply with certain provisions of gainful employment, saying it plans to review the rule.

By then, Hansen was watching from the inside, benefiting from the Trump administration’s ethics policies that allow former lobbyists to work for agencies they have recently tried to influence. He told ProPublica that, about a month ago, the Trump administration hired him to join the Education Department’s “beachhead” team. It’s a group of temporary employees, often with political connections, who do not require U.S. Senate approval for their appointments.

Hansen said that he isn’t working on gainful employment regulations. Still, his hiring shows how closely the Trump administration is in sync with the for-profit education industry, which has long been criticized for loading students with debt that they struggle to pay off. The sector’s market value and enrollment plunged under the Obama administration, which instituted the gainful employment rule, and chains such as Corinthian Colleges and ITT Educational Services shut down. Now, it anticipates a resurgence under President Donald Trump.
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Annie Waldman is a reporter covering education. She recently graduated with honors from the dual masters program at Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs and the School of Journalism.
@AnnieWaldman

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[58Sunliner]

3. Thanks.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

4. About the "beachhead teams":

ProPublica has been working overtime on this issue. Hats off to them.

ProPublica builds list of officials sent into Federal agencies as "beachhead teams."