WASHINGTON — Of the five minutes Rep. Randy Fine, R-Fla, had to question Department of Education Secretary Linda McMahon about the 2027 Department of Education budget, he spent four of them expressing his concerns about how a new rule creating a federal cap on student loans for nursing graduate students affected nursing shortages.
“Are you willing to work together to try to make sure that maybe we give a little bit less to the lawyers … and we make sure in these critical medical fields, where I believe [the loan cap] is going to do real damage, we can try to make sure we get the staff that we need?” Fine asked.
“Well, that rule is final,” McMahon said.
Fine wasn’t the first nor last to bring up the cap. During the hearing on May 14, representatives expressed bipartisan concerns about how the exclusion of graduate nursing degrees from a new federal “professional” classification impacted a growing nursing shortage in the U.S.
The “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” introduced the rule that subjected all graduate degrees to a new classification: “professional” or not. Students pursuing a graduate degree marked “professional” could receive $50,000 in federal loans annually. Meanwhile, students pursuing degrees not designated as “professional” were capped at $20,500 in federal loans per year.
Over the course of a graduate degree, “professional” programs’ federal loans are capped at an aggregate total of $200,000, while other programs are capped at $100,000.
As of May 1, following the DOE’s student loan provision negotiations, graduate nursing programs were officially excluded from the “professional” designation.
The programs listed as “professional” included pharmacy, dentistry, veterinary medicine, chiropractic, law, medicine, optometry, osteopathic medicine, podiatry, and theology, as well as “all programs that are adjacent to the 10 programs listed.” None of these adjacent programs included graduate nursing degrees.
The Education Department said in a Nov 24, 2025, press release that “the definition of a ‘professional degree’ is an internal definition used by the Department to distinguish among programs that qualify for higher loan limits, not a value judgment about the importance of programs.”
However, during the hearing, Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., said her home state had a projected shortage of 30,000 nurses over the next 4 years.
“Our nurses, obviously, are limited in their capacity,” Omar said. “They're overworked, and they're worried. So I know you said the decision is final, but I'm just trying to figure out, if you can answer, why did you move forward with an action that you know is going to be creating a problem or worsening a problem that already exists?”
McMahon said the caps were partly done to try to drive down the costs of graduate programs. She said that with the loan caps, colleges would reduce costs for graduate nurse programming.
“There are places to go and get these degrees that cost less,” McMahon said. “I really do believe, as market competition is available, you will see universities and colleges bring down these costs.”
McMahon said the enrollment rate drop was an incentive for colleges to lower their tuition.
But Rep. Lisa C. McClain, R-Mich., said it instead deters would-be nurses.
“I've been getting feedback quite heavily … to the contrary from both the hospitals and the schools, they see their enrollment rates going down for the graduate nursing programs, right? I'm not talking about the undergrads, but the graduate nursing programs. I don't know if there's something we can do to bridge the gap.” McClain said.
Omar asked how the caps would incentivize colleges to lower tuition rates, which McMahon said was already happening at the University of California, Irvine, and Purdue University in Indiana. When Omar asked what program colleges lowered tuition for, McMahon said they’d lowered business tuition.
“We're talking about nursing,” Omar said.
Rep. Donald Norcross, D-N.J., asked how the department chose the ten “professional” degrees, which McMahon said was “rule-making.”
“I get it's rule-making,” Norcross said. “What criteria did you use to make that list of ten?”
She offered no criteria but said the department spoke with lobbyists. She said the department “wanted to make sure that we weren't affecting a lot of professions that you know that were out there.”
The decision won’t affect undergraduate programs, but many states currently experience a shortage of graduate-level nurses, such as nurse anesthetists and advanced practice registered nurses.
According to the American Association of Colleges of Nursing, “Approximately 29,200 new APRNs, which are prepared in master’s and doctoral programs, will be needed each year through 2032 to meet the rising demand for primary and specialty care.”
By 2038, the Health Resources and Services Administration projected the U.S. would have a shortage of 141,160 nurse anesthetists.
Rep. Randy Fine, R-Fla, said he was concerned that nurse anesthetists’ degree programs qualify for the same level of government loans as registered nursing programs. Even though a certified registered nurse anesthetist needs a doctorate degree, which requires at least three years on top of a registered nurse degree.
“We've sort of taken all nurses, and we lumped them all together,” Fine said. “A registered nurse is super important as well. But, $100,000 for a registered nurse is probably not the same as $100,000 for the person who makes sure you don't die when you go under surgery.”
The American Nurses Association released a statement on Feb. 3, where it said it was “deeply concerned” about the decision.
In the statement, Jennifer Mensik Kennedy, president of the American Nurses Association, said the decision “sent an alarming message to nurses and the public.”
“The Department of Education’s reasoning distorts how nursing education, licensure, and practice work and, in doing so, sends an alarming message to nurses and to the public,” Kennedy said. “Excluding nursing from the professional degree category has the potential to put patient care at risk, especially in areas where nurses are the only healthcare providers in their communities. We urge the department to correct this proposal and explicitly include nursing as a professional degree before the rule is finalized.”
McMahon reiterated the ruling to withhold the “professional” label from graduate nursing degrees was final multiple times during the hearing, both to Republicans and Democrats, as they asked her to reconsider.
The rule will come into effect on July 1.
Omar said to McMahon that the decision made education less accessible.
“Your specific job is to try to make sure, as the head of the Department of Education, to make education accessible for Americans,” Omar said. “When you create policies that make education unreachable for Americans that want that education, you are failing at your job.”
Matthew Junkroski is a graduate student at Northwestern University.
U.S. President Donald Trump boards Air Force One on August 14, 2026 at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland. Trump is traveling to Long Island to tour law enforcement facilities in Nassau County and rally support for local Republican candidates ahead of the upcoming midterm elections
Travel Far Enough, You Meet Yourself
Is it possible that our President has simply not traveled enough?
Born and raised in Queens and attending Fordham University in the Bronx, Donald Trump has no record of traveling outside New York until he was over 20, when he transferred to a college in the neighboring state of Pennsylvania. Were his formative years amiss, then, in his learning about other places and other people?
Is his view akin to the famous New Yorker cover by Saul Steinberg, an illustration of the United States with New York City as the epicenter of the country and the Hudson River the border of the known world? We can now at least add Washington, D.C., and Mar-a-Lago to the map of “the realm.”
Our President has now traveled some, but what we recommend is another kind of travel. Not a state-sponsored trip or a venture to scout locations for future Trump Towers. This would be a genuine travel experience, enriching and eye-opening, showcasing other cultures and ways of living.
It will extend far beyond viewing military parades, hobnobbing with such “understanding” world leaders as Kim Jong Un, or taking tea with the King.
WHERE, then, should the President go? As Elon Musk’s Starship spacecraft is not yet ready to take passengers to Mars, perhaps he could explore our own vast country?
Maybe he could travel to “flyover country,” the farming states, where his ying-yanging tariffs and trade restrictions have played havoc with rural economies. Or possibly to California, number one in homeless U. S. citizens, and while there, regale homeless veterans (approximately 32,500 nationwide) with tales of his brave exploits invading and bombing foreign countries.
Or he might tour the Great Lakes, and rename the other four?
WHEN should he go? This will be tough, as he is very busy building his ballroom and renaming bodies of water.
How about a trip in early November, around the midterm elections? Despite the long-discredited accusation of widespread voter fraud, it would be reassuring to know he might be so caught up divvying out ladles of soup in a soup kitchen somewhere that he wouldn’t remember to deploy the military for “election security.”
HOW will he travel? He should definitely not take his Qatari-donated, newly renovated 747, especially after last time, when he had to be smuggled off clandestinely in a catering truck. It’s unlikely any traveling companions, like the Secretary of State or of the Treasury, are going to fall for the ruse a second time. Besides, we may need those people. No more decoys!
Perhaps the President could fly commercially, although this likely would expose him to undue suffering. Without gold bathroom fixtures and maple wood floors, the trip will be no “Luxury Experience.” If only he still had his “Trump Shuttle,” bought with a massive loan he later defaulted on, saying then, “I’m smart. I got out at a good time.”
Considering the potential pitfalls, maybe it’s best the President travel incognito, disguised perhaps as an elderly woman wearing a lot of bronzer.
Wherever, whenever, however: our President needs a vacation.
Moreover, we need a vacation from him.
If the President refuses our travel suggestions, here’s another idea:
Let’s get him a pet! He has never owned a pet. As we know with our children, pets teach essential life lessons: compassion and empathy; they instill a sense of responsibility. There is a well-established connection between those who can care for a pet and those who can care for people.
So, which pet should we choose? A puppy? A kitten? A boa constrictor?
Imagine, the President may even decide he likes having a pet. After all, what is more obedient than a well-trained dog, besides possibly the Cabinet? And what is more docile than a sweet kitten, other than plausibly the Supreme Court?
The President may even become more mellow with a pet afoot and less likely to slap tariffs on our allies, or attempt to annex our neighbors, or bully our Congress. (Realizing, of course, a bully requires active participation from the bullied to maintain his status.)
Maybe we should do both: get the President a pet and devise a travel plan for him. (Do you think we could possibly convince him to leave his phone at home?)
Let’s go for it! After all:
Travel far enough, you meet yourself. (David Mitchell)
And for our President, that would likely be the most profound discovery of all.
Amy Lockard is an Iowa resident who regularly contributes to regional newspapers and periodicals. She is working on the second of a four-book fictional series based on Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice."