DOE prioritize illegal immigrant students over citizens creating a backlog

[lfromnj]

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/13/us/politics/fafsa-college-admissions.html

“It’s agonizing,” said Andrea, 17, who asked to be identified by her first name to protect her parents, who immigrated to the United States from Mexico and are undocumented. “It’s deeper than a form. It’s our futures.”

Her case collided with perhaps the most pernicious flaw in the rollout: The new form froze out applicants who could not provide a social security number for themselves or their parent or caregiver, something that had not been an issue with the old form.

To get students with missing social security data approved, the Education Department asked applicants like Andrea to submit by email photographs of a driver’s license, identity card or other documents that would verify their identity. As the department prepared to announce last week that the social security number issue had been resolved, officials realized that the inbox, and its 70,000 emails, had gone untouched.

That prompted Mr. Cordray to assemble emergency teams of volunteers to work overtime to blast through the backlog.

Because of the delays in the FAFSA rollout, schools do not have the information they need from the government to assemble financial aid offers. Students have had to postpone decisions about where to attend college because they have no idea how much aid they will receive.

Many schools are pushing back their enrollment deadlines to give students more time to figure out their finances, throwing college budgets and wait lists into chaos.

Edit: I think the specific student in this article may have been a natural born citizen but others included were certainly not citizens.

[Horus]

Completely unacceptable. Undocumented status should not be rewarded.

[jojoju1998]

Cordray huh ? Interesting. I remember reading about this guy somewhere...

[OSR stands with Israel]

And democrats claim the problem is the lack of new Legislation rather than laws not being enforced

[jojoju1998]

And democrats claim the problem is the lack of new Legislation rather than laws not being enforced

Well if you want my hot take of the year, and I will probably get downvoted for this.

No illegal migrant should receive any government services period. And by the way, we should also consider restricting legal migration as well.

Hot take ? Sure. But I'm probably one of the few democrats here who takes a conservative position on immigration.



Immigration is not a right end of story. It's granted by the citizens of the country.

[quesaisje]

The angle emphasized in the headline of this thread drastically understates how comprehensive this failure is. This is like the story of Healthcare.gov's botched launch all over again:

Although the previous FAFSA form was long and complex, seniors at Andrea’s school managed to fill out their forms without much incident in previous years. KIPP Colorado, part of a network of public charter schools with some of the highest college acceptance rates for low-income students in the country, holds an annual FAFSA night, when families gather to complete the form together.

This year, only about 20 percent of the students at FAFSA night were able to complete the form — a huge change from previous years, school officials said.

The picture is also one of an administration in denial:

On Feb. 13, Miguel A. Cardona, the education secretary, told reporters that once the technical problems were cleared, FAFSA would be a “15-minute process” and a “net win” for students and schools.

A week later, at a staff meeting, Mr. Cordray had a different assessment: “It’s really bad,” he said, according to people who heard the remarks. “It may get worse.”

When you're describing a project as "a top priority at the highest levels" and you can't execute, you are in a crisis of competence.

[GeneralMacArthur]

her parents, who immigrated to the United States from Mexico and are undocumented

Oh, her parents just didn't get documented after they immigrated?  Like they're just not in the system?  Doesn't seem like it should be a big deal, but why don't they just visit their local DHS bureau and get that sorted out?

[All Along The Watchtower]

The title of this thread is misleading at best and deliberately inflammatory. And the article is about an urgent issue so that makes the thread title all the more infuriating.

[All Along The Watchtower]

Anyway, something to actually get mad about:

Some Education Department officials privately complained that the contractor hired to build the new FAFSA platform was missing deadlines, according to two people familiar with the concerns. They spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations.

The company, General Dynamics Information Technology, was one of the contractors involved in the debacle of HealthCare.gov — an Obama-era online insurance marketplace that had a notoriously rough rollout in 2013.

Constantly rewarding failure.

[dead0man]

Anyway, something to actually get mad about:

Some Education Department officials privately complained that the contractor hired to build the new FAFSA platform was missing deadlines, according to two people familiar with the concerns. They spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations.

The company, General Dynamics Information Technology, was one of the contractors involved in the debacle of HealthCare.gov — an Obama-era online insurance marketplace that had a notoriously rough rollout in 2013.

Constantly rewarding failure.

the American voter's moto

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

And democrats claim the problem is the lack of new Legislation rather than laws not being enforced

Well if you want my hot take of the year, and I will probably get downvoted for this.

No illegal migrant should receive any government services period. And by the way, we should also consider restricting legal migration as well.

Hot take ? Sure. But I'm probably one of the few democrats here who takes a conservative position on immigration.



Immigration is not a right end of story. It's granted by the citizens of the country.

I agree with the last part (although I think there is also a case for a moral and practical responsibility to help our fellow human beings), but the rest is flawed.

So long as there is a demand for illegal labor, there will be illegal labor. If you want to go after the demand, you need to punish those who directly profit from it (such as RepublicanMAGA Leader Donald Trump), and Americans as a whole need to wean themselves away from an economy gains significant benefits from illegal labor.

And if you treat illegal laborers as the problem, while ignoring those who abuse and profit from them, what you're doing is building a powerless underclass who will be used against citizen labor by the wealthiest. You send the kids of illegal laborers to school and provide their parents with public services not because it is a legal obligation, but because it is worse for everyone if you don't.

[All Along The Watchtower]

Anyway, something to actually get mad about:

Some Education Department officials privately complained that the contractor hired to build the new FAFSA platform was missing deadlines, according to two people familiar with the concerns. They spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations.

The company, General Dynamics Information Technology, was one of the contractors involved in the debacle of HealthCare.gov — an Obama-era online insurance marketplace that had a notoriously rough rollout in 2013.

Constantly rewarding failure.

the American voter's moto

But enough about the 2024 presidential primaries—wrong subforum

[All Along The Watchtower]

And democrats claim the problem is the lack of new Legislation rather than laws not being enforced

Well if you want my hot take of the year, and I will probably get downvoted for this.

No illegal migrant should receive any government services period. And by the way, we should also consider restricting legal migration as well.

Hot take ? Sure. But I'm probably one of the few democrats here who takes a conservative position on immigration.



Immigration is not a right end of story. It's granted by the citizens of the country.

I agree with the last part (although I think there is also a case for a moral and practical responsibility to help our fellow human beings), but the rest is flawed.

So long as there is a demand for illegal labor, there will be illegal labor. If you want to go after the demand, you need to punish those who directly profit from it (such as RepublicanMAGA Leader Donald Trump), and Americans as a whole need to wean themselves away from an economy gains significant benefits from illegal labor.

And if you treat illegal laborers as the problem, while ignoring those who abuse and profit from them, what you're doing is building a powerless underclass who will be used against citizen labor by the wealthiest.

Well yeah, the whole point of making it harder to immigrate legally, and setting up a massive state apparatus to deport people is to make it harder for say, farm workers to organize for better pay and conditions. Holding the threat of deportation over someone’s head is a good way to keep them in line.