Thousands Of ‘Sweet V. McMahon’ Class Members Notified Their Student Loans Will Be Discharged – AfroTech

Nearly 30,000 student loan borrowers will be granted relief.

A class action lawsuit, Sweet v. Cardona, was filed in 2019 against the Department of Education, alleging that thousands of borrower defense applications had been stalled for years without clarity on a decision, according to a blog post from Tate Law. Borrower defense outcomes typically mean that borrowers should not have to repay a loan as a result of deception or misrepresentation by a school, reports Project on Predatory Student Lending, the legal organization representing the class action members in the case. 

“It is also a critical safeguard for the taxpayer investment in higher education,” Project on Predatory Student Lending said on its website.

Qualifying class members are post-class applicants who attended a school that is not on the case’s original Exhibit C list (a list of 151 schools identified for misconduct by the Education Department). They must also have submitted a borrower defense application between June 23 and Nov. 15, 2022, per Tate Law.

In 2022, a settlement was reached that required the Education Department to either discharge the loans or set decision deadlines for three borrower groups, according to the outlet. Original class members received automatic full settlement relief. The decision deadline for Post-class Exhibit C applicants was Jan. 28, 2026. The deadline was not met, and automatic relief was triggered with notices going out on March 30, 2026. 

For the last group, Post-class non-Exhibit C applicants, the deadline was April 15, 2026, and the Education Department also did not respond. So, qualifying class action members can now receive automatic full settlement relief, Tate Law reports.

Notifications were issued to qualifying class members during the week of June 15, 2026.

“As some post-class members have started to see their loans being discharged, others have reported seeing unexpected changes to their balances,” Project on Predatory Student Lending said on its website. “This is a normal part of the discharge process. As the Department of Education and its servicers unwind your loans, your balance may fluctuate. This is a good sign: it means your discharge is in process. Your relief is still on track to be delivered within a year from the date on your notice of relief.”

It is recommended that class action members check their spam or junk folders if they have not received a notification from [email protected]. They can also email [email protected] and copy [email protected], providing their name, email, borrower defense number, and application date.