Today, Education and Workforce Committee Chairman Tim Walberg (R-MI) delivered the following statement, as prepared for delivery, at a markup of seven bills to strengthen literacy instruction, protect students, crack down on student aid fraud, and safeguard workers’ retirement savings:
"Good morning, and welcome to the Committee on Education and Workforce. Today we’ll mark up seven bills to strengthen literacy instruction, protect students, crack down on federal student aid fraud, and safeguard workers’ retirement savings.
"First is H.R. 7894, Truman Scholarship Clean House Act, authored by Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY). The Truman Scholarship is a publicly funded award established by Congress in 1975 to honor President Truman’s legacy of public service. However, the program is rife with political bias. A recent College Fix investigation found that liberal winners outnumber conservatives by a staggering 14:1 ratio. An American Enterprise Institute study could not identify a singlewinner between 2021 and 2023 focused on stopping illegal immigration, protecting the unborn, or defending the Second Amendment. The time has come to clean house. The Truman Scholarship Clean House Act fires the existing program leadership, institutes numerous safeguards to ensure political bias is rooted out, and establishes a student code of conduct winners must meet.
"Next is H.R. 7661, Stop the Sexualization of Children Act, authored by Rep. Mary Miller (R-IL). Many schools are filled with inappropriate content. For example, all the top 10 most frequently removed school books contain graphic sexual content. Some of these books are so obscene that adults get censored by television stations for reading them aloud in school board meetings. Federal dollars should never be used to promote sexually explicit material to children. The Stop the Sexualization of Children Act ensures that federal dollars under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act do not fund inappropriate content.
"The next bill we’ll consider is H.R. 7890, Science of Reading Act of 2026, authored by Rep. Erin Houchin (R-IN). For generations, students in elementary school were taught to read through phonics—by identifying letters and the sounds they represent. But in recent years, some educators have insisted that phonics is old-fashioned and that students must be taught through 'three-cueing,' which instructs students to guess a word based on its context, place in the sentence, or even adjacent pictures. This approach has been terrible for students. The Science of Reading Act of 2026 ensures that literacy funds under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act are not used for three-cueing and instead prioritize states that adopt phonics-based instruction grounded in the Science of Reading.
"Fourth and fifth, we’ll mark up two bills focused on tackling 'ghost student' fraud—schemes in which fraudsters use stolen or counterfeit identities to steal federal student aid dollars.
"H.R. 7892, No Aid for Ghost Students Act, introduced by Rep. Burgess Owens (R-UT), strengthens safeguards against identity fraud in the federal student aid process. The bill requires the Department of Education to use an identity fraud detection system to review each FAFSA application and institutions to verify the identity of those applicants flagged by the Department before disbursing federal student aid.The legislation also establishes an annual evaluation of the system’s effectiveness and reporting requirements to Congress, ensuring continued oversight of the system’s performance and the Department’s efforts to ensure aid dollars go to deserving students—not fraudsters.
"H.R. 7891, Student Aid Fraud Oversight and Accountability Act, introduced by Rep. Glenn 'GT' Thompson (R-PA), strengthens federal oversight of institutions that disburse federal student aid to individuals suspected of identity fraud. The bill requires the Department to prioritize program reviews of schools that disburse federal student aid to FAFSA applicants flagged for suspected identity fraud. At the same time, the bill allows institutions to avoid scrutiny if they simply verify student identity before disbursing aid for those applications flagged as suspicious.
"Next, we’ll mark up my bill, H.R. 7893, FAFSA Verification Efficiency Act, a straightforward bill that ensures the Department of Education has clear authority to verify the identities of everyone who provides information on the FAFSA. Under the FUTURE Act, contributors must consent to having their tax information transferred from the IRS and populated into the form. To do this, the Department must be able to verify the identities of everyone who fills out the FAFSA form.
"Finally, the Committee will mark up H.R. 6084, ERISA Litigation Reform Act, authored by Rep. Randy Fine (R-FL). This common-sense bill takes a balanced approach to litigation reform and works hand-in-hand with courts’ efforts to curb abusive lawsuits. Over the last 10 years, frivolous class action lawsuits against employer-sponsored benefit plans governed by ERISA have grown, draining time and resources. These lawsuits make it harder and more expensive for employers to provide voluntary benefits, ultimately harming the workers and retirees ERISA was meant to protect.
"This legislation preserves the ability to bring legitimate claims while screening out frivolous class actions. Too often, trial lawyers exploit ERISA to extract massive settlements, regardless of merit. Unscrupulous lawyers know that settling is often cheaper than litigating, even when the claims lack merit. This creates an opportunity for class action lawsuits to exploit employers who wish to provide benefits to workers. Workers, employers, and retirees all lose out as legal fees soar as plan resources are drained. ERISA was designed to protect retirement savings—not to bankroll a business model of opportunistic lawsuits. Simply put, without these important reforms, employees will continue to bleed as lawyers continue to feed."
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