California judge says ex-Education Secretary Betsy DeVos must testify in student loan suit

Washington — A federal judge in California ruled Wednesday that former Education Secretary Betsy DeVos must comply with a subpoena for testimony in a class-action lawsuit brought by former students of now-defunct for-profit colleges seeking to have their federal student loan debt forgiven.

U.S. District Judge William Alsup of the Northern District of California denied DeVos' request to block a subpoena for her deposition issued in a suit concerning the lawfulness of the Education Department's 18-month pause in issuing decisions on "student-loan borrower-defense applications," which allow borrowers to seek forgiveness of their student debt if their schools misled them or engaged in other unlawful misconduct. Scores of borrowers asked the department to relieve them of their debt after Corinthian Colleges, a for-profit institution, collapsed and were awaiting decisions from the Department of Education on their requests.