The Department of Education’s broadened borrower defense to repayment rule, recently released in its final form, looks likely as ever to do far more harm than good. Despite widespread concern that the department’s move was a dangerous “overreach” with collateral consequences, the expansion will proceed largely unchecked.

The update expands on a 1995 department rule that allowed federal borrowers to sue for student loan forgiveness but left the claims up to state law. What was a narrowly applicable solution to a rare problem came to seem, in the wake of the Corinthian College closures, the best way to weaponize the department against for-profit colleges: The initial push to expand borrower defense swiftly followed concerns that the department had not done enough for those enrolled in Corinthian classes cut short by the closure.