The majority of the nation was asleep when Austin Hinkle filed a motion in a US District Court late on a Tuesday night in June. However, what transpired in that quiet legal filing had the potential to change the most pressing financial reality for about 7.5 million student loan borrowers who were enrolled in the SAVE plan. A federal judge was asked to halt the forced transfer of four student loan borrowers to more expensive repayment plans, at least until the firm’s larger lawsuit against the Department of Education is settled. The motion was filed by the legal firm Public Goods Practice on behalf of the borrowers.
Public Goods Practice has previously intervened in this conflict. Havens v. U.S. Department of Education, a separate federal lawsuit filed by the firm back in March, claimed that the department had violated federal administrative law by refusing to implement the SAVE plan. The case is still pending. In essence, the June motion is an urgent add-on: cease transferring individuals to more costly plans while the legal proceedings are ongoing. The managing partner, Hinkle, was direct about the urgency. He stated that once transfers begin, “injuries for lots of borrowers could start to happen right away.”
The SAVE plan — formally called Saving on a Valuable Education — was introduced by the Biden administration in 2023 and billed as the most affordable income-driven repayment option ever created. For many borrowers, it cut monthly payments significantly and accelerated the path to debt forgiveness. Then came the legal challenges, a months-long forbearance limbo, and, in March 2026, an Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals decision mandating the plan’s termination. The Trump administration had pushed for exactly that outcome, working alongside Republican attorneys general who had filed suit against SAVE from the beginning.
The Public Goods Practice Save lawsuit argues, among other things, is that the department cannot simply discard the plan’s precursor — REPAYE, the Revised Pay As You Earn program — without offering it as an alternative.
Borrowers who left REPAYE to enroll in SAVE, the filing contends, should at minimum have the right to return there rather than being automatically deposited into the Standard Repayment Plan or the new Tiered Standard Plan, both of which carry significantly higher monthly costs. “REPAYE borrowers were forced to switch at the time they moved into SAVE,” stated Natalia Abrams of the Student Debt Crisis Center. “It only makes sense that now they have the option to re-enroll in it.”
The Department of Education has retaliated by advising borrowers to just sign up for the new Repayment Assistance Plan, which will go into effect on July 1. Payments under that plan range from 1% to 10% of income, and loan forgiveness is possible after 30 years of timely payments—much longer than what SAVE had promised. For borrowers like Elizabeth Robeson, a South Carolina woman who borrowed $12,000 in the 1980s and watched her balance swell to $93,000 despite over a hundred payments beyond the required 216, the bureaucratic maneuvering reads as something close to cruel. In the lawsuit, she called the student loan system “a labyrinth with no clear exit.”
Starting July 1, servicers will begin sending notices to SAVE-enrolled borrowers giving them a 90-day window to switch plans voluntarily. If they do nothing, they will be automatically enrolled in the standard plan that their servicer chooses. The financial risks are real. A median household with four members and an income of about $81,000 may see monthly student loan payments increase from $36 to $440 under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, according to analysis from the Institute for College Access and Success.
Before that process starts, it’s still unclear if the court will approve the motion. Millions of people are clearly watching a legal battle that seems more like a countdown to them than a policy debate. There’s a feeling that whatever comes next will happen more quickly than borrowers can anticipate.
