Teachers sue Trump admin for stopping affordable student loan repayment plans

One of America's largest unions is taking aim at President Donald Trump's administration for shutting down access to affordable student loan repayment plans -- saying the decision is "effectively breaking" the system.

The American Federation of Teachers (AFT), representing 1.8 million educators across the country, filed a lawsuit against the Department of Education in Washington, D.C., hoping to restore the programs that have now been shuttered for three weeks.

The filing alleges the administration halting the application process for all Income-Driven Repayment (IDR) plans and ordering student loan servicers to stop all processing violates federal law.

"AFT sued the United States Department of Education (ED) for effectively breaking the student loan system, denying borrowers' access to affordable loan payments and blocking progress towards Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF), in violation of federal law," the union said in a statement Wednesday.

Federal Income-Driven Repayment plans were first created by Congress in the 1990s to make student borrowers' loan bills more affordable and cap the length of time students would be on the hook for paying back debt.

As of this year, there were four IDR plans offered by the Department of Education: the Saving on a Valuable Education (SAVE) Plan, the Pay As You Earn (PAYE) Repayment Plan, the Income-Based Repayment (IBR) Plan and the Income-Contingent Repayment (ICR) Plan.

All of the plans are based on the borrower's income, with student loan forgiveness of any remaining debt after a fixed repayment term of 20 or 25 years.

There are over 12 million student loan borrowers enrolled in IDR plans and more than 1 million borrowers were waiting for their applications to be processed when the Dept. of Education shuttered the system three weeks ago, according to the union.

On its website, the Education Department cites a federal court-issued injunction on the Saving on a Valuable Education (SAVE) Plan, which was introduced under former President Joe Biden's administration, as the reason for the pause on all IDR plans. The agency also says students can submit paper applications to programs.

The teachers' union, however, says the Education Department's decision to interpret the 8th Circuit's decision on Feb. 18 "in such a maximalist way" has "wreaked havoc" on the system. The union claims in its filing that paper applications are not currently being processed as well.

"Student loan borrowers are desperate for help, struggling to keep up with spiking monthly payments in a sinking economy, all while President Trump plays politics with the student loan system," Mike Pierce, executive director of the Student Borrower Protection Center, said in a statement Wednesday.

"Borrowers have a legal right to payments they can afford and today we are demanding that these rights are enforced by a federal judge," Pierce added.

The union said in its filing that the department has not provided any guidance to borrowers about when their applications will be restored and when they can expect to see their payments lowered.

In a statement to ABC News on Wednesday, a spokesperson for the Dept. of Education said the federal agency "is working to ensure these programs conform with the 8th Circuit's ruling, and anticipates the revised form allowing borrowers to change repayment plans to be available as soon as next week."

In a letter earlier this month to the agency, 25 U.S. senators similarly called for clarity, noting that the federal court's ruling focused on a single IDR plan, not the remaining three.

"While the Department was tasked with implementing a judicial ruling to suspend a single IDR plan... the Department inexplicably and confusingly chose to also suspend access to every other IDR plan," the senators wrote in the letter.

"Borrowers have relied on many of these plans for decades and this sudden and reckless action means millions of borrowers have fewer repayment options available and are unsure of what to do in order to manage their debt," the senators wrote.

Student loan debt remains massive in the United States and reliance on federal support for payments is a reality for millions of borrowers.

According to AFT's filing, there are nearly 43 million federal student loan borrowers in the U.S., with approximately $1.62 trillion outstanding in debt.