HR2272-119

What This Bill Does

The FAFSA Act, also styled in the text as the Freeze Aid For Student Assaulters Act of 2025, creates a student-aid penalty for certain criminal convictions. Beginning with the first award year after enactment, an individual convicted of assault against a police officer or of rioting is ineligible for title IV grants, most loans, and work assistance. The rioting category includes inciting, organizing, promoting, encouraging, participating in, carrying on a riot, committing violence in furtherance of a riot, or aiding and abetting those acts. If the individual already received title IV grants for the program of study in which the individual was enrolled when the offense occurred, the grant amounts become Federal Direct Unsubsidized Stafford Loans with interest accruing from the original grant award date. Those loans are not eligible for forgiveness, cancellation, discharge, or reduction under the Higher Education Act, any other law, or administrative action.

Who Benefits and How

Police officers benefit from a federal student-aid consequence attached to convictions for assault against police officers. Federal student aid programs benefit from a statutory exclusion for people convicted of covered assault or riot offenses. Taxpayers funding student grants benefit if grants to covered convicted individuals are converted into repayable loans. Campus safety advocates benefit from a deterrent aimed at riot-related violence and assaults on police.

Who Bears the Burden and How

Students convicted of assaulting police officers lose eligibility for title IV grants, most loans, and work assistance. Students convicted of rioting offenses must repay covered title IV grants as unsubsidized Stafford loans with interest. Education Department aid administrators must identify covered convictions, terminate eligibility, convert grants, and block forgiveness or discharge. Student loan servicers must service converted grants as unsubsidized loans that are excluded from relief programs.

Key Provisions

• Bars most title IV grants, loans, and work assistance after convictions for assaulting a police officer or rioting.
• Defines covered rioting offenses to include incitement, organization, participation, violence, and aiding or abetting.
• Converts covered title IV grants into Federal Direct Unsubsidized Stafford Loans.
• Requires interest to accrue from the original grant award date.
• Prohibits forgiveness, cancellation, discharge, or reduction of the converted loans.