[Congressional Bills 119th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 7891 Introduced in House (IH)]

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119th CONGRESS
  2d Session
                                H. R. 7891

 To amend section 498A of the Higher Education Act of 1965 to require 
      the Secretary of Education to prioritize program reviews of 
 institutions of higher education that disburse Federal financial aid 
under title IV of such Act without verifying the identity of a student 
     whose FAFSA presents a reasonable suspicion of identity fraud.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                             March 12, 2026

 Mr. Thompson of Pennsylvania introduced the following bill; which was 
          referred to the Committee on Education and Workforce

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
 To amend section 498A of the Higher Education Act of 1965 to require 
      the Secretary of Education to prioritize program reviews of 
 institutions of higher education that disburse Federal financial aid 
under title IV of such Act without verifying the identity of a student 
     whose FAFSA presents a reasonable suspicion of identity fraud.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Student Aid Fraud Oversight and 
Accountability Act of 2026''.

SEC. 2. PROGRAM REVIEW PRIORITY CATEGORY.

    (a) Program Review Priority Category.--Section 498A(a)(2) of the 
Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1099c-1(a)(2)) is amended--
            (1) in subparagraph (E), by striking ``and'' at the end;
            (2) by redesignating subparagraph (F) as subparagraph (G); 
        and
            (3) by inserting after subparagraph (E) the following:
                    ``(F) institutions identified under paragraph (4); 
                and''.
    (b) Identification of Institutions.--Section 498A(a) of the Higher 
Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1099c-1(a)) is amended--
            (1) in paragraph (3), by striking the period at the end and 
        inserting ``; and''; and
            (2) by adding at the end the following:
            ``(4) shall identify each institution that has disbursed, 
        on or after October 1, 2026, Federal financial aid under this 
        title for an award year to any student whose application under 
        section 483 for such award year presented a reasonable 
        suspicion of identity fraud, as determined by the identity 
        fraud detection system used by the Secretary, except that the 
        Secretary shall exclude from such identification any 
        institution that demonstrates to the Secretary that, with 
        respect to each such student, before the disbursement of 
        Federal financial aid to the student, the institution, in 
        accordance with procedures established by the Secretary, 
        determined that a reasonable suspicion of identity fraud was 
        not present by confirming the identity of such student using 
        in-person verification or live, synchronous audiovisual 
        verification and notified the Secretary that the identity of 
        the student has been verified, and maintains a record of such 
        identity verification.''.
    (c) Special Considerations.--Section 498A of the Higher Education 
Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1099c-1) is further amended by adding at the 
following:
    ``(e) Special Considerations.--Identification of an institution 
under subsection (a)(4)--
            ``(1) may be used to inform program reviews, audits, 
        investigations, and other oversight activities authorized under 
        this title; and
            ``(2) shall not, by itself, constitute a determination that 
        an institution has failed to meet the requirements of this 
        title.''.
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