Doug briefs the Hill
Last month, Doug Criscitello was a featured speaker at a staff briefing in the Capitol Visitor Center, hosted by Senators Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) and Maggie Hassan (D-NH). Senator Blackburn’s Deputy Legislative Director Alexander Gonzalez and Senator Hassan’s Senior Advisor for Government Reform Mark Bussow also spoke. Doug walked staff through the breadth of the government’s loan portfolio and how the Federal Loan Systems Modernization Act would change the lender and borrower experience while reducing the cost of administering credit programs. The bill would stand up Lending.gov as a shared services platform, a single front door for borrowers and standardized loan management on the back end, with each agency keeping its own loan-making authorities.
The Pentagon is hiring loan officers
The Office of Strategic Capital plans to lend more than $200 billion across 30-plus sectors in the coming years, and it has decided it cannot do that with five dealmakers. OSC has added 30 professionals in recent weeks and plans to hire 40 more out of private equity, private credit, and investment banks. Director David Lorch told the Wall Street Journal that the recruits include “people, many of whom have taken seven-figure pay cuts to do this.” A May executive order authorized up to 400 federal officials to be paid as much as $400,000 a year, and some senior OSC positions now reach $438,000. The office lent nothing before 2025. It has committed $5 billion in direct loans this year and signed term sheets for another $14 billion, including $500 million to Phoenix Tailings and $725 million to Energy Fuels in June. Heidrick & Struggles is running part of the search, and the Pentagon has persuaded mid-career investment professionals to pause MBA programs at Stanford and Penn to take the assignments. (Federal credit has never been this fashionable.)
EXIM lends $58 million for critical minerals
At the White House critical minerals roundtable on August 7, EXIM announced three direct loans. Westwater Resources gets $25 million for graphite battery components in Alabama, Global Advanced Metals gets $25 million for tantalum and niobium in Pennsylvania, and 5E Advanced Materials gets $8 million for boron in California. Chairman John Jovanovic said “critical mineral security is national security.”
Energy Dominance Financing closes a Puerto Rico deal
DOE’s Office of Energy Dominance Financing, the renamed Loan Programs Office, closed a $489.4 million loan on August 5 to Amanecer Puerto Rico LLC, a Pattern Energy subsidiary. The financing covers 220 megawatts of battery storage in Arecibo and Santa Isabel, backup power for more than 100,000 customers, and a pathway to future natural gas generation. Director Gregory Beard said the investment will “strengthen Puerto Rico’s electric grid, lower electricity costs, support American manufacturing, and provide a pathway for reliable power.”
Nearly a million borrowers have left SAVE
The Wall Street Journal got the migration data first. About half the departing borrowers moved to IBR, 30% went to the new Repayment Assistance Plan, and 20% picked one of two older plans that will be phased out by 2028. Under Secretary of Education Nicholas Kent said he has discouraged that last option, since those borrowers will have to switch again in a couple of years. More than 7 million borrowers were in SAVE. Notices started going out July 1 with a 90-day clock, and anyone who does not choose is moved automatically to the new Tiered Standard plan. One borrower profiled in the piece watched her monthly payment go from about $400 to nearly $1,400. More than 400,000 borrowers have signed up for the Department’s temporary 1% interest rate reduction for autopay.
Student loans are now a retirement planning problem
About 9.5 million Americans age 50 and older held roughly $452 billion in student loans as of the first quarter of 2026, according to Federal Student Aid. Much of it is Parent PLUS debt taken on for children, and many of those borrowers lost access to more affordable monthly payments in the recent overhaul. Advisers quoted in the piece describe clients who deferred retirement twice, claimed Social Security before full retirement age to cover payments, and moved into income-driven plans that are themselves being phased out.
GAO on the Home Loan Banks and March 2023
GAO reviewed the Federal Home Loan Bank System’s liquidity role and what happened around the spring 2023 bank failures. About 93% of banks were members as of June 2025, and more than three-quarters had taken advances in the prior decade. Institutions above $10 billion in assets make up 3% of members and hold roughly 74% of outstanding advances. Silicon Valley Bank raised its advances 50% in early March 2023 before failing on March 10, and Signature Bank raised its 37% before failing on March 12. GAO found coordination gaps between the FHLBanks and the Federal Reserve Banks and wants both to stay with the interoperability work they started afterward.
No disaster loan for a bad ski season
GAO also took up whether businesses hurt by low snowfall and warm winters can get SBA disaster assistance. Generally, they cannot, since neither condition meets the statutory definition of a disaster and the harm is economic rather than physical. Ski areas and nearby hospitality businesses qualify only when conditions connect to a drought declaration. Visits fell 9% in the 2025-2026 season. GAO gave Congress options for adding these conditions to statute, then noted that doing so could invite claims from businesses affected by every other kind of weather. (Everyone has a bad quarter.)
Summit joins CUSAL
Summit Consulting has signed on as part of the Center for USA Lending as a Community Sponsor. Doug pointed to the firm’s analytical rigor, “bringing PhD-level economists and statisticians to the hardest questions in federal credit.” Summit Senior Partner Anthony Curcio said effective credit programs “require sound stewardship, modern infrastructure, and a sustained focus on borrower outcomes.”