The U.S. Department of Education formally asked a federal judge to push back a January 2026 deadline in the landmark Sweet v. McMahon borrower-defense settlement, requesting up to an 18-month extension to adjudicate roughly 207,000 claims. The settlement guaranteed automatic relief or timely decisions for groups of borrowers defrauded by predominantly for-profit colleges; the agency now cites resource constraints in court filings filed in November. The Project on Predatory Student Lending—representing affected borrowers—urged the judge to deny the extension, saying the department must "hold to its commitments". The delay would shift automatic relief triggers into mid-2027, prolonging uncertainty for nearly 200,000 borrowers and keeping colleges’ accountability and federal balance-sheet exposure in play.