After Jona Morales took out federal student loans for college, he worked to stay on top of payments. The U.S. Department of Education announced in December that it will resume garnishing paychecks and tax returns from defaulted loan borrowers, a practice that was paused in March 2020 in response to COVID. They will continue to garnish wages until either the loan is paid in full or removed from default, Wallace said. The Department of Education told NNS that garnishment will only be conducted after student and parent borrowers have received sufficient notice and opportunity to repay their loans. “These people are student loan experts,” Trone said.