Grand Canyon University faces new legal headache from the Biden administration
Jeremiah Poff
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The Biden administration’s Federal Trade Commission has filed a lawsuit against an Arizona-based Christian college that it says misled students on the cost of its doctoral programs.
The lawsuit, which was filed Wednesday, accuses Grand Canyon University, the largest Christian university in the nation, of engaging in fraudulent advertising practices by marketing itself as a nonprofit institution and misrepresenting the price of its doctoral programs. The government said that the school does not properly disclose the costs of its “continuation courses,” which purportedly add thousands of dollars to the publicly disclosed cost of the degree.
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As for its tax-exempt status, Grand Canyon University, which switched to a for-profit status in the late 2000s, has attempted to return to nonprofit status for several years. The Internal Revenue Service granted the school nonprofit status, but the Department of Education has yet to approve that tax-exempt status. The school has sued the department, seeking to compel recognition of the change.
“Grand Canyon deceived students by holding itself out as a non-profit institution and misrepresenting the costs and number of courses required to earn doctoral degrees,” Samuel Levine, the Director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection, said in a press release. “We will continue to aggressively pursue those who seek to take advantage of students.”
The lawsuit is the second legal action taken against the university by the Biden administration over its doctoral programs. In October, the Department of Education announced it was fining the university $37.7 million for the same issue. The university has appealed the fine and has vowed to sue if the appeals within the department are unsuccessful.
The school has contended that the prolonged legal battle with the Biden administration resulted from a deliberate targeting campaign. GCU president Brian Mueller told the Washington Examiner in October that the investigations into the school were launched in bad faith, calling them “fishing expeditions.”
In a statement to the Washington Examiner, the university said that the FTC lawsuit is a case of the Biden administration “weaponizing federal government agencies in a coordinated effort to target institutions to which they are ideologically opposed.”
“Given the major problems that exist in higher education related to high tuition costs, significant student debt, poor student loan default rates, long completion times, etc., it is baffling that the federal government has chosen to target a Christian university that is addressing those issues in very positive ways,” the university said. “No other institution in higher education is facing this level of government scrutiny, which speaks volumes about these agencies’ motivations and agenda.”
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Despite the pending fine and litigation costs, the school announced this month that it will not raise tuition for the 16th consecutive year. The school’s annual tuition is $16,500 for the 2024-2025 school year.
Asher Notheis contributed to this report.