Hill GOP leaders make new offer on student loans

WASHINGTON — Top con­gres­sional Repub­li­cans made a new offer to Pres­i­dent Barack Obama on Thurs­day in their fight over head­ing off a dou­bling of inter­est rates on fed­eral col­lege loans for 7.4 mil­lion stu­dents, propos­ing fresh ways to cover the effort’s $6 bil­lion cost.