The spouse of a member of the Illinois National Guard took out a loan of $2,575 in Illinois. Due to triple-digit interest rates, the family spent more than $8,000 to repay the loan.

In South Carolina, a service member took out a $1,615. The total interest charges? Over $15,000.

These stories of unfair and abusive lending practices that target service men and women are all too common. Payday lenders, car title lenders and other high-cost lenders crowd around military bases and aggressively market to military families.

Once an unaffordable loan is taken, subsequent loans are needed to pay off the previous ones creating a long term cycle of debt. In fact, the Defense Department found that more than one in 10 troops have taken out a high-cost loan.

Unmanageable debt is difficult for any family struggling to balance their finances. In the military, the burden can affect security clearances and advancement. Unscrupulous debt collectors go after service members deployed overseas and who are unable to answer claims. Credit is destroyed and lives are disrupted.

Recognizing the dangers, DoD determined that abusive lending, including loans made by payday and car title lenders among others, was having a negative impact on military readiness.

Back in 2006, Congress adopted the Military Lending Act and the department issued rules to address the abuses, including the establishment of a 36 percent cap on interest rates and fees.

The act also prohibits practices that allow lenders to ignore whether a borrower has the ability to repay the loan, practices such as securing loans with car titles, taking post-dated checks or gaining direct access to borrowers' bank accounts to ensure the lender is first in line to be paid ahead of rent or utility payments.

Unfortunately for service members, the lenders exploited loopholes in the rules.

Where the rules applied to payday loans of roughly three months or less, lenders made loans of three months and a day. Where the rules applied to loans of less than $2,000, the lenders made loans of $2,001. The rules applied to loans with a defined schedule for repayment, so some lenders moved to offering open-ended lines of credit.

All these maneuvers allowed lenders to escape the borrower protections and continue to charge troops and their families triple-digit interest rates.

In August 2013, I led a coalition of 54 members of Congress urging the secretary of defense to expand the definition of consumer credit and close loopholes that allowed predatory lending practices to continue.

This past month, I was thrilled to see that DoD responded to our concerns and took action by proposing clear and comprehensive rules that close the loopholes and end the evasions.

The rules cover loans of any size and length. Credit cards with exorbitant fees are covered while those with reasonable rates are exempt, preserving access to credit on fair terms. Taken together, these new rules will protect the financial security of America's all-volunteer fighting force.

There can be little doubt that ensuring our service members are offered fair and affordable credit is a priority.

Defense officials have made clear they will go after lenders who prey on our military families by peddling unfair and abusive credit, undermining the financial stability of service men and women and the military readiness of our troops.

I am encouraged by the proposal of these commonsense changes and I strongly support adoption of the proposed rules.

Tammy Duckworth is a congresswoman from Illinois and lieutenant colonel in the National Guard who recently announced she is retiring from the service.

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