WASHINGTON— The for-profit college sector was portrayed as both villain and victim Friday at a panel discussion on the proposed rules that seek to make the sector more accountable for how often its graduates find jobs that enable them to pay back their student loans.

The most biting criticism came from panelist Barmak Nassirian, associate executive director of the American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers, who accused the sector of preying on the poor by selling bogus degrees that don’t lead to jobs.

“Contrary to what the advocates for this sector and their proxies constantly repeat, this is now a sector in which the vast majority of participants are actually engaged in what I view as counterfeiting of degrees and consumer fraud,” Nassirian said at a panel discussion at the New America Foundation titled “Reining in For-Profit Higher Education.”

Nassirian’s co-panelist questioned the wisdom of targeting for-profit colleges for heavier regulation.

“Why is it precisely that we’re singling out these for-profit, vocational and career programs when a lot of the arguments apply perfectly well to all kinds of education?” asked co-panelist Katherine Mangu-Ward, senior editor of Reason magazine.

Featured speaker James Kvaal, deputy under secretary at the U.S. Department of Education, explained that if colleges get federal money, federal law gives the U.S. Secretary of Education the responsibility to set minimum standards for those institutions.

“There are good reasons for that,” Kvaal said, explaining that the federal government has the right to make sure that students educated with federal dollars get training that enables them to get a job that enables them to repay their student loans.

Among other things, the proposed set of rules, released by the Education Department in late July, would seek gauge the effectiveness of for-profit colleges by subjecting the colleges to two “tests.”