The Education Department has maintained it did nothing wrong.

“This story is based entirely on a wrongful premise,” the department wrote in a statement. “The full and complete timeline shows Dream Center did not receive any unique benefits from policy decisions made by the department. We simply worked to try and get as many students into a new program as possible. While we did not achieve a perfect outcome, our actions helped thousands of students land on their feet.”

In a response letter to Mr. Scott on Monday, the department’s acting general counsel, Reed D. Rubinstein, submitted documentation that he said contradicted the committee’s “unfair suggestions” that the department tailored its policies to assist Dream Center and was not forthcoming with Congress. “The Department categorically rejects these allegations,” he wrote.

“Dream Center’s management received no special treatment,” he said.

President Trump has moved to deregulate any number of industries, from mining and offshore oil exploration to chemicals and internet providers. But Ms. DeVos’s efforts to get the government off the backs of for-profit colleges have come under particular scrutiny, in part because of the spectacular implosions of for-profit college chains only a few years ago, in part because people who once worked in the sector have led the DeVos deregulatory push.

Dream Center’s collapse was the first of the new deregulatory era. Yet Education Department officials insisted, repeatedly, that its demise had nothing to do with the administration’s policies or efforts. Ms. Jones told Congress that she did not even know of Dream Center’s accreditation problems at the time the company said she was working to get it out of its jam. She also told lawmakers the policy change extending retroactive accreditation had “nothing to do with the Dream Center.”

Those assurances are now being questioned.

“The documents further suggest that department officials were not forthcoming to Congress and the public about the information they had about Dream Center’s status and practices,” Mr. Scott wrote. He is requesting emails, text messages and interviews with several department officials, including Ms. Jones.