Americans stranded abroad as the coronavirus spread took a lifeline offered by the State Department: We’ll fly you home, but you have to pay us back.

Some Americans had to use passports as collateral for loans — but months later, they’re still waiting for a bill, so their passports are invalid. Others signed promissory notes agreeing to pay an eventual bill they’re still waiting for, and dreading a price tag that for a family of four could weigh in at $10,000.

State has flown home about 100,000 U.S. citizens home from nearly 150 countries since the pandemic began, at a cost of $196 million to the agency, which it must collect from passengers. Of that sum, about $8 million comes from direct loans secured with a passport.

Desperate to get home to California from Peru, Ash Maki took out a direct […]