On Tuesday, the Pacific Legal Foundation asked the Supreme Court to block the Biden administration from implementing its goal of canceling $10,000 in student debt for millions of students.
Allowing the White House to adopt the action without court scrutiny, the nonprofit legal organization claimed, would “encourage similar malfeasance from future administrations on a plethora of other problems.” The student loan cancellation proposal would also forgive up to $20,000 in student loans for Pell Grant recipients.
“The government is seeking to erase half a trillion dollars in debt without any legal foundation,” said Caleb Kruckenberg of the Pacific Legal Foundation in a press statement. “The Court should put a stop to this unlawful activity until the courts review it.”
Attempts to block the student loan cancellation policy have already been rejected by the legal system. Justice Amy Coney Barrett of the Wisconsin Supreme Court denied an emergency appeal filed by the Brown County Taxpayers Association, most likely because the plaintiffs lacked legal standing to challenge the regulation.
District Judge Henry Autrey of the Eastern District of Missouri ruled that his court lacked jurisdiction to hear a separate case filed by six Republican attorneys general, forcing the officials to seek emergency relief from the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals. On October 21, the court ordered the White House to delay from erasing student debt, providing an administrative stay while justices review the complaint.
Many leftists have criticized Biden’s student loan proposal, claiming that he lacks the ability to erase up to $500 billion in debt without the permission of Congress. According to the Pacific Legal Foundation, the Department of Education has also neglected to release any official regulations or “any legally binding explanation” of the student debt cancellation program.
“At no time has the administration presented a convincing case that the underlying policy is legitimate,” Pacific Legal Foundation attorney Michael Poon remarked. “The administration’s practice of ‘lawmaking by press release’ is certainly unlawful.”
In a related case, the group said that President Joe Biden used the HEROES Act, a 2003 statute intended to help Iraq War veterans and their families, to justify the loan cancellation with “breathtaking informality and opacity.”
Last month, Biden stated that more than 22 million individuals had already filed for student loan relief. “My vow when I campaigned for President of the United States: if elected, I’d make the government operate and deliver for the people,” he stated at Delaware State University, a historically black college. “A straightforward application procedure maintains that promise, just as I maintain my commitment to alleviate student debt while borrowers recover from the economic crisis brought on by the once-in-a-lifetime pandemic.”
Though the president stated that “not a dollar” will assist the top 5% of earners, facts show that student debt forgiveness mostly benefits those who are prepared to make the most from their degrees, as graduate-level education is frequently required for the most lucrative jobs. According to a Brookings Institution analysis, the wealthiest 20% of households owe one-third of student debt, while the poorest 20% owe only 8%.
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