Here’s how Biden defied the Supreme Court to cancel $144 billion in student loans

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Washington Examiner

President Joe Biden unveiled another round in his steady drip of student debt write-offs on Thursday, announcing that 78,000 public sector workers would not have to repay $6 billion in loans.

“From day one of my administration, I promised to fix broken student loan programs and make sure higher education is a ticket to the middle class, not a barrier to opportunity,” Biden said. “I won’t back down from using every tool at my disposal to deliver student debt relief to more Americans, and build an economy from the middle out and bottom up.”

Biden’s previous loan cancellation plan was ruled illegal by the Supreme Court. However, his more recent debt transfers rest on a different legal authority than the original, $400 billion-plus plan.

 

The original program, which was announced six weeks before the 2022 midterm elections, rested legally on the HEROES Act of 2003. That law was written with Iraq War veterans in mind and dependent on the presence of a national emergency, which Biden said was apt due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The high court disagreed.

Cancellation rounds since then have rested on the Higher Education Act of 1965, a portion of which reads, “in the performance of, and with respect to, the functions, powers, and duties, vested in him by this part, the Secretary [of Education] may enforce, pay, compromise, waive, or release any right, title, claim, lien, or demand, however acquired, including any equity or any right of redemption.”

[Geee]

Biden faces fresh political peril with latest student loans lawsuit

A fresh lawsuit revives an old challenge for President Joe Biden — delivering on his 2020 campaign pledge to forgive student loans.

Biden announced in 2022 that he’d “cancel” $10,000 of federal student debt per borrower, only to see his plan ruled illegal by the Supreme Court. He has since announced another $144 billion in student debt writeoffs and created a program to lower future payments, but he was slapped with a new lawsuit by a coalition of Republican-led states on Thursday.

 

“Last time defendants tried this the Supreme Court said that this action was illegal,” reads a portion of the suit from Kansas and 10 other states. “Nothing since then has changed, other than introducing more legal errors into this rule’s underlying analysis.”

Missouri has promised to deliver a second suit making similar arguments next week, creating the possibility that Biden will once again face a political setback on student loans that could dampen enthusiasm for his reelection campaign in 2024, particularly among younger voters.

Biden has aggressively pursued student debt transfers even without congressional support. His original plan would have written off at least $400 billion of debt, and since it was struck down, he has announced new rounds of cancellation using a different legal justification, plus the Saving on a Valuable Education Plan, to lower loan payments drastically.

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Federal Appeals Court Blocks Joe Biden’s Student Loan Bailout Program

A federal appeals court blocked one of Joe Biden’s student loan bailout programs.

The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday blocked Biden’s plan to cancel loans for borrowers who claim they were victims of ‘misleading information’ by colleges.

A three-judge panel – one Reagan appointee and two Trump appointees – said Biden’s program was ‘almost certainly unlawful.’

 

ABC News reported:

 

A Biden administration plan to provide student debt relief for people who say they were victims of misleading information by trade schools or colleges is “almost certainly unlawful” a federal appeals court said in a ruling blocking enforcement of the policy against a group of privately owned Texas institutions.