Student loan cancellation
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@George-K said in Student loan cancellation:
Supreme Court asked to block Biden student debt relief program
The Supreme Court on Wednesday was asked to block the Biden administration’s student loan debt relief program, which is set to take effect this weekend.
The request by the Brown County Taxpayers Association in Wisconsin was directed to Justice Amy Coney Barrett, who is responsible for handling emergency application requests from the 7th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the group’s request.
A federal judge in Wisconsin earlier this month dismissed the taxpayers association’s lawsuit challenging the program, ruling that the group did not have legal standing to block the plan.
The group then filed an appeal of that ruling to the 7th Circuit appeals court.
Wednesday’s request to Barrett asks that the plan by President Joe Biden to cancel up to $20,000 in student debt for millions of borrowers be suspended pending the outcome of the pending appeal.
The U.S. Department of Education opened its application for student loan forgiveness in a beta test on Friday.
More than 8 million people submitted requests for relief over that weekend.
The application officially launched on Monday. The Biden administration could start processing borrowers’ requests for student loan forgiveness as soon as this Sunday.
The legal challenges that have been brought against the president’s plan continue to mount.
Six Republican-led states — Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska and South Carolina — are trying to block Biden’s plan, arguing that the president doesn’t have the power to issue nationwide debt relief without Congress. They’re also claiming that the policy would harm private companies that service some federal student loans by reducing their business.
The main obstacle for those hoping to foil the president’s action is finding a plaintiff who can prove they’ve been harmed by the policy. “Such injury is needed to establish what courts call ‘standing,’” said Laurence Tribe, a Harvard law professor.
Tribe said he isn’t convinced that any of the current lawsuits filed have successfully done that.
That’s going to be a hard nope.
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@jon-nyc said in Student loan cancellation:
That’s going to be a hard nope.
Trump appointed judge agrees "no standing."
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/20/us/politics/supreme-court-student-loan-forgiveness.html
Justice Amy Coney Barrett on Thursday rejected a challenge to President Biden’s student debt relief program from a taxpayers’ association in Wisconsin that said he had overstepped his authority in adopting the sweeping measure, one that could cost the government hundreds of billions of dollars.
Justice Barrett denied the association’s challenge without comment, which is the court’s custom in ruling on emergency applications. She acted on her own, without referring the application to the full court, and she did not ask the administration for a response. Both of those moves were indications that the application was not on solid legal footing.
Although she did not say so, Justice Barrett most likely rejected the application because the plaintiff, the Brown County Taxpayers Association, did not appear to have shown that it had suffered a direct injury that gave it standing to sue.
The association argued that Mr. Biden had exceeded his authority under a 2003 federal law that allows the education secretary to modify financial assistance programs for students “in connection with a war or other military operation or national emergency.”
The plan cancels $10,000 in debt for those earning less than $125,000 per year and $20,000 for those who had received Pell grants for low-income families. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said last month that it estimated the plan’s price tag at $400 billion. White House officials have said that the cost could be lower because fewer borrowers than expected might apply for the relief. -
Appeals court temporarily halts Biden’s student debt relief
A federal appeals court on Friday evening blocked the imminent cancellation of federal student loans under President Biden’s debt relief program, days after millions of borrowers began applying.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit granted an administrative stay while it considers a request for an injunction filed by a coalition of six Republican-led states seeking to block the forgiveness program. It instructed the Biden administration not to begin discharging debt under the relief effort.
The decision arrives a day after a lower court dismissed the states’ lawsuit for lack of standing. -
"Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... " - Mik, 6/14/08
The saying, "Lite is just one damn thing after another," is a gross understatement. The damn things overlap.
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Are there any more cases pending right now?
Again, the best standing would come from Congress as this is a transgression of their powers and responsibilities. The question is whether a minority party in Congress could file contrary to the majority? I say yes, they can. It is still a transgression on their powers even if they would lose the vote if it was put up to one…
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I’m guessing they simply can’t speak for Congress without a majority. I’m sure if they had a case they’d have filed it.
And I’m pretty sure by January 3rd the program would have been implemented. I’m not sure if it’s possible they could get it reversed or not. I’ve not read any informed commentary on the subject.
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@jon-nyc said in Student loan cancellation:
It’s not remotely stunning. This was that Indiana plaintiff that had a case when it was mandatory but once Biden made it optional his case went poof.
It was justice Barret that declined it.
You mean that Nazi radical activist judge?
God, people are stupid.
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@jon-nyc said in Student loan cancellation:
I’m guessing they simply can’t speak for Congress without a majority. I’m sure if they had a case they’d have filed it.
And I’m pretty sure by January 3rd the program would have been implemented. I’m not sure if it’s possible they could get it reversed or not. I’ve not read any informed commentary on the subject.
I don’t think they would have. I think they would rather have it as a wedge issue…
Now, as for reversing it on January 3rd, I imagine that it will depend on whether any accounts have actually had the $10K cleared yet…
Well, Lucas thanks ya’ll!
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I wonder if McCarthy could get an injunction to delay the actual debt forgiveness… The process for the forgiveness takes 6-8 weeks and we’re 6-8 weeks from a new Congress…. So it’s not like a delay would be causing harm to debtors…
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Federal judge in Texas blocks Biden’s student loan forgiveness
A federal judge in Texas on Thursday blocked President Biden’s student loan forgiveness program, delivering a victory to a conservative advocacy group that sued to strike down the plan.
The Job Creators Network Foundation filed a lawsuit in October on behalf of a borrower who does not qualify for the full $20,000 in debt relief and one who is ineligible altogether. The suit alleges the administration violated federal procedures by denying borrowers the opportunity to provide public comment before unveiling the program.
U.S. District Judge Mark T. Pittman, who was appointed by Donald Trump, declared the policy unlawful in the Thursday order.It comes after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit last month granted a stay against the loan forgiveness program in a separate lawsuit brought by six Republican-led states. The cases are among a growing number of legal challenges to stop Biden’s program. Some of those suits, including one filed in Indiana and another in Wisconsin, have been dismissed for lack of standing, but others are ongoing.
Republican attorneys general, top lawmakers and conservative groups have been discussing legal options to dismantle Biden’s plan, which they say represents illegal executive overreach, since he announced it in August. A week after Biden unveiled the policy, the president of the Job Creators Network — founded by Bernie Marcus, a GOP donor who co-founded Home Depot — told Fox News the group was building a legal team and working with outside advisers to prepare a lawsuit.
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Always remember, Operation Valkyrie was an act of sedition.
Warning: I post things that interest me. Read and comment at your own discretion. -
@Jolly said in Student loan cancellation:
the judge's opinion
Regarding standing:
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Defendants seem to argue that no one has standing to challenge the Program because where the government is providing a benefit, nobody is harmed by the existence of that benefit. ECF No. 32 at 57–58. And according to Defendants, “sometimes the result is that there is executive or legislative action for which there isn’t an appropriate plaintiff.” Id. at 57 (emphasis added). The Court must disagree. The Supreme Court has recognized that a plaintiff has standing to challenge a government benefit in many cases. See, e.g., Ne. Fla. Chapter of Associated Gen. Contractors of Am. v. City of Jacksonville, 508 U.S. 656, 666 (1993) (holding that plaintiffs who did not qualify for government benefits had standing); Bowsher v. Synar, 478 U.S. 714, 721, (1986) (holding that the failure to receive benefits is enough to confer Article III standing). Because Defendants’ contention that no one has standing to challenge the Program because it confers a benefit is incorrect, the Court next turns to whether Plaintiffs have standing.
*b. Plaintiffs Have Standing
i. Injury in fact*
Plaintiffs allege that their concrete injury is the deprivation of their procedural right under the APA to provide meaningful input on any proposal from the Department to forgive student-loan debt and their accompanying economic interest in debt forgiveness. ECF No. 4 at 12.
As for Plaintiffs’ alleged deprivation of their procedural right, the APA requires agencies administering their delegated authority to follow certain procedures. See 5 U.S.C. § 553. These procedures obligate agencies to subject their substantive rules to a notice-and-comment period unless an exception applies. Id. A plaintiff is deprived of “a procedural right to protect its concrete interests” if an agency violates
the APA’s procedural requirements. Texas v. EEOC, 933 F.3d 433, 447 (5th Cir. 2019) (citing Summers v. Earth Island Inst., 555 U.S. 488, 496 (2009)). But a bare assertion of a procedural right violation is not enough to confer Article III standing. See Shrimpers & Fishermen of RGV v. Tex. Comm’n on Env’t Quality, 968 F.3d 419, 426 (5th Cir. 2020). A plaintiff must instead show a concrete injury stemming from that procedural violation. Id.
Defendants dispute Plaintiffs’ alleged injuries for two reasons. First, they argue that Plaintiffs could not have suffered a procedural deprivation based on the lack of a notice-and-comment period because the HEROES Act expressly exempts the APA’s notice-and-comment requirement. ECF No. 24 at 8–9. Plaintiffs dispute this and argue that because the HEROES Act does not authorize the Program, the Program was promulgated in violation of the APA’s notice-and-comment requirement. ECF No. 26 at 6–7. Because the Court must “assume, for purposes of the standing analysis, that [Plaintiffs are] correct on the merits of [their] claim that the [Program] was promulgated in violation of the APA,” Plaintiffs have successfully alleged the deprivation of a procedural right. EEOC, 933 F.3d at 447.Second, Defendants assert, even if Plaintiffs have established the violation of a procedural right, there is no accompanying concrete interest stemming from that violation. ECF No. 24 at 9–11. They contend that Plaintiffs’ “unhappiness that some other borrowers are receiving a greater benefit than they are” is not a concrete interest. Id. But this is untrue. Plaintiffs do not argue that they are injured because other people are receiving loan forgiveness. Their injury—no matter how many people are receiving loan forgiveness—is that they personally did not receive forgiveness and were denied a procedural right to comment on the Program’s eligibility requirements. Plaintiffs need to prove only the existence of an associated “concrete interest,” not a guarantee of concrete harm due to the procedural violation. EEOC, 933 F.3d at 447. A benefit or legal-entitlement guarantee is not a prerequisite to successfully establishing standing in the event of a procedural-right violation. See, e.g., Teton Historic Aviation Found. v. U.S. Dep’t of Def., 785 F.3d 719, 724 (D.C. Cir. 2015). A “plaintiff suffers a constitutionally
cognizable injury by the loss of an opportunity to pursue a benefit even though the plaintiff may not be able to show that it was certain to receive that benefit had it been accorded the lost opportunity.” Id.Much more legalese at the link.
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Biden administration stops taking applications
The Biden administration has stopped accepting applications for federal student loan forgiveness after a court struck down its plan on Thursday evening.
“Courts have issued orders blocking our student debt relief program,” according to a note on the forgiveness application page at Studentaid.gov. “As a result, at this time, we are not accepting applications. We are seeking to overturn those orders.”
The suspension of the forgiveness program comes shortly after a federal judge in Texas rejected President Joe Biden’s executive action in August to cancel up to $20,000 in student debt for tens of millions of Americans.
The Biden administration said the Justice Department has already appealed the decision.
“We believe strongly that the Biden-Harris Student Debt Relief Plan is lawful and necessary to give borrowers and working families breathing room as they recover from the pandemic and to ensure they succeed when repayment restarts,” Education Secretary Miguel Cardona said in a statement. “Amidst efforts to block our debt relief program, we are not standing down.”
The main obstacle for those hoping to bring a legal challenge against Biden’s plan has been finding a plaintiff who can prove they’ve been harmed by the policy.
“Such injury is needed to establish what courts call ‘standing,’” said Laurence Tribe, a Harvard law professor.
For that reason, Tribe said he was floored by the Texas judge’s ruling.
“Judge Pittman’s decision was about as wrong and weird as any federal court ruling I can recall reading,” Tribe said. “He was wrong to decide the merits without first deciding whether either of the two plaintiffs had standing.”
