Student loan cancellation

[George K]

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.

[Jolly]

Read the judge's opinion?

It's all about funding and separation of powers.

[George K]

@Jolly said in Student loan cancellation:

the judge's opinion

Regarding standing:

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

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.

[jon-nyc]

It’s very interesting. Can’t wait for a proper analysis from Sarah and David.

[George K]

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.”

[George K]

Biden administration asks Supreme Court to reinstate student loan forgiveness

The Biden administration on Friday asked the Supreme Court to reinstate its student loan forgiveness program, saying its creation was well within the authority of the education secretary and that a lower court decision putting it on hold “leaves millions of economically vulnerable borrowers in limbo.”

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit decided 3 to 0 on Monday to side with a coalition of six Republican-led states that requested that the court table any debt cancellation amid its ongoing litigation. The injunction is to remain in place until further notice from the court or the Supreme Court, according to the order.

The ruling arrives days after a federal judge in a separate lawsuit in Texas declared Biden’s debt relief plan unlawful, effectively barring the Education Department from accepting more applications and discharging any debt. This week, Justice Department attorneys asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit to stay the ruling in the Texas case. and asked the court for a ruling by Dec. 1 “to allow the government to seek relief from the Supreme Court” if needed.

[Jolly]

It's only wise to decide the issue before dispersing the money.

[jon-nyc]

The Texas lawsuit standing argument is really interesting. I still can’t figure out if it’s super clever or question begging.

Though I read (Ilya Somin for example) that the case of the 6 GOP states is stronger. I think this will manage to be overturned before it’s implemented.

[LuFins Dad]

@jon-nyc said in Student loan cancellation:

The Texas lawsuit standing argument is really interesting. I still can’t figure out if it’s super clever or question begging.

Though I read (Ilya Somin for example) that the case of the 6 GOP states is stronger. I think this will manage to be overturned before it’s implemented.

Do you mean the Texas decision will be overturned or the Biden plan will be overturned?

[jon-nyc]

Biden plan will be.

[Horace]

Another political act by the party of the deplorables which will be taken for granted by the rational left.

[Jolly]

Meanwhile, the ads during the election featuring loan cancellation were saturating the airwaves in college towns.

[Mik]

At this point Biden doesn't care whether its implemented or not. he can claim he fulfilled his promise and if it gets overturned the GOP is to blame.

[LuFins Dad]

I do feel bad for the kids. They don’t really get it yet. I mean, Lucas got the economics of everything and rationally he knew that this program could ultimately cost him more than it gave him, on an emotional level these kids thought $10-20K in debt was about to be wiped out and now it’s not.

[LuFins Dad]

@Mik said in Student loan cancellation:

At this point Biden doesn't care whether its implemented or not. he can claim he fulfilled his promise and if it gets overturned the GOP is to blame.

Yep. That’s the bitch of it.

[jon-nyc]

Yeah, especially since they banked it mentally.

It’s one thing for the Dems to say “your loans would be forgiven if it weren’t for these damn republicans voting against it”. It’s another if they get it and plan around having it for four months and the the GOP takes it out of their hands.

[LuFins Dad]

If Congressional R’s were smart, they would start working on some comprehensive student loan reform that did include some sort of relief and would have lasting benefit.

[LuFins Dad]

Stop Interest Capitalization on Federally Subsidized Loans. Forbid capitalization on private loans from Approved Lenders.

Cap interest rates from approved lenders at 10%

Make student debt interest dischargeable in bankruptcy.

Revamp the GI Bill, include some non-military options and promote retroactive options… Just graduated from with a bachelors in engineering but buried in debt already? Welcome to the Army Corps of Engineers… We’ll pay off your debt and you will make a living. Hell, we’ll even help with graduate school… Today’s military needs college grads more than high school grads…

Expand the Pell Grant program income eligibility and amounts for students going to 2 year trade schools. Push the hell out of that program.

[LuFins Dad]

And yes, forgive student loans that have paid as much in interest as they have in principle.

[jon-nyc]

@LuFins-Dad said in Student loan cancellation:

If Congressional R’s were smart, they would start working on some comprehensive student loan reform that did include some sort of relief and would have lasting benefit.

Hate to break it to you….