This week, the Biden-Harris administration filed a brief with the Supreme Court in the legal challenge to its student loan forgiveness program, which is on hold until the high court issues a decision on the matter later this year.
In a recent interview with the Grio, Education Secretary Miguel Cardona expressed extreme confidence that the administration will succeed against the two legal challenges that might prevent millions of qualifying borrowers from getting up to $20,000 in student loan forgiveness.
Student Loan Forgiveness Update
The head of the United States Department of Education stated that it is unfortunate that conservatives are challenging a program that, according to him, tries to provide desperately needed help to Americans, particularly Black borrowers.
Republican elected leaders are preventing us from providing aid to the American people at a time when we know we cannot leave them worse off than before the outbreak, added Cardona.
On Wednesday, the Department of Justice submitted the administration’s Supreme Court brief.
The Department of Justice claimed that the HEROES Act of 2003 allowed Education Secretary Cardona the legal right to issue debt relief for millions of Americans owing to the COVID-19 pandemic. The HEROES Act gives the secretary of education the legal ability to waive authority to respond to war or other military action or national disaster.
Read more: Student Loan Forgiveness: What do you need to know to settle your debt this year?
Department Of Justice Prevents Previous Ruling
However, the Justice Department is asking the Supreme Court to overturn past illegal verdicts from Texas and Missouri.
In a case brought by the Job Creators Network Foundation, a federal judge in Texas invalidated the White House’s student debt assistance program last year.
The claim, filed in the U.S District Court for the Northern District of Texas, asserts that the plaintiffs were deprived of their right to due process under the Administrative Procedure Act when they were denied the opportunity to object to the relocation during the comment period.
In addition, Missouri led Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska, and South Carolina in filing a lawsuit challenging the program on the grounds that the Department of Education lacks the power to erase debt to this extent.
The lower courts’ orders have erroneously deprived the Secretary of his statutory authority to provide targeted student-loan debt relief to borrowers affected by national emergencies, leaving millions of economically vulnerable borrowers in limbo, the Department of Justice wrote in a filing on Wednesday.
Read more: Student loan forgiveness: What to do amid blockade of Biden administration’s program?