- The Supreme Court is set this week to decide on Biden's student-loan forgiveness.
- Since November, the relief has been paused because of two conservative-backed lawsuits.
It's a big week for millions of student-loan borrowers.
The Supreme Court is entering the last week of its term, and it's set to hand down all remaining decisions on pending cases. That means borrowers banking on President Joe Biden's plan to cancel up to $20,000 in student debt will likely soon find out whether they will resume payments this fall with a reduction to their balances — or if they'll be thrown back into repayment without any relief.
The earliest the high court could hand down a decision on the student-debt-relief plan is Tuesday, with the option for additional decision days to be added for the rest of the week.
Since November, Biden's loan-forgiveness plan has been paused because of two conservative-backed lawsuits seeking to permanently block the relief from reaching borrowers. One of the lawsuits, US Department of Education v. Brown, was brought on by two student-loan borrowers who sued because they didn't qualify for the full $20,000 in relief. And the other lawsuit, Biden v. Nebraska, was filed by six GOP-led states who argued the debt relief would hurt their states' tax revenues, along with the revenue of the student-loan company MOHELA.
The Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the cases in February, and the issue of standing dominated questioning. Even before a court decides whether the challenged policy is legal, it must determine whether the plaintiffs have standing and can validly sue the government, meaning the plaintiff must prove the policy would injure them, that the injury directly traced back to the defendant, and that the relief they're seeking would address those injuries.
Liberal justices, along with the conservative Justice Amy Coney Barrett, scrutinized whether the states had standing to sue the federal government. One major sticking point is whether the states can involve MOHELA in their lawsuit, as the student-loan company denied involvement in the case.
And recent rulings from the Supreme Court shed light on how justices are taking a stricter look at standing issues. In separate decisions authored by the conservative Justice Brett Kavanaugh and Barrett, two cases brought on by states were struck down because the justices ruled the states did not have the standing to sue the federal government. While the details of those cases are different from the student-loan cases, there are some strong similarities to the standing questions raised by the justices in oral arguments.
For example, in Haaland v. Brackeen, Texas was among the petitioners that challenged the Indian Child Welfare Act of 1978. Barrett wrote in her opinion: "We reject all of petitioners' challenges to the statute, some on the merits and others for lack of standing.
"That should make the issue open and shut."
And Kavanaugh's opinion concerned the United States v. Texas, in which Texas sued the Department of Homeland Security and accused it of violating federal law over the treatment of non-US citizens who entered the country illegally. The decision said that Texas didn't have standing in the suit, as the federal immigration policy didn't directly harm the state. Kavanaugh wrote that the court's "precedents and longstanding historical practice establish that the States' suit here is not the kind redressable by a federal court."
Of course, it's unclear whether the Supreme Court will handle the student-debt-cancellation cases in the same manner. And regardless of the decision, the Education Department has confirmed student-loan payments will resume in October, with interest beginning to accrue again on borrowers' balances in September. The department has yet to comment on a backup plan for relief in the event of an adverse decision, but some Democratic lawmakers have said they're prepared to fight for borrowers no matter the outcome.
"We are prepared in the event of any outcome in this ruling," Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York said last week. "We are here to fight, and we are here to make sure, and encourage, and have the president's back, in making sure that this cancellation goes through for the millions of people in the United States."