WASHINGTON — Judge Amy Coney Barrett on Thursday dismissed a challenge to President Biden’s student debt relief package by a Wisconsin taxpayers’ association that said he exceeded his authority by passing the sweeping measure, which could cost the government hundreds of billions of dollars.
Judge Barrett dismissed the association’s challenge without comment, which is the court’s custom of deciding emergency applications. She acted alone, without referring the request to the whole court, and she did not ask for a response from the administration. These two movements indicated that the request was not based on solid legal grounds.
Although she did not say so, Judge Barrett most likely dismissed the claim because the plaintiff, the Brown County Taxpayers Association, did not appear to have demonstrated that it had suffered direct harm giving it standing to sue.
The association argued Mr Biden had exceeded his authority under a 2003 federal law that allows the Secretary of Education to change student financial aid programs ‘in connection with a war or other military operation or national emergency”.
The plan forgives $10,000 of debt for those earning less than $125,000 a year and $20,000 for those who had received Pell grants for low-income families. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said last month it estimated the plan’s price tag at $400 billion. White House officials said the cost could be lower because fewer borrowers than expected could apply for the relief.
Learn more about student debt relief
- A legal challenge: Six Republican-led states have sued to block President Biden’s student loan forgiveness plan, accusing him of grossly overstepping his authority.
- The price of the plan: Mr. Biden’s plan could cost around $400 billion, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said, making it one of the most expensive programs on the president’s agenda.
- A hard sell: At the White House and aboard Air Force One, supporters of debt cancellation have made strenuous efforts to win over Mr. Biden. Here’s how he finally gave in.
- Who will benefit? : The big winners from Mr. Biden’s plan are not wealthy Harvard and Yale graduates, as many critics claim. It’s middle class – and disproportionately young and black.
Federal District Court Judge William C. Griesbach in Green Bay, Wisconsin, dismissed the case without determining whether Mr. Biden acted lawfully. Instead, Judge Griesbach, who was appointed by President George W. Bush, ruled that the association had failed to prove it had standing to sue.
The Supreme Court said that simply paying taxes does not give plaintiffs the right to challenge government programs. “If every federal taxpayer could bring a lawsuit challenging any government expenditure, federal courts would cease to function as courts and function as general complaints offices,” Judge Samuel A. Alito Jr. wrote in 2007.
The court created a narrow exception for certain religious disputes, although Judge Griesbach noted that even this exception “has been the subject of much criticism.”
He rejected the group’s request to expand the exception to allow the challenge of the student loan program. “This court certainly does not have the power to do so,” he wrote.
Judge Griesbach also considered whether an injunction stopping the program would be justified even if the challenger had standing. If the administration acted illegally, he wrote, people who get debt relief could again be held liable for canceled debts.
“A future administration may not be bound” by the Biden administration’s agenda, the judge wrote, “and may seek to collect allegedly canceled debts.” Judge Griesbach added that “those looking to take advantage of the program” may want to “consider the possibility before placing undue reliance on the promised benefits.”
A three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit in Chicago declined to intervene in an unsigned and unreasoned order. Judge Barrett oversees this circuit, and emergency requests for its rulings are directed to him in the first instance.
In its motion, the association argued that the sums at stake warranted a relaxation of the permanent rules. “We are witnessing a gargantuan increase in the national debt accomplished by a complete disregard for limitations on the constitutional power to spend,” the association’s lawyers wrote.
They added: “The argument that a president can unilaterally cancel the debt owed to the US Treasury through an executive order, and that no one has standing to challenge it, threatens the very foundations of a constitutional republic.