The Supreme Court of the United States will examine this Tuesday a file opposing the administration of Joe Biden and six American states on a decision of the president to cancel the debts of tens of millions of students of the country who live in financial difficulties.
The Biden administration is once again blocked by its opponents. The American president announced several months ago the cancellation of student loans up to $ 20,000, one of his campaign promises, to relieve young people in financial difficulty since the Covid-19 pandemic. A decision blocked since after six American states, with a Republican majority, took legal action against this measure.
From this Tuesday, the Supreme Court of the United States will therefore examine two of these legal proceedings, in particular that opposing Joe Biden to the State of Nebraska. The six states opposed to this measure (Nebraska, Missouri, Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas and South Carolina) believe that the American president greatly exceeds his authority and cannot, on his own, decide on the cancellation of the loans of millions of Americans (between 30 and 45 million, according to the American press).
Public scholarships are no longer enough, says joe biden
Joe Biden announced in August his intention to cancel debts of less than $20,000 for all students receiving the Pell Scholarship, a means-tested grant paid by the federal government to help students finance their studies, and up to $10,000 for others.
The Democratic administration justified this decision in particular by the fact that the average cost of university studies, private and public, had almost tripled in forty years. According to the White House, the Pell Grant now only covers a third of the total cost of a four-year public college degree, whereas they once “covered almost 80%” of the cost of the degree, according to a official statement.
The government is relying on the 2003 “Heroes Act,” which allowed the US Department of Education to modify the federal student loan system in the event of a national emergency, a law that arose from the September 11 terrorist attack 2001 to provide relief to those taking out student loans affected by the attacks.
Opponents of this measure believe that Joe Biden is using the Covid-19 crisis as a pretext, and that this plan would cause significant financial damage, in particular a loss of profits for the companies which manage federal student loans.
federal state VS federated states
According to the New York Times, the subject of the Supreme Court’s review will not be so much whether the Biden administration has the right to carry out this measure, but rather whether the states have the power to do so. sue the federal government for its political agenda.
The decision of the highest US court would be much more important than the question of student loans, because it could set a precedent on the question of the power of the president against that of the states. In addition, according to the American newspaper, the lawsuits of the States against federal programs remain rare in American history. This decision of the Supreme Court could also further weaken the American president if it is unfavorable to him, while the latter plans to represent himself in 2024.
The Supreme Court, with a Republican majority, will announce its decision only in several weeks, on a date which has not yet been made public.
