CV NEWS FEED // In a recent op-ed published by Reason, legal expert Ilya Somin argues that the likelihood of President Biden’s latest student loan forgiveness plan advancing has significantly decreased in wake of two federal district court rulings.
In Missouri v. Biden, and Alaska v. Department of Education (formerly Kansas v. Biden) Judges Daniel Crabtree of the District of Kansas and John A. Ross of the Eastern District of Missouri both ruled against Biden’s SAVE Plan, which would have discharged at least $156 billion of federal backed student loan debt, according to Somin.
“President Biden’s new large-scale student loan forgiveness plan had a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day,” the Georgetown law professor wrote in the June 24 article, citing two separate rulings which occurred on the same day by two Barack Obama-appointed judges.
“That makes it hard to argue the decisions were a result of ideological or partisan bias, and is a very bad sign for the Administration’s chances of prevailing on appeal,” he wrote.
Although the two judges maintained slight differences in their rulings, Somin explained that both courts issued a nationwide preliminary injunction on the SAVE plan due to a “compelling need” as Judge Crabtree put it, for the Biden administration to adopt uniformity in its student loan programs.
Furthermore, though the rulings were only preliminary injunctions, Somin notes that both judges expressed dubiousness at the prospect of the plan holding up in future proceedings.
“The Biden Administration will surely appeal both rulings. But the fact they lost at the trial court level in both cases, despite litigating them before liberal Democratic appointees, is a strong indication they will face an uphill struggle.”
