The Huffington Post looks at the case to be argued Feb. 28, 2023….
The case can be argued as plain effort to limit Presidential ‘Executive Power’ ….
Or?
Can individual states and individual’s derail President’s actions, even they are NOT actually effected….
Or?
Can a company stop a President’s action because they simply ‘lose money’?
The decsion will affect 40 Million or so American’s looking for economic relief….
The Supreme Court is slated to soon decide the financial fortunes of over 40 million Americans who are in line for significant student loan relief, when it hears arguments on the legality of President Joe Biden’s plan to provide targeted relief to student loan borrowers.
On Feb. 28, the court is expected to hear arguments about whether the millions of Americans eligible for up to $20,000 in student-loan debt forgiveness should get that relief, or whether they should be forced to continue to pay their loans.
With a six-vote conservative supermajority, it seems unlikely that the court would rule to uphold a sweeping executive-branch action by a Democratic administration that involves the redistribution of money from lenders to debtors. But there may be a way for at least some of the court’s conservatives to preserve the debt relief program while achieving a conservative goal.
The most likely way the program would survive the challenges presented in two cases — Biden v. Nebraska and Department of Education v. Brown — is if the outcome turns on the question of standing; that is, whether the parties suing to challenge the program can prove it harms them, and that they are the relevant party being harmed. If the court decides that the six states and two individuals suing the administration lack standing, the justices will not need to actually decide whether the program is legal….
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Despite their own belief that the administration’s debt relief plan is “unlawful,” Bray and Baude argue that none of the states or people filing suit can properly prove they would be harmed by the program. And if the court were to grant standing, it would further expand the ability of states to bring lawsuits to force or block executive actions ― something three of the conservative justices opposed in the 2007 case Massachusetts v. EPA, where the court gave the state “special solicitude” to sue to require the government to regulate carbon emissions….
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Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska and South Carolina claimed that they would lose tax revenue due to a 2021 law that exempts student-loan debt discharges from being calculated as “gross income.” These states allege they would lose tax revenue because they tie their own state tax definitions of “gross income” to the IRS’s definition.
However, court precedent says that a state cannot allege a harm from an act that is self-inflicted. It was the individual choice of Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska and South Carolina to tie their state tax codes to the federal tax code….
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If the court were to accept such a theory, it would give “any lender” the standing to sue to block “any regulation that reduced the income of any of its borrowers,” Bray and Baude argue ― adding that “such a theory should not be taken more seriously here.”
The conservative justices may ultimately rule in favor of standing, as they have in a number of post-Massachusetts v. EPA cases where states made similar arguments. If they do, then the case would come down to whether the relief program is legal, or if it is not allowed under the court’s “major questions doctrine” that limits expansive regulatory actions that affect the economy. But standing is the best bet the Biden administration has to keep its plan intact, even if it comes with collateral damage….