Biden’s student loan forgiveness plan takes hits from federal court

Student loan borrowers are now facing an undetermined amount of time in order to know if they will receive debt relief after a federal judge in Texas stated that Biden’s relief plan was illegal. Wikicommons

Ever since President Joe Biden’s administration announced that student loan relief was on its way, there has been a mixed response from the general public regarding this decision.

However, once the plan was announced officially and the application opened for students to fill out, it faced lots of backlash from many politicians who questioned its legality.

U.S. District Judge Mark Pittman, the Texas federal judge, ruled against Biden’s plan on Nov. 10, calling it “unlawful.” Pittman claims that Biden did not follow the proper federal procedures to allow for public comment before the plan’s official announcement. The lawsuit claims that the federal procedure that was not followed through was regarding Biden not seeking public comment before announcing the plan officially. 

Miguel Cardona, the U.S. secretary of education, released a statement on Nov. 11 following the court’s ruling of the loan forgiveness plan.

"We believe strongly that the Biden-Harris Student Debt Relief Plan is lawful and necessary to give borrowers and working families breathing room as they recover from the pandemic and to ensure they succeed when repayment restarts,” Cardona said in the statement. 

As of now, people who have applied and are being considered for the program will have to wait for the results of the court case ruling. The ruling is stated to take up to several months, and the Department of Education urges applicants to sign up for updates to keep up-to-date with the results once they’re made public. 

However, Biden is currently calling on the Supreme Court to interject into the dispute that has been occurring for the last several months against the debt forgiveness plan.

During this pause, 200,000 loan borrowers are set to receive a total of $6 billion in debt relief. 

Madeline Harris is a sophomore creative producing major at Chapman who has not taken out student loans for higher education.

“I think that it is upsetting that the process has been paused, and I do not think that should be happening,” Harris told The Panther. “The longer that it is blocked, the worse things will get financially for students.”

Ashlee Levien is a Chapman alumna who graduated this past spring with a bachelor’s in TV writing and production. Levien will not be relying on the student loan forgiveness plan to pay back her student loans. 

“I’m very glad to see that the transfer of student loans from those who took them out to other taxpayers who already paid off their loans or did not take any out has been put on hold,” Levien said. “It is very dangerous to allow presidents to use power they do not constitutionally have, and I think this is a great example of how our checks and balance system works.”