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The US Supreme Court on Friday blocked President Joe Biden's plan to cancel $430 billion in student loan debt, which would benefit 43 million Americans.
In a 6-3 decision, the justices ruled against President Biden's plan and in favor of six conservative-leaning states that had opposed it. The court action dealt a blow to the 26 million Americans who have taken out student loans and applied for debt relief since President Biden announced the program in August 2022, until last November, when several courts low, blocked it. The decision is also seen as a political setback for the Democratic president.
Meanwhile, states Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska and South Carolina have filed lawsuits against President Biden's plan. The lawsuit was also filed by two people who had received student loans and did not qualify for relief, according to the criteria of the plan.
Mr. Biden's plan was a fulfillment of his 2020 campaign promise to cancel some of the $1.6 trillion in debt that students and alumni owe the federal government. But Republicans called it an overreach by the president that would unfairly benefit some rather than all student loan borrowers. The court decision comes at a time when President Biden has launched the campaign to be re-elected in 2024.
Under the president's plan, the government would forgive up to $10,000 in student debt for Americans making less than $125,000 a year, as well as $20,000 for recipients of Pell grants, which are awarded to students from low-income families. .
The decision came a day after the Supreme Court blocked the use of race as a factor in US university admissions, a policy aimed at increasing the number of underrepresented black, Hispanic or other minority students. President Biden said Thursday that the court, with its conservative majority, was an institution uninformed about the country's fundamental values.
During arguments on the student loan issue in February, the Biden administration said the plan was based on a 2003 federal law called the Higher Education Student Aid Opportunities Act, which gives the secretary of education to "remove or modify" financial aid for students in times of war, or national emergencies.
Both President Biden and his Republican predecessor, Donald Trump, relied on this act in 2020 to temporarily suspend payments on student loans, or the accumulation of interest during that period, as a measure to ease the financial problems they are facing. students faced during the COVID-19 pandemic.
According to a survey conducted in March by the agency "Reuters" and the center "Ipsos", about 53% of Americans support President Biden's plan to ease the student financial burden, while 45% are against it. Respondents are sharply divided by party affiliation, with Democrats broadly supporting it and Republicans generally opposed./ VOA
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