High court hears arguments on Biden’s student loan debt plan

Oral arguments got underway at the Supreme Court Tuesday morning over President Biden’s plan to wipe away billions of dollars in federal school loan debt for millions of Americans. 

The court’s six-member conservative majority took up the giveaway, which has already been blocked by Republican-appointed judges in lower courts, in a closely watched case that will test the extent of the executive branch’s authority. 

The program, a 2020 campaign promise by Biden, is estimated to cost $400 billion over the next 30 years.

It would forgive up to $10,000 in federal student debt for Americans earning under $125,000 and up to $20,000 for recipients of Pell Grants. 

Already 26 million people have applied to have their school debt wiped out and 16 million have been approved. 

Biden, speaking at a Black History Month event Monday at the White House, said he was confident his administration has the “legal authority” to move ahead with the program. 

The president announced his debt forgiveness plan in August using as a basis a 2003 federal law called the Higher Education Relief Opportunities for Students Act, or HEROES Act, that protects federal student loan borrowers during a national emergency. 

The White House contends the COVID-19 pandemic is such an emergency — despite Biden declaring the outbreak “over” in a September “60 Minutes” interview — and the announcement came after both the Biden and Trump administrations repeatedly paused federal student loan payments and stopped interest from accruing.

But the program was immediately challenged in the courts.

Six Republican-led states — Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska and South Carolina — and two student loan borrowers claim the Biden White House overstepped its authority to cancel the debt. 

Missouri said canceling the debt would deprive it of much-needed revenue, and the other states claim the plan would provide a “windfall” to the borrowers that would make them better off than before the pandemic. 

With Post wires