President Joe Biden quickly responded to the Supreme Court last week calling for him to end his “student loan forgiveness” under the so-called “HEROES” (Higher Education Relief Opportunities for Students) Act of 2003, and his move will see him drop the HEROES tack and shift to “forgiveness” via a 1965 federal statute.
In the case of “Biden et al, v Nebraska et al” the Supreme Court last week ruled in favor of the government of Nebraska in its attempt to stop Biden’s Department of Education from continuing to suspend demand for college loan payments. The Nebraska legal team (the state is partner to a corporation handling student loans) argued that because the “national health emergency” Donald Trump unconstitutionally invoked in March of 2020 was called to an end by Biden earlier this year, the already-shoehorned HEROES Act (ideally supposed to apply to military personnel) no longer can be used as a justification to stop collecting government-dealt college loans.
The majority on the Supreme Court agreed, and that send the Biden Administration scrambling to continue their welfarist practice of making us taxpayers cover the student loan obligations of other people.
Misty Severi reports for The Washington Examiner:
“Biden said his next move would be through the use of the 1965 Higher Education Act, which gives Education Secretary Miguel Cardona the authority to ‘compromise, waive, or release any right, title, claim, lien, or demand, however acquired, including any equity or any right of redemption.’”
And so, rather than demand repayment of the loans the feds gave to millions of students over the years, Biden wants Cardona to “waive” or “release” the recipients from obligation to pay…
And make us and our progeny pay.
Related: Obama Admin. Hid the Coming Tsunami of College Loan Defaults | MRCTV
In fact, this shift in policy is far more disastrous for us taxpayers, because under the HEROES rationale, Biden and his pals only could delay payment. Now, they can do much more.
Severi notes that, under this new paradigm, Ed Sec Cardona already has…
“…finalized a repayment plan that includes lowering the amount of money borrowers need to repay in each check, cutting the amount from 10% to 5% of their discretionary income. It will also allow many borrowers to make $0 monthly payments, and it will not charge borrowers unpaid monthly interest if they make their monthly payment, according to a White House Fact Sheet.”
And, that’s not all. The new Biden plan, enacted completely through Executive Branch so-called “authority,” will see federal mandates applied to corporations like the Nebraska loan company that was part of the recent Supreme Court focus:
“Another change is the creation of a 12-month ‘on-ramp repayment program’ that will remove the threat of default for loan recipients who are unable to pay their bills. The Department of Education will not refer those borrowers who miss payments to credit agencies for a year as they readjust to making payments again.”
How nice. Nothing is as reassuring to state-level politicians and the corporations with which they work than imagining the prospect of another year of non-payments that cannot even be handled by credit agencies. It’s very easy to balance the books with that new factor, there.
But why get angry? This is to help! It’s a way to make loan recipients more comfortable, after not having to pay for three years. That must be a very trying experience, right?
“The White House encouraged borrowers to repay the loans if they can, but it said the new repayment program was to help borrowers adjust after the three-year repayment pause during the COVID-19 pandemic.”
Here’s what’s missed in the Biden White house, and, in fact, in the entire debate about the college loans and the HEROES act.
First. The HEROES Act.
There is no enumerated power in the U.S. Constitution that allows the feds to reshape, rework, pay for, or subsidize the payment of private loans in the U.S. As then-Congressman David Crockett explained circa 1830, handing out money in such a manner is not allowed by the so-called “rules” of the Constitution and it would require an amendment to make it so.
Second. The feds do not have any power to handle student loans at all. They cannot issue them, adopt them, or subsidize them. They cannot make rules as to how private loans will be issued if there were private loans in question, and they cannot claim any moral prerogative to rob from Peter to pay Paul’s college debt or reduce his penalties.
Third. The President cannot call an “emergency,” period.
In times of international conflict or conflict with violent agents from outside the U.S., the Congress can Declare War, or issue Letters of Marque and Reprisal in order to let the President hire mercenaries to fight non-state adversaries.
Related: Biden Expands Taxpayer Bailouts Of Student Loans | MRCTV
Within the U.S., there is no such thing as a federally declared “emergency,” and the closest one can come to anything resembling that general situation appears in Article Four, Section Four, which you and I can read, and so can the feds, if they want to bother abiding by their so-called “rule book.” It states:
“The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence.”
To pretend that anyone on the federal level can simply “declare an emergency” and suspend the Constitution is to play in a dangerous fantasy world. Likewise, to believe that there can be such a thing as a “Secretary of Education” is to delude oneself.
I have spelled out the dark, delusional history of U.S. involvement in college tuition and college loans here. Doubtless the Biden Administration would not like you to do so, but please feel free to read it and to share it with students.
After all, if many of these students are going to be enjoying lighter loan burdens, thanks to us, perhaps we can offer them something truthful about the servitude in which the Biden Administration would like to place us.
All to help the students, of course.
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— MRCTV (@mrctv) July 6, 2023