The US Supreme Court has blocked President Biden’s plan to forgive student loan debt for more than 40 million Americans.
The ruling was 6-3, with the three liberal justices dissenting.
His plan, announced last year, would have forgiven up to $10,000 (£7,800) per borrower, and $20,000 in some cases.
Soon after it was announced, lower courts blocked it – leaving millions of borrowers in limbo.
The US Supreme Court also ruled in favour of a website designer who refused to serve a same-sex couple due to her religious beliefs.
The court argues the First Amendment, which protects free speech, blocks Colorado from forcing the designer to create endorsing messages with which she disagrees.
Chief Justice John Roberts, speaking for the majority, says the Biden administration created a “novel” and “fundamentally different” loan forgiveness programme than the Heroes Act intended.
The “modifications” by the Department of Education, he adds, “expanded forgiveness to nearly every borrower in the country”.
The forgiveness plan had relied on the 9/11-era law allowing the Secretary of Education to “waive or modify” student financial assistance programs as deemed “necessary in connection with a war or other military operation or national emergency”.
Roberts rejects the federal government’s claim that the act also gives it the power to “waive” legal provisions, arguing the debt relief waiver “does not remotely resemble how it has been used on prior occasions”.
BBC
