The Pelican Institute for Public Policy, a conservative think tank based in New Orleans, has filed a lawsuit against the Biden administration on behalf of Louisiana Attorney Tommy Badeaux, claiming student loan debt cancellation is illegal.
“This involves half a trillion dollars of public debt, debt that’s owned by the taxpayers, and typically something of that magnitude would go through Congress, but this all occurred in secret and that’s not the way our laws and Constitution are designed,” said Pelican Institute’s special counsel James Baehr.
The Biden administration cites the 2003 HEROES Act as its authority to cancel student loan debt. Baehr said the HEROES Act is designed to help members of the military dealing with war or a national emergency.
“And it allowed the Secretary of Education to waive and modify some debt obligations. It was never intended to justify mass cancellation of half a trillion dollars of public debt,” said Baehr.
Baehr said the Biden Administration cites the COVID pandemic as the emergency to grant student loan debt forgiveness for civilians.
Baehr said they are challenging the process the Biden Administration used to cancel the debt not the act of forgiveness itself.
“A lot of people obviously think this is a good thing, but there are a lot of good things that people think the president might be able to do, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t have to go through the process and follow the rules,” said Baehr.
He said a number of lawsuits have been filed by different people over student loan debt forgiveness on the grounds of a variety of theories.
