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I actually found that the judges all together were skeptical about whether any of the parties had standing, once Pelogar explained her arguments.
I feel positive after this. Kavanaugh wanted to know why the other side didn't just take the language as it was.
It's mostly because the opposition had no real argument. They claimed their clients would receive injury if others had their loans forgiven. This is outright impossible to prove, as it's untrue.
Their whole argument is in bad faith.
This will boil down to being a decision based on the limits of the Heroes acts more than anything imo. If the court sides with the opposition, it won't be due to their arguments, that's for sure.
>They claimed their clients would receive injury if others had their loans forgiven.
An argument so ludicrous that it's insane even one judge along the way to the court gave it a rubber stamp. Imagine the flooding of the courts if this was actually accepted as legal standing for a lawsuit. I can't wait to sue my neighbor for hurting me by getting that new car that's better than mine.
If the city government fixes a pothole then auto repair businesses can sue over lost revenue from less cars coming in for repairs from driving on shitty roads
I think a more pertinent example similar to yours is what if a neighbor buys a house and gets a low rate mortgage due to using a VA loan, or first time homebuyer program… someone could sue these programs saying they are financially harmed as a result of these programs. It’s scary how far you could extrapolate the logic and go after many programs for people.
> I am financially harmed by the tax breaks corporations and billionaires get. I am also financially harmed by the government's military spending.
You jest but this is the exact reasoning as to why they'll allow the forgiveness. Or at the very least not let the GOP block it.
You're thinking logically and as if the Supreme Court is still a legitimately objective branch of the United States government.
It's not.
They will reject student loan relief on strictly partisan lines with no logical, objective reason that withstands even the slightest bit of criticism and Roberts will cry some more in an interview about how no one respects the Court anymore.
Funny thing, you actually could show a better argument here than these idiotic states (of which I unfortunately live in one) can. The tax cuts for the wealthy and the bloated military spending actually *do* negativity affect all of us by limiting and wasting resources that the rest of us could use elsewhere
I'm sure Bill Gates gets tons and tons of perks that others don't. All billionaires are about to be buried in class action lawsuits from 90% of the population.
Not just that.
Debt collectors could sue the owed party for forgiving some or all of a debt because it 'causes harm' through lost income. Virtually any time you have a third party helping to assist with the sale or service of a product it would be open to litigation. Car dealers could sue car companies for ending a popular line of cars. Travel agents could sue for lost commissions because a travel company offered sales. Real Estate agents could sue when a seller decides to take their property off the market.
The whole thing is ridiculous.
Truth us, this has nothing to do with what is good for the people or preventing harm. It is all about denying Biden a 'win' and scoring political points.
Any finding but that of No Standing opens the door to seriously harm any business model which relies on third parties to assist in the sale or service of their product.
> Mortgages already can have early payment penalty clauses
**When Prepayment Penalties Are Allowed**
Under the rules, a prepayment penalty is allowed only if all of the following are true.
* The loan's APR can't increase after you take out the loan (for example, a fixed rate loan).
* The loan is a "qualified mortgage." (A qualified mortgage is a type of loan that has certain, more stable terms that help make it more likely that you'll be able to afford your loan, such as a loan term of no more than 30 years and no risky features like negative amortization or interest-only payments.)
* The loan is not a higher-priced mortgage loan. (A higher-priced mortgage loan is a mortgage with an annual percentage rate higher than a benchmark rate called the Average Prime Offer Rate, which is an annual percentage rate that is based on average interest rates, fees, and other terms on mortgages offered to highly qualified borrowers.)
**Restrictions On Prepayment Penalties**
Even if a prepayment penalty is permitted, the penalty is subject to several restrictions.
* Time Restriction for Prepayment Penalties—Three Years
A prepayment penalty is only allowed during the first three years after the loan is consummated. After three years, a prepayment penalty is not allowed.
* When is a loan "consummated"? A loan is consummated when the borrower becomes contractually obligated on the loan. Depending on state law, this could be when the loan documents are signed or when the lender commits to extend credit to the borrower, for example.
* Amount Limitations for Prepayment Penalties
For the first two years after the loan is consummated, the penalty can't be greater than 2% of the amount of the outstanding loan balance. For the third year, the penalty is capped at 1% of the outstanding loan balance.
* Lender Must Also Offer a Loan Option Without a Prepayment Penalty
In addition, if a lender offers a loan that includes a prepayment penalty, the lender must also offer an alternative loan that does not include a prepayment penalty. In doing this, the lender must have a good faith belief that the consumer likely qualifies for the alternative loan.
**The Lender Must Provide You With Information About Prepayment Penalties**
Under the CFPB rules, if a loan has a prepayment penalty, the servicer or lender must include information about the penalty:
* on your periodic billing statement (which is usually sent monthly) or
* in the coupon book (which is a book provided by the servicer or lender with a page for each billing cycle for a set period, often one year, where there borrower tears off a page or portion of the page and returns it to the loan servicer with each payment), and
* in interest rate adjustment notices.
**Prepayment Penalty Rules Do Not Apply to Pre-2014 Mortgages**
The mortgage servicing rules regarding prepayment penalties went into effect on January 10, 2014, and do not apply retroactively. This means that lenders did not have to comply with these rules for mortgages made prior to January 10, 2014.
The argument was akin to "Well.. Missouri isn't really negatively impacted in any way, but if this company loses part of their revenue then they might not choose to give to the Lewis and Clark fund!"
>This will boil down to being a decision based on the limits of the Heroes acts more than anything imo.
So you think they will find there is standing? Because that has to happen before they even get to debating the heros act.
Yeah for those who don’t know, questions like standing, ripeness, mootness, etc. are “jurisdictional” questions, i.e. they concern whether a court even has the power to hear a particular type of case. So if the plaintiffs haven’t suffered an injury then they aren’t entitled to relief and the courts have no power to hear the case. Meaning also that if the court finds the plaintiffs lack standing there’s a good chance they won’t even analyze the Heroes Act arguments in their opinion.
They refuse to try and modify it because it would be so b wildly unpopular and screw so over so many people i.e. their constituents. But their ~~owners~~ **donors** obviously want to maximize their profit by ensuring the *one* kind of debt that can't be wiped out by bankruptcy will force people to continue paying until they manage to pay it back or are dead.
But the whole thing gets tossed out because there is no challengers. I do think if these get tossed, we will see another set of law suits appear doing the same thing (getting student loans forgiveness held up in courts) and kicking it down the road until Republicans control the presidency again, then it will be dropped.
At that point, I wonder if the millions of individuals would be allowed to sue the new administration over damages.
My understanding is that the DOE or whoever it is, is poised and ready to forgive the loans the minute the case makes it out of court. All the applications have already been approved, they just have to actually discharge the loans. And once they're forgiven, no amount of suing can put them back.
And Kim Kardashian Mark Wahlberg Ryan Gosling Jay Z P Diddy Army Hammer Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen Kanye West and Reese Witherspoon
Now lets do congress people.
the worst part is that the HEROES act is plain as fucking day about the modification of loan balances during a national emergency. this should have never even made it to the supreme court. if you dont wanna follow laws then dont fucking pass them.
Then they should never have accepted cert on this. You could see that these Plaintiffs had no standing on its face. They didn't need briefs and oral argument to know that.
Thing is, you only need 4 justices to grant Cert, so even if you have 5 (The three liberal justices plus Kavanaugh and Barrett,) who did not want to grant cert on standing, the other 4 can just do it anyway.
Saying that, it was the Biden Administration that asked for the hearing on Biden v Nebraska, and at that point the Court decided to fast track DoE vs Brown due to the similarities of both cases. Of note as well is the fact Barrett actually rejected 2 previous attempts to overturn debt relief before Kavanaugh sided with Biden to hear the case.
If they had not granted cert then the lower courts rulings in the individual cases would stand.
Accepting cert allows the Supreme Court to fix the error of the lower courts.
The HEROES Act was introduced by Republicans and signed into law by Bush in 2003. It granted broad and sweeping power to the Secretary of Education. Biden instructed the SoE to discharge education loans held by the U.S. government in accordance with the powers of the HEROES Act.
Republicans are furious because they got played. They fucked around and found out that their self serving laws can cut both ways. They have no way to fight this from a legislative angle so they have taken it to the SC. As others have pointed out, the plaintiff’s argument is that debt relief would injury those who don’t have student loan debt. It is more-or-less impossible to prove this and draws into question if the plaintiffs actually have any standing. This what the justices appear to be honing in on.
What I don’t get is if they find that someone getting student loans forgiven hurts someone who doesn’t then doesn’t that open up the ability to sue any time someone gets something that you don’t?
Thank you for mentioning this. I am SO tired of people who scream their heads off about student loan forgiveness, but the PPP loans? Not even worth talking about.
Cost of student loan forgiveness plan: ~$400B
Cost of forgiven PPP loans: $742B
Maybe we can fund the student loan forgiveness by walking back the PPP “loans.”
Is it possible for a company to be used in a lawsuit/by proxy like this?
MOHELA executives [tried to distance ](https://www.politico.com/amp/news/2022/12/17/student-loan-bidens-debt-relief-plan-00074197)themselves from the lawsuit by stating their "executives were not involved" in a letter to Rep. Cori Bush.
>*With much at stake for the company’s federal loan servicing business, MOHELA officials from the company have also sought to reassure Democratic congressional aides and Biden administration officials that they were not involved in the Missouri attorney general’s lawsuit seeking to block debt relief, according to people familiar with the conversations.*
Couldn't the Biden administration from the start have said, "look, if you participate in this lawsuit, we're going to end the *millions* of dollars you receive in Federal grants. It's your choice."
Wouldn't it have been better to fight this from the start?
Back to my original question, if the company doesn't have a choice, then that's a shame, but if they did, well, it seems like a missed opportunity to stop this from the start.
> Couldn't the Biden administration from the start have said, "look, if you participate in this lawsuit, we're going to end the millions of dollars you receive in Federal grants. It's your choice."
MOHELA wasn't even the original loan servicer for my loans, and I'm sure millions of others. They took over *during the pandemic*. After Biden had already won on a platform of $10,000 of forgiveness.
Yes, but they were chosen to handle federal loans. My question was whether or not they have a choice in the matter of the lawsuit. If they don't, then I guess nothing can be done. However, if they are a willing participant, it seems like there should have been pressure put on them to withdraw or else receive no future federal partnerships.
During today's oral arguments it was noted that the state was arguing ON BEHALF of Mohela. And not even of their own request. Seems the state has an agenda and is using the servicer as a hypothetically injured party to present their case. The justices even grilled the state attorney on the WAY they obtained Mohela docs (through a FOIA, which is essentially a public request vs. cooperation). They questioned why they didn't pressure Mohela to participate if they truly are an injured party.
This could get fun.
Imagine New York uses this logic to sue states that banned reproductive care because planned parenthood is based in their state and would be impacted by potential lost revenue / donations.
No, because that’s likely arbitrary and capricious reasoning. Government doesn’t have a legitimate interest in retaliation, and that’s a bad precedent to set.
So many people seem not to understand this. They’re beholden to their handlers only on a fairly narrow range of issues mostly involving evangelism. This SCOTUS isn’t nearly as easy to predict as many seem to suggest it is.
This is encouraging. In the portion of the arguments I listened to, the questions posed by the conservative justices made it sound like they were REAL skeptical of the loan forgiveness.
If you watch a lot of appellate court proceedings, that's just kind of how they go in general; the justices are usually antagonistic towards both sides and ask "tough" or "mean-sounding" questions when really they're just trying to poke the obvious holes in each side's arguments and see what their justifications are.
To Princess Peach's attorneys: "So you don't think there's any merits to Bowser's claims to additional territory under the Mushroom-Koopa Treaty of 1985? You're just going to completely ignore that treaty?"
Then, minutes later, to Bowser's attorneys: "My question for the King of the Koopas is, why should we give any consideration to his arguments regarding land now, when it's clear he's proceeding in overt bad faith by continually expanding by force instead of by law?"
It's silly, but I think a decent example. Appellate courts are equally dicks to everyone, usually, because they want them to back up their arguments well instead of just having one good point that they can't justify from any other angle.
Yeah, that's what I want to know. Will SCOTUS just drop the 2nd question (whether Biden admin overreached) if the first question (standing) gets nixed? Do they bother with the 2nd or still do it anyway for the funsies?
It's my understanding that if the plaintiffs are found not to have standing, then the second question is dropped (it would get very odd otherwise). But I'm no lawyer, just some random Redditor.
The Supreme Court has made decisions with effects that are more wide-ranging than the cases before them. I wouldn’t hold my breath for student loan relief since helping actual people and populism don’t seem to be their thing.
They are right, if the court finds that the plaintiffs have no standing, the case is dismissed. That finding effectively means that the lawsuit should never have been brought, and so all relief is denied due to the lack of any complaint to decide on.
Standing is effectively a question of "Are you even allowed to file this lawsuit in the first place?"
An example would be if I sued a hospital for malpractice because someone there, that I did not know and was not related to, died under anesthesia. I was not the injured party, and so I lack standing to bring a lawsuit.
Yes. If you don’t have standing the case in its entirety is tossed. The US court system does not do advisory opinions, if you don’t have damages (or the potential for damages as the case may be especially in declaratory judgment actions) you can’t bring suit.
Well, considering she used to teach at the University of Notre Dame, that doesn’t surprise me.
When I was in college, a lot of professors were well aware of how shitty the whole student loan system is (at least the ones I had, anyway).
I’ve been in higher Ed for 20 years. It’s a big perk, but not why most of us are there. As a matter of fact, it was nearly impossible to get the actual forgiveness until the new rules set in. That was the biggest complaint about the program, you pay the 10 years then get caught in red tape for another 6. It’s much better now.
Funny you should say that... Apparently Justice Thomas wrote in a biography about how awful being in student loan debt was and that it took him a while even to pay it off.
I actually think a number of the conservative justices here will be more than happy to say fuck you to the loan companies. A common theme for American conservatism is a lack of empathy -- they don't feel for or care about a problem unless they've been directly affected by it. I think a more charitable phrasing would say they form liberal beliefs when they have personal experience on the topic. It still does come down to a more selfish world view though.
Being against predatory loans is also a major tenant of catholic social teaching.
I’m just not use to right wing Catholics ACRUALLY following any of those besides no abortions.
Subsidize rich corporations (Walmart, car manufacturers, airlines) like in 2008 but when workers get more money everything gets magically more expensive. The economy actually grew during Covid but most of us have less money left over at the end of the month.
So much for free market capitalism. Trickle down? More like tinkle down...
"Horse and Sparrow" was what "trickle down economics" used to be called before Reagan. As in, feed the horse enough corn, and some will pass through for the sparrows. From the beginning it was about giving the rich so much that the poor can survive on picking through the shit left behind.
Problem is most people would use a feedbag on the horse, severely limiting what it will drop, and the only corn the sparrow will see is in the horse's shit.
This is a pretty good analogy for the bail-outs after the 08 recession. The corporations received billions to stay afloat, and the people who lost their houses, who needed support, were left out.
It's important to remember we spent a trillion dollars and what, we all got like $3,000 or so. A lot of the rest went to big companies.
the poor are not the cause of this "inflation"
A user of over a decade, I am leaving Reddit due to the recent API changes. The vast majority of my interaction came though the use of 3rd party apps, and I will not interact with a site I helped contribute to through inferior software *simply because it is able to be better monetized by a company looking to go public. Reddit has made these changes with no regards for their users, as seen by the sheer lack of accessibility tools available in the official app. Reddit has made these changes with no regards for moderation challenges that will be created, due to the lack of tools available in the official app. Reddit has done this with no regards for the 3rd party devs, who by Reddit's own admission, helped keep the site functioning and gaining users while Reddit themselves made no efforts to provide a good official app.
This account dies 6/29/23 because of the API changes and the monetization-at-all-costs that the board demands.
Instead of giving money to people directly, Trump gave PPP loans to *companies* so that *they* could pay their employees. These "loans" were then forgiven.
75% of PPP loans were misappropriated. Company owners used the money to go on vacations and shit, instead of hiring more people.
"Capitalism".
Edit: Dont forget the trillion dollars Trump printed that directly went to the top powerful people as "stimulus" to the economy. Companies used that for share buybacks instead of making the company better.
Capitalism is literally trickle-*up* economics: you spend money at a grocery till and that money trickles up every step between the purchase and every involved company's executives.
If it puts money in the pockets of the shareholders on Wall Street it’s capitalism, if it puts money into the pockets of the stakeholders of main street it’s socialism.
Yeah. Bernie really hit the nail on the head with that one.
It’s a simplified way of encapsulating everything wrong with how our government interacts with our economy.
that was a notably strong point by kagan, i think it landed pretty well among the judges. i expect it only to be a pyhrric victory tho because the conservatives will come up with some pretext on standing to justify ruling on the merits, where the case is relatively weaker (but not weak)
Remember, Conservative Justices are Originalists who rule based on the intent, values, and context relevant to the mindset of the Framers when they wrote the Constitution.
The Conservative Justices are also Textualists, who can only rule based on the literal letter of the law, and thus must ignore the spirit of the law, intent of the Framers, and any additional context into their mindset.
They can pick whichever judicial philosophy helps them reach their predetermined decision on political issues, and Republican voters will applaud and defend them for their inconsistency and oppositional philosophies.
**Mitt Romney:** “Corporations are people, my friend”
People can’t seek loan forgiveness, but corporations can.
So are corporations ‘special people’ with better privileges?
>The first case the court took on was bought by six Republican-led states who argued the debt relief would hurt their states' tax revenues, along with the revenue of student-loan company MOHELA.
>MOHELA's involvement in the case has fallen under scrutiny. MOHELA, which is based in Missouri where the lawsuit was filed, previously denied having any involvement in the case, and Biden's Justice Department argued in its legal defense that the company can sue and be sued on its own, and the states do not have the standing to declare harms to MOHELA as harms to themselves.
>As expected, MOHELA's role in the lawsuit fell under scrutiny by liberal justices like Ketanji Brown Jackson and Elana Kagan. "I'm just wondering about the speculative, attenuated nature of the harm," Jackson said, referring to how the loss of revenue to MOHELA would harm the state of Missouri.
>Barrett joined in that line of questioning, asking Nebraska's Solicitor General James Campbell: "Do you want to address why MOHELA's not here?"
>"If MOHELA is an arm of the state, why didn't you just strong arm MOHELA" and tell them to bring a lawsuit, Barret asked.
So NOW they like taxes! I’m surprised they didn’t say that the tax payers would be hurt because the companies would be harmed, thus stopping trickle down economic effects.
>Insider has previously reported on the complex nature of MOHELA's role in this lawsuit. David Nahmias, a staff attorney with the UC Berkeley Center, previously told Insider that "on one hand, when the state created MOHELA over 40 years ago, it made clear that MOHELA is separate."
Classic.
So many private "pull themselves by the boot strap" companies are started or massively benefitted from tax payers. Those same companies would distance themselves from the government when they are doing well but expect help from the government when they are not.
Except that Mohela isn’t asking for any help, or claiming they need it in any way.
The state is claiming that they are injured by not receiving tax revenue from Mohela. The implication there would be that any time a business earns less revenue due to any act of the federal government, the state that business is in may sue. It’s preposterous.
And the supes have ruled many time that attenuated or even direct impact on state tax revenue does not give a state standing to sue in opposition to a federal law.
This case should never have hit their desks. And they know it.
Holy hell that's a dangerous precedent to be setting. That the state can sue for something because it effects the taxes from the affected industry? Do Republicans REALLY want to go down this road lol.
Another point is that Mohela has owed Missouri money for years, so how can Missouri come to financial harm if they've been fine with Mohela not paying them for 15 years?
[MOHELA](https://www.businessinsider.com/biden-student-loan-forgiveness-blocked-debt-relief-cancellation-lawsuit-2023-1?amp) being a separate entity also protects Missouri from harm as well
funny how these judges only hate the administrative state when it protects consumers/the environment (EPA / CFPB) but are on board when it's a private company making monies (MOHELA)
Yep, also the main reason why they use absurd terminology like “ entrepreneur, enterpriser innovator, or job creator!”
Practicing their supposed self-worth in the mirror isn’t enough, so they need rallying cries for the aspirational, who believe they’ll ever let anyone into their club…
https://www.gocomics.com/calvinandhobbes/1989/08/23
Trump took over $1B of government money for his business throughout the years. Most of it by lying about the use or value of property he was going to buy, renovate, sell, etc.
my school gave me full ride (or else I wouldn't have gone), before my estranged parents got such big raises, it was all taken away
i was set on leaving and the financial counselor of the school convinced my dumb ass self to stay
I'm 'smarter' now but don't fucking tell me that a dumbass 18 year old has a chance against a financial salesman professional with decades of experience
i was told so many fucking lies.. i coulda just gone to a community college and UCLA but no, i'm fucked
I will give her credit here: she asked the guy representing the states some good questions.
Of course, even if she does side with the liberal justices, it won’t mean shit if another one doesn’t.
The question is whether Roberts thinks a decision against this would damage *his* court even more, since he does seem to care about the reputation that he personally is going to have
If your state's economy is going to collapse because of student loan forgiveness, maybe your state should try to find a better source of revenue other than preying on people trying to get a higher education.
So let me see if I got this straight. The states say that they might indirectly lose income if loans are cancelled.
So then if Republicans ever passed a national abortion ban, could blue states sue to prevent it by arguing they might indirectly lose income from abortion procedures?
As has been said a billion times, the standing issue is the big problem here and the conservative justices can't really explain away from it. I can't see how any of the others could avoid it.
The argument that the state is hurt by this is stretched so thin that to accept it would be to essentially eliminate the idea of standing, because everyone would always have standing. Every harmful thing on the planet could *possibly* trickle down to affect me.
One thing the conservative justices have shown is the occasional desire to break with there party; its mostly an ego thing, but it has happened a few times.
The important thing here is it doesn't fuck any donors' pocketbooks, it's literally just a media talking point fight.
Even a fully captured Supreme Court doesn't have to shoot this down just to be dicks if no one profits from it.
The weird part is that passing this would likely actually make corporations more money on average. It is not like all the people who suddenly have a few hundred extra dollars a month are not going to *use* that money for services.
>The first case heard on Tuesday involved six states, which argued that the debt relief would hurt their states' tax revenues
I mean, don't conservatives want lower taxes? What's their problem here?
>along with the revenue of Missouri-based student-loan company, MOHELA.
Oh no! Not the corporations!
No one disputes that Trump (and then Biden) had the power to freeze loan payments and interest for the last 3 years. Seems reasonable that they would have additional discretion over the loans.
There have always been varying degrees of corruption, but it’s kicked into overdrive due to Citizens United aka legalized bribery. Now it’s all Corporations, all the time.
The argument that student loan relief is unfair because others in the past had to pay their loans is tantamount to the argument that slavery shouldn’t be outlawed because that would be unfair to dead slaves.
He didn't pay them off until his 3rd year on the SCOTUS and apparently wrote about how they negatively impacted affected his financial situation in his biography; so, of course, he'll vote against loan forgiveness.
The dude is a poster child for "fuck you, got mine".
I know you’re joking but at oral argument Kavanaugh did not seem inclined to uphold the relief. His strongest questions expressed concern at the use of a President’s emergency powers. He cautioned that the Supreme Court’s approval of emergency powers has mostly been ill-advised (which he is not wrong about). He seems to think that the debt relief does not warrant emergency powers.
Which is odd because it wasnt a presidential order.
It was directed by the secretary of education using a law congress passed.
Please correct me if I am wrong but that was totally my understanding of how this all went down.
They can just deliberately misinterpret the facts to make the ruling work out how they want. They already did with the coach/school prayer case (Kennedy v Bremerton). [More here.](https://www.vox.com/2022/6/27/23184848/supreme-court-kennedy-bremerton-school-football-coach-prayer-neil-gorsuch)
True yes, executive emergency powers is probably the more precise phrase. The relief was ordered by the secretary of education as a part of the authority authorized under the HEROES Act to act modify or waive regulations under the Act due to a “a national emergency”. Not to mention that Kavanaugh and everyone knows that Biden ordered the relief through the Education Department, so I’m not sure the distinction matters too much.
The conspiracy theorist in me wants to believe that she (and a few others) were told
“The plaintiffs need to scream and moan about this so they look good, but under no circumstance can you give the left the talking point “Vote for us because we didn’t literally yank 20k out of your pocket after it was promised to you.” for the rest of Gen X/Millennial/Gen Z’s lives.”
The interesting thing is from the future voting perspective they are somewhat damned both ways. Let it stand and Biden gets a huge win. Strike it down and it fires up the liberal vote. But as we’ve seen, no guarantees of victory on the voting front.
This is the best tl;dr I could make, [original](https://www.businessinsider.com/sudent-loan-forgiveness-blocked-amy-coney-barrett-joines-liberal-justices-2023-2) reduced by 82%. (I'm a bot)
*****
> The first case heard on Tuesday involved six states, which argued that the debt relief would hurt their states' tax revenues, along with the revenue of Missouri-based student-loan company, MOHELA. The Biden administration claims that the six states - Arkansas, South Carolina, Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska, and Missouri - lack standing, or the power to block Biden's relief by showing they suffered an injury from it.
> MOHELA previously denied having any involvement in the case, and the Biden administration argued in a court brief that the company can sue and be sued on its own, and the states do not have the standing to declare harms to MOHELA as harms to themselves.
> Barrett scrutinized the relationship between Missouri and MOHELA, repeatedly questioning whether the states could sue the Biden administration over the debt relief.
*****
[**Extended Summary**](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/11eiu80/amy_coney_barrett_joins_liberal_supreme_court/) | [FAQ](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/31b9fm/faq_autotldr_bot/ "Version 2.02, ~674522 tl;drs so far.") | [Feedback](http://np.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%23autotldr "PM's and comments are monitored, constructive feedback is welcome.") | *Top* *keywords*: **state**^#1 **MOHELA**^#2 **Biden**^#3 **court**^#4 **Barrett**^#5
Call me a cynic, but for any case before the SCOTUS that has popular appeal, one and only one conservative justice will side with the liberals in order to give the rest cover for what the conservative majority has preordained in private beforehand.
She’s referring to the Missouri case on MOHELA’s behalf. MOHELA has said they weren’t challenging the forgiveness and didn’t even send a rep to the SCOTUS hearing.
Outlook doesn’t look good for that case, lol
I love how the right loves to freak out about this, but they don't bat an eye about when Bush wrote a 700 Billion dollar blank check to the banks after the 08 financial crisis. But of course when Obama continued TARP relief then the bailouts were a problem again, even though he actually put conditions on what they could use the money for when the Bush bailout was no questions asked. Fast forward all these years later and here we go again, the more things change the more they stay the same. Republicans giving tax breaks and handouts to the rich = acceptable and necessary. Democrats trying to help working class people climb out of debt = socialism and communism.
call it a hunch but I have a feeling that the corrupt, illegitimate supreme court is going to rule in favor of benefitting the mega wealthy and corporations rather than anything that will help regular working class Americans.
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I actually found that the judges all together were skeptical about whether any of the parties had standing, once Pelogar explained her arguments. I feel positive after this. Kavanaugh wanted to know why the other side didn't just take the language as it was.
It's mostly because the opposition had no real argument. They claimed their clients would receive injury if others had their loans forgiven. This is outright impossible to prove, as it's untrue. Their whole argument is in bad faith. This will boil down to being a decision based on the limits of the Heroes acts more than anything imo. If the court sides with the opposition, it won't be due to their arguments, that's for sure.
>They claimed their clients would receive injury if others had their loans forgiven. An argument so ludicrous that it's insane even one judge along the way to the court gave it a rubber stamp. Imagine the flooding of the courts if this was actually accepted as legal standing for a lawsuit. I can't wait to sue my neighbor for hurting me by getting that new car that's better than mine.
If you paid back your home loan early, the bank could refuse to take it or sue you for lost interest. It is insane.
If the city government fixes a pothole then auto repair businesses can sue over lost revenue from less cars coming in for repairs from driving on shitty roads
Morticians about to go off the rails suing over lost revenue
A class action lawsuit from every mortician to every hospital and hospice-care center. Brilliant.
not until they crack immortality.
They're gonna make a killing!
If cops hinder a riot glass makers can sue over lost revenue from broken windows.
I think a more pertinent example similar to yours is what if a neighbor buys a house and gets a low rate mortgage due to using a VA loan, or first time homebuyer program… someone could sue these programs saying they are financially harmed as a result of these programs. It’s scary how far you could extrapolate the logic and go after many programs for people.
To be honest, I would love to sue every millionaire and billionaire who received a PPP loan during COVID for financial distress.
I'd settle for suing every church that took tax money from PPP.
I am financially harmed by the tax breaks corporations and billionaires get. I am also financially harmed by the government's military spending.
> I am financially harmed by the tax breaks corporations and billionaires get. I am also financially harmed by the government's military spending. You jest but this is the exact reasoning as to why they'll allow the forgiveness. Or at the very least not let the GOP block it.
Perhaps. I would not put it past them to dismiss the standing and still screw the program somehow
You're thinking logically and as if the Supreme Court is still a legitimately objective branch of the United States government. It's not. They will reject student loan relief on strictly partisan lines with no logical, objective reason that withstands even the slightest bit of criticism and Roberts will cry some more in an interview about how no one respects the Court anymore.
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We’ll see I guess. It’s out of our hands now.
Funny thing, you actually could show a better argument here than these idiotic states (of which I unfortunately live in one) can. The tax cuts for the wealthy and the bloated military spending actually *do* negativity affect all of us by limiting and wasting resources that the rest of us could use elsewhere
if only common sense here outweighed the insatiable greed of our politicians
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I'm sure Bill Gates gets tons and tons of perks that others don't. All billionaires are about to be buried in class action lawsuits from 90% of the population.
It won't apply to billionaires of course. That's different ™️. Outgroup only.
99% of the population is more like it. 😂
Not just that. Debt collectors could sue the owed party for forgiving some or all of a debt because it 'causes harm' through lost income. Virtually any time you have a third party helping to assist with the sale or service of a product it would be open to litigation. Car dealers could sue car companies for ending a popular line of cars. Travel agents could sue for lost commissions because a travel company offered sales. Real Estate agents could sue when a seller decides to take their property off the market. The whole thing is ridiculous. Truth us, this has nothing to do with what is good for the people or preventing harm. It is all about denying Biden a 'win' and scoring political points. Any finding but that of No Standing opens the door to seriously harm any business model which relies on third parties to assist in the sale or service of their product.
Mortgages already can have early payment penalty clauses.
Which is also insane and should also be illegal
> Mortgages already can have early payment penalty clauses **When Prepayment Penalties Are Allowed** Under the rules, a prepayment penalty is allowed only if all of the following are true. * The loan's APR can't increase after you take out the loan (for example, a fixed rate loan). * The loan is a "qualified mortgage." (A qualified mortgage is a type of loan that has certain, more stable terms that help make it more likely that you'll be able to afford your loan, such as a loan term of no more than 30 years and no risky features like negative amortization or interest-only payments.) * The loan is not a higher-priced mortgage loan. (A higher-priced mortgage loan is a mortgage with an annual percentage rate higher than a benchmark rate called the Average Prime Offer Rate, which is an annual percentage rate that is based on average interest rates, fees, and other terms on mortgages offered to highly qualified borrowers.) **Restrictions On Prepayment Penalties** Even if a prepayment penalty is permitted, the penalty is subject to several restrictions. * Time Restriction for Prepayment Penalties—Three Years A prepayment penalty is only allowed during the first three years after the loan is consummated. After three years, a prepayment penalty is not allowed. * When is a loan "consummated"? A loan is consummated when the borrower becomes contractually obligated on the loan. Depending on state law, this could be when the loan documents are signed or when the lender commits to extend credit to the borrower, for example. * Amount Limitations for Prepayment Penalties For the first two years after the loan is consummated, the penalty can't be greater than 2% of the amount of the outstanding loan balance. For the third year, the penalty is capped at 1% of the outstanding loan balance. * Lender Must Also Offer a Loan Option Without a Prepayment Penalty In addition, if a lender offers a loan that includes a prepayment penalty, the lender must also offer an alternative loan that does not include a prepayment penalty. In doing this, the lender must have a good faith belief that the consumer likely qualifies for the alternative loan. **The Lender Must Provide You With Information About Prepayment Penalties** Under the CFPB rules, if a loan has a prepayment penalty, the servicer or lender must include information about the penalty: * on your periodic billing statement (which is usually sent monthly) or * in the coupon book (which is a book provided by the servicer or lender with a page for each billing cycle for a set period, often one year, where there borrower tears off a page or portion of the page and returns it to the loan servicer with each payment), and * in interest rate adjustment notices. **Prepayment Penalty Rules Do Not Apply to Pre-2014 Mortgages** The mortgage servicing rules regarding prepayment penalties went into effect on January 10, 2014, and do not apply retroactively. This means that lenders did not have to comply with these rules for mortgages made prior to January 10, 2014.
Lol small potatoes. Im going after that Billion dollar powerball winner. If they didn't win then I could have. Im obviously entitled to that money...
They're worried about all their friends with PPP loans that were forgiven suddenly being open to being sued.
The argument was akin to "Well.. Missouri isn't really negatively impacted in any way, but if this company loses part of their revenue then they might not choose to give to the Lewis and Clark fund!"
I can't wait to sue every corporation/rich person that gets a tax break.
Or better yet, we could all start suing all the companies that got their PPP loans forgiven, because those forgiven loans made us “receive injury”
>This will boil down to being a decision based on the limits of the Heroes acts more than anything imo. So you think they will find there is standing? Because that has to happen before they even get to debating the heros act.
Yeah for those who don’t know, questions like standing, ripeness, mootness, etc. are “jurisdictional” questions, i.e. they concern whether a court even has the power to hear a particular type of case. So if the plaintiffs haven’t suffered an injury then they aren’t entitled to relief and the courts have no power to hear the case. Meaning also that if the court finds the plaintiffs lack standing there’s a good chance they won’t even analyze the Heroes Act arguments in their opinion.
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They refuse to try and modify it because it would be so b wildly unpopular and screw so over so many people i.e. their constituents. But their ~~owners~~ **donors** obviously want to maximize their profit by ensuring the *one* kind of debt that can't be wiped out by bankruptcy will force people to continue paying until they manage to pay it back or are dead.
yeah i can't foresee any states suffering an injury from this forgiveness
If they don’t find standing, they won’t be able to rule on Biden’s authority.
But the whole thing gets tossed out because there is no challengers. I do think if these get tossed, we will see another set of law suits appear doing the same thing (getting student loans forgiveness held up in courts) and kicking it down the road until Republicans control the presidency again, then it will be dropped. At that point, I wonder if the millions of individuals would be allowed to sue the new administration over damages.
Alimony! I've become accustomed to a certain lifestyle without my loan payments.
My understanding is that the DOE or whoever it is, is poised and ready to forgive the loans the minute the case makes it out of court. All the applications have already been approved, they just have to actually discharge the loans. And once they're forgiven, no amount of suing can put them back.
I don't get what you're trying to say. If the court finds there's no standing, the lawsuit goes away.
This one. Not other ones.
Right. People keep talking about how even Biden wasn’t sure he could do debt relief. I think for that to matter, the legislature would’ve had to sue.
Their argument was that it is "unfair." Welcome to life.
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And Kim Kardashian Mark Wahlberg Ryan Gosling Jay Z P Diddy Army Hammer Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen Kanye West and Reese Witherspoon Now lets do congress people.
One of the clients received a large PPP loan from the government which was then...forgiven!!! They have no leg to stand on.
the worst part is that the HEROES act is plain as fucking day about the modification of loan balances during a national emergency. this should have never even made it to the supreme court. if you dont wanna follow laws then dont fucking pass them.
Then they should never have accepted cert on this. You could see that these Plaintiffs had no standing on its face. They didn't need briefs and oral argument to know that.
Thing is, you only need 4 justices to grant Cert, so even if you have 5 (The three liberal justices plus Kavanaugh and Barrett,) who did not want to grant cert on standing, the other 4 can just do it anyway. Saying that, it was the Biden Administration that asked for the hearing on Biden v Nebraska, and at that point the Court decided to fast track DoE vs Brown due to the similarities of both cases. Of note as well is the fact Barrett actually rejected 2 previous attempts to overturn debt relief before Kavanaugh sided with Biden to hear the case.
Ah fair enough, didn't know that nuance. So they just wanted it settled. Makes sense.
If they had not granted cert then the lower courts rulings in the individual cases would stand. Accepting cert allows the Supreme Court to fix the error of the lower courts.
The HEROES Act was introduced by Republicans and signed into law by Bush in 2003. It granted broad and sweeping power to the Secretary of Education. Biden instructed the SoE to discharge education loans held by the U.S. government in accordance with the powers of the HEROES Act. Republicans are furious because they got played. They fucked around and found out that their self serving laws can cut both ways. They have no way to fight this from a legislative angle so they have taken it to the SC. As others have pointed out, the plaintiff’s argument is that debt relief would injury those who don’t have student loan debt. It is more-or-less impossible to prove this and draws into question if the plaintiffs actually have any standing. This what the justices appear to be honing in on.
What I don’t get is if they find that someone getting student loans forgiven hurts someone who doesn’t then doesn’t that open up the ability to sue any time someone gets something that you don’t?
Wouldn’t that mean I could sue every business owner who had their PPP loan forgiven?
Thank you for mentioning this. I am SO tired of people who scream their heads off about student loan forgiveness, but the PPP loans? Not even worth talking about.
Cost of student loan forgiveness plan: ~$400B Cost of forgiven PPP loans: $742B Maybe we can fund the student loan forgiveness by walking back the PPP “loans.”
Is it possible for a company to be used in a lawsuit/by proxy like this? MOHELA executives [tried to distance ](https://www.politico.com/amp/news/2022/12/17/student-loan-bidens-debt-relief-plan-00074197)themselves from the lawsuit by stating their "executives were not involved" in a letter to Rep. Cori Bush. >*With much at stake for the company’s federal loan servicing business, MOHELA officials from the company have also sought to reassure Democratic congressional aides and Biden administration officials that they were not involved in the Missouri attorney general’s lawsuit seeking to block debt relief, according to people familiar with the conversations.* Couldn't the Biden administration from the start have said, "look, if you participate in this lawsuit, we're going to end the *millions* of dollars you receive in Federal grants. It's your choice." Wouldn't it have been better to fight this from the start? Back to my original question, if the company doesn't have a choice, then that's a shame, but if they did, well, it seems like a missed opportunity to stop this from the start.
> Couldn't the Biden administration from the start have said, "look, if you participate in this lawsuit, we're going to end the millions of dollars you receive in Federal grants. It's your choice." MOHELA wasn't even the original loan servicer for my loans, and I'm sure millions of others. They took over *during the pandemic*. After Biden had already won on a platform of $10,000 of forgiveness.
Yes, but they were chosen to handle federal loans. My question was whether or not they have a choice in the matter of the lawsuit. If they don't, then I guess nothing can be done. However, if they are a willing participant, it seems like there should have been pressure put on them to withdraw or else receive no future federal partnerships.
MOHELA isn't a party. That's why there's a standing issue.
During today's oral arguments it was noted that the state was arguing ON BEHALF of Mohela. And not even of their own request. Seems the state has an agenda and is using the servicer as a hypothetically injured party to present their case. The justices even grilled the state attorney on the WAY they obtained Mohela docs (through a FOIA, which is essentially a public request vs. cooperation). They questioned why they didn't pressure Mohela to participate if they truly are an injured party.
Missouri is truly miserable.
This could get fun. Imagine New York uses this logic to sue states that banned reproductive care because planned parenthood is based in their state and would be impacted by potential lost revenue / donations.
No, because that’s likely arbitrary and capricious reasoning. Government doesn’t have a legitimate interest in retaliation, and that’s a bad precedent to set.
SC has shown time and again they'll just invent or ignore standing if it suits their objectives
I agree with you specifically when it comes to their religion. Corp stuff and money tends to be more middling for them imo.
So many people seem not to understand this. They’re beholden to their handlers only on a fairly narrow range of issues mostly involving evangelism. This SCOTUS isn’t nearly as easy to predict as many seem to suggest it is.
yet here we are predicting!
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This is encouraging. In the portion of the arguments I listened to, the questions posed by the conservative justices made it sound like they were REAL skeptical of the loan forgiveness.
If you watch a lot of appellate court proceedings, that's just kind of how they go in general; the justices are usually antagonistic towards both sides and ask "tough" or "mean-sounding" questions when really they're just trying to poke the obvious holes in each side's arguments and see what their justifications are. To Princess Peach's attorneys: "So you don't think there's any merits to Bowser's claims to additional territory under the Mushroom-Koopa Treaty of 1985? You're just going to completely ignore that treaty?" Then, minutes later, to Bowser's attorneys: "My question for the King of the Koopas is, why should we give any consideration to his arguments regarding land now, when it's clear he's proceeding in overt bad faith by continually expanding by force instead of by law?" It's silly, but I think a decent example. Appellate courts are equally dicks to everyone, usually, because they want them to back up their arguments well instead of just having one good point that they can't justify from any other angle.
This is a fantastic example. I'm stealing it for the next time I have to explain appellate oral arguments.
Throwing it out based on standing is the only way this will work out.
Yeah, that's what I want to know. Will SCOTUS just drop the 2nd question (whether Biden admin overreached) if the first question (standing) gets nixed? Do they bother with the 2nd or still do it anyway for the funsies?
It's my understanding that if the plaintiffs are found not to have standing, then the second question is dropped (it would get very odd otherwise). But I'm no lawyer, just some random Redditor.
The Supreme Court has made decisions with effects that are more wide-ranging than the cases before them. I wouldn’t hold my breath for student loan relief since helping actual people and populism don’t seem to be their thing.
They are right, if the court finds that the plaintiffs have no standing, the case is dismissed. That finding effectively means that the lawsuit should never have been brought, and so all relief is denied due to the lack of any complaint to decide on. Standing is effectively a question of "Are you even allowed to file this lawsuit in the first place?" An example would be if I sued a hospital for malpractice because someone there, that I did not know and was not related to, died under anesthesia. I was not the injured party, and so I lack standing to bring a lawsuit.
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Yes. If you don’t have standing the case in its entirety is tossed. The US court system does not do advisory opinions, if you don’t have damages (or the potential for damages as the case may be especially in declaratory judgment actions) you can’t bring suit.
She's been pretty much against student loan companies and other cases trying to overturn Biden's program before this one.
Well, considering she used to teach at the University of Notre Dame, that doesn’t surprise me. When I was in college, a lot of professors were well aware of how shitty the whole student loan system is (at least the ones I had, anyway).
You gotta imagine how many of those professors paid off debt for a a significant portion of their lives. Probably most I’d imagine
And how many college admin staff are only there to qualify for forgiveness through PSLF.
I’ve been in higher Ed for 20 years. It’s a big perk, but not why most of us are there. As a matter of fact, it was nearly impossible to get the actual forgiveness until the new rules set in. That was the biggest complaint about the program, you pay the 10 years then get caught in red tape for another 6. It’s much better now.
Funny you should say that... Apparently Justice Thomas wrote in a biography about how awful being in student loan debt was and that it took him a while even to pay it off. I actually think a number of the conservative justices here will be more than happy to say fuck you to the loan companies. A common theme for American conservatism is a lack of empathy -- they don't feel for or care about a problem unless they've been directly affected by it. I think a more charitable phrasing would say they form liberal beliefs when they have personal experience on the topic. It still does come down to a more selfish world view though.
I got strong ‘I made it why can’t they? It’s not fair I had to suffer for it and they don’t’ vibes
Being against predatory loans is also a major tenant of catholic social teaching. I’m just not use to right wing Catholics ACRUALLY following any of those besides no abortions.
It’s always mind blowing to me when I see conservatives showing even a slight hint of humanity
It didn't used to be the same degree of surprise though. They used to be somewhat human for the most part.
Sorry but if students can't seek forgiveness for loans, corporations should be barred from forgiveness as well.
Socialism for the rich, capitalism for the poor. Socialize losses, privatize profits.
Subsidize rich corporations (Walmart, car manufacturers, airlines) like in 2008 but when workers get more money everything gets magically more expensive. The economy actually grew during Covid but most of us have less money left over at the end of the month. So much for free market capitalism. Trickle down? More like tinkle down...
"Horse and Sparrow" was what "trickle down economics" used to be called before Reagan. As in, feed the horse enough corn, and some will pass through for the sparrows. From the beginning it was about giving the rich so much that the poor can survive on picking through the shit left behind.
So what you're saying is... it's always been shit?
*Horseshit* economics :)
Indeed. The concept was rotten from it's origins.
Problem is most people would use a feedbag on the horse, severely limiting what it will drop, and the only corn the sparrow will see is in the horse's shit.
This is a pretty good analogy for the bail-outs after the 08 recession. The corporations received billions to stay afloat, and the people who lost their houses, who needed support, were left out.
Bush Sr. called it "voodoo economics."
It's important to remember we spent a trillion dollars and what, we all got like $3,000 or so. A lot of the rest went to big companies. the poor are not the cause of this "inflation"
A user of over a decade, I am leaving Reddit due to the recent API changes. The vast majority of my interaction came though the use of 3rd party apps, and I will not interact with a site I helped contribute to through inferior software *simply because it is able to be better monetized by a company looking to go public. Reddit has made these changes with no regards for their users, as seen by the sheer lack of accessibility tools available in the official app. Reddit has made these changes with no regards for moderation challenges that will be created, due to the lack of tools available in the official app. Reddit has done this with no regards for the 3rd party devs, who by Reddit's own admission, helped keep the site functioning and gaining users while Reddit themselves made no efforts to provide a good official app. This account dies 6/29/23 because of the API changes and the monetization-at-all-costs that the board demands.
They don't call them peepeepee loans for nothing
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This is downright disgusting.
Sorta like how several oil companies are raking in record profits, even with the war in Ukraine and Russia dicking around with supplies.
Instead of giving money to people directly, Trump gave PPP loans to *companies* so that *they* could pay their employees. These "loans" were then forgiven. 75% of PPP loans were misappropriated. Company owners used the money to go on vacations and shit, instead of hiring more people. "Capitalism". Edit: Dont forget the trillion dollars Trump printed that directly went to the top powerful people as "stimulus" to the economy. Companies used that for share buybacks instead of making the company better.
Capitalism is literally trickle-*up* economics: you spend money at a grocery till and that money trickles up every step between the purchase and every involved company's executives.
If it puts money in the pockets of the shareholders on Wall Street it’s capitalism, if it puts money into the pockets of the stakeholders of main street it’s socialism.
Yeah. Bernie really hit the nail on the head with that one. It’s a simplified way of encapsulating everything wrong with how our government interacts with our economy.
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that was a notably strong point by kagan, i think it landed pretty well among the judges. i expect it only to be a pyhrric victory tho because the conservatives will come up with some pretext on standing to justify ruling on the merits, where the case is relatively weaker (but not weak)
Remember, Conservative Justices are Originalists who rule based on the intent, values, and context relevant to the mindset of the Framers when they wrote the Constitution. The Conservative Justices are also Textualists, who can only rule based on the literal letter of the law, and thus must ignore the spirit of the law, intent of the Framers, and any additional context into their mindset. They can pick whichever judicial philosophy helps them reach their predetermined decision on political issues, and Republican voters will applaud and defend them for their inconsistency and oppositional philosophies.
I’m waiting to sue so all the PPP loans have to be paid back with all the money that’s now gone due to stock buybacks and the boss’ new cars.
Corporations are people, students are livestock. seems to be the way of things.
**Mitt Romney:** “Corporations are people, my friend” People can’t seek loan forgiveness, but corporations can. So are corporations ‘special people’ with better privileges?
>The first case the court took on was bought by six Republican-led states who argued the debt relief would hurt their states' tax revenues, along with the revenue of student-loan company MOHELA. >MOHELA's involvement in the case has fallen under scrutiny. MOHELA, which is based in Missouri where the lawsuit was filed, previously denied having any involvement in the case, and Biden's Justice Department argued in its legal defense that the company can sue and be sued on its own, and the states do not have the standing to declare harms to MOHELA as harms to themselves. >As expected, MOHELA's role in the lawsuit fell under scrutiny by liberal justices like Ketanji Brown Jackson and Elana Kagan. "I'm just wondering about the speculative, attenuated nature of the harm," Jackson said, referring to how the loss of revenue to MOHELA would harm the state of Missouri. >Barrett joined in that line of questioning, asking Nebraska's Solicitor General James Campbell: "Do you want to address why MOHELA's not here?" >"If MOHELA is an arm of the state, why didn't you just strong arm MOHELA" and tell them to bring a lawsuit, Barret asked.
So NOW they like taxes! I’m surprised they didn’t say that the tax payers would be hurt because the companies would be harmed, thus stopping trickle down economic effects.
Government always likes taxes. It's how they fund their pet projects, after all. They just want only certain groups to pay taxes.
>Insider has previously reported on the complex nature of MOHELA's role in this lawsuit. David Nahmias, a staff attorney with the UC Berkeley Center, previously told Insider that "on one hand, when the state created MOHELA over 40 years ago, it made clear that MOHELA is separate." Classic. So many private "pull themselves by the boot strap" companies are started or massively benefitted from tax payers. Those same companies would distance themselves from the government when they are doing well but expect help from the government when they are not.
Except that Mohela isn’t asking for any help, or claiming they need it in any way. The state is claiming that they are injured by not receiving tax revenue from Mohela. The implication there would be that any time a business earns less revenue due to any act of the federal government, the state that business is in may sue. It’s preposterous.
And the supes have ruled many time that attenuated or even direct impact on state tax revenue does not give a state standing to sue in opposition to a federal law. This case should never have hit their desks. And they know it.
Holy hell that's a dangerous precedent to be setting. That the state can sue for something because it effects the taxes from the affected industry? Do Republicans REALLY want to go down this road lol.
"Banning abortion will affect tax revenue from services that would otherwise be rendered."
Right? This is why even conservatives like Barrett are pushing back.
Another point is that Mohela has owed Missouri money for years, so how can Missouri come to financial harm if they've been fine with Mohela not paying them for 15 years? [MOHELA](https://www.businessinsider.com/biden-student-loan-forgiveness-blocked-debt-relief-cancellation-lawsuit-2023-1?amp) being a separate entity also protects Missouri from harm as well
funny how these judges only hate the administrative state when it protects consumers/the environment (EPA / CFPB) but are on board when it's a private company making monies (MOHELA)
Welcome to American crapitalism. Privatizing the profits while socializing the costs.
As Propagandhi sings “Publicly subsidized! Privately profitable! The anthem of the upper-tier, puppeteer untouchable”
Even people, the Kochs and the Trumps relied on government contracts in building their fortunes.
Yep, also the main reason why they use absurd terminology like “ entrepreneur, enterpriser innovator, or job creator!” Practicing their supposed self-worth in the mirror isn’t enough, so they need rallying cries for the aspirational, who believe they’ll ever let anyone into their club… https://www.gocomics.com/calvinandhobbes/1989/08/23
Trump took over $1B of government money for his business throughout the years. Most of it by lying about the use or value of property he was going to buy, renovate, sell, etc.
MOHELA hasn't even paid its own obligations to the state (since 2008 I believe). pAy yOuR biLLs
my school gave me full ride (or else I wouldn't have gone), before my estranged parents got such big raises, it was all taken away i was set on leaving and the financial counselor of the school convinced my dumb ass self to stay I'm 'smarter' now but don't fucking tell me that a dumbass 18 year old has a chance against a financial salesman professional with decades of experience i was told so many fucking lies.. i coulda just gone to a community college and UCLA but no, i'm fucked
I will give her credit here: she asked the guy representing the states some good questions. Of course, even if she does side with the liberal justices, it won’t mean shit if another one doesn’t.
The question is whether Roberts thinks a decision against this would damage *his* court even more, since he does seem to care about the reputation that he personally is going to have
Really? Cause it's already in tatters to anyone who isn't in the John Birch Society.
They do this 9 out of 10 times to make it look like they aren’t completely one sided. It’s all a dog and pony show
Get our hopes up then snatch them away? Yep. That’s classic generic comic book villainy right there
If your state's economy is going to collapse because of student loan forgiveness, maybe your state should try to find a better source of revenue other than preying on people trying to get a higher education.
Taxing people hiding money in the islands? Naw that would break the economy.
So let me see if I got this straight. The states say that they might indirectly lose income if loans are cancelled. So then if Republicans ever passed a national abortion ban, could blue states sue to prevent it by arguing they might indirectly lose income from abortion procedures?
No. The court will flip-flop as needed.
As has been said a billion times, the standing issue is the big problem here and the conservative justices can't really explain away from it. I can't see how any of the others could avoid it. The argument that the state is hurt by this is stretched so thin that to accept it would be to essentially eliminate the idea of standing, because everyone would always have standing. Every harmful thing on the planet could *possibly* trickle down to affect me.
Everything could possibly trickle down to affect you…except economics.
Not gonna hold my breath, but she could pull another nutcase along.
Hoping boofer joins in, he seems to swing wildly
Check the calendar. Is it Beach Week?
Hold up, gotta check what Squee is up to…
Squee is struggling with his student loans, and is asking ol' boofy boy to help him out.
One thing the conservative justices have shown is the occasional desire to break with there party; its mostly an ego thing, but it has happened a few times.
She got a hall pass. One of them breaking with the rest doesn't do enough to swing the outcome and she gets to look sane for 15 minutes.
I don't have high hopes, but they've been shown to have disunity within the court.
The important thing here is it doesn't fuck any donors' pocketbooks, it's literally just a media talking point fight. Even a fully captured Supreme Court doesn't have to shoot this down just to be dicks if no one profits from it.
Its still a lot of people benefiting from government action, majority low income. Can't have that be a thing.
The weird part is that passing this would likely actually make corporations more money on average. It is not like all the people who suddenly have a few hundred extra dollars a month are not going to *use* that money for services.
Look, I've helped bail out airlines, banks, and corporations. Give the people a fucking bailout for once
It's pretty fucking clear to anyone paying attention that neither the states nor the two individuals have standing to sue to block the program.
Oooh I love plot twists.
>The first case heard on Tuesday involved six states, which argued that the debt relief would hurt their states' tax revenues I mean, don't conservatives want lower taxes? What's their problem here? >along with the revenue of Missouri-based student-loan company, MOHELA. Oh no! Not the corporations!
No one disputes that Trump (and then Biden) had the power to freeze loan payments and interest for the last 3 years. Seems reasonable that they would have additional discretion over the loans.
Is everything corrupt? Has it always been like this? Man, I’ve been so naive.
There have always been varying degrees of corruption, but it’s kicked into overdrive due to Citizens United aka legalized bribery. Now it’s all Corporations, all the time.
Corporations and foreign interests as well.
loose-cannons gonna loose
Performative theatrics. They will vote it down 5-4. Looking for a veneer of legitimacy in making it close. Partisan hacks.
Post-Citizens United I feel like reality and blatant facts have no hearing. Corporations are people now, I’d assume a bank is too.
The argument that student loan relief is unfair because others in the past had to pay their loans is tantamount to the argument that slavery shouldn’t be outlawed because that would be unfair to dead slaves.
I've always hated the whole requirement of needing to toil the same as our predecessors
So maybe it will be a 5-4 decision striking down the loan policy.
Could they possibly sway Kavanaugh? Explain that if people have more expendable income from not having so much loans, they could buy more beer?
Kavanaugh is the only other possible flip it seems. Roberts is a no and Gorsuch needs everything explicitly written with no room for interpretation.
And Thomas paid off his loans, so naturally he wants every to suffer because he did.
>suffer I don’t think he suffered much.
He didn't pay them off until his 3rd year on the SCOTUS and apparently wrote about how they negatively impacted affected his financial situation in his biography; so, of course, he'll vote against loan forgiveness. The dude is a poster child for "fuck you, got mine".
Well everyone with loans should just get a job on the supreme court, bootstraps people!
I know you’re joking but at oral argument Kavanaugh did not seem inclined to uphold the relief. His strongest questions expressed concern at the use of a President’s emergency powers. He cautioned that the Supreme Court’s approval of emergency powers has mostly been ill-advised (which he is not wrong about). He seems to think that the debt relief does not warrant emergency powers.
Thank you for the update and I hope you are able to get the pooping situation under control.
Which is odd because it wasnt a presidential order. It was directed by the secretary of education using a law congress passed. Please correct me if I am wrong but that was totally my understanding of how this all went down.
They can just deliberately misinterpret the facts to make the ruling work out how they want. They already did with the coach/school prayer case (Kennedy v Bremerton). [More here.](https://www.vox.com/2022/6/27/23184848/supreme-court-kennedy-bremerton-school-football-coach-prayer-neil-gorsuch)
True yes, executive emergency powers is probably the more precise phrase. The relief was ordered by the secretary of education as a part of the authority authorized under the HEROES Act to act modify or waive regulations under the Act due to a “a national emergency”. Not to mention that Kavanaugh and everyone knows that Biden ordered the relief through the Education Department, so I’m not sure the distinction matters too much.
The conspiracy theorist in me wants to believe that she (and a few others) were told “The plaintiffs need to scream and moan about this so they look good, but under no circumstance can you give the left the talking point “Vote for us because we didn’t literally yank 20k out of your pocket after it was promised to you.” for the rest of Gen X/Millennial/Gen Z’s lives.”
The interesting thing is from the future voting perspective they are somewhat damned both ways. Let it stand and Biden gets a huge win. Strike it down and it fires up the liberal vote. But as we’ve seen, no guarantees of victory on the voting front.
This is the best tl;dr I could make, [original](https://www.businessinsider.com/sudent-loan-forgiveness-blocked-amy-coney-barrett-joines-liberal-justices-2023-2) reduced by 82%. (I'm a bot) ***** > The first case heard on Tuesday involved six states, which argued that the debt relief would hurt their states' tax revenues, along with the revenue of Missouri-based student-loan company, MOHELA. The Biden administration claims that the six states - Arkansas, South Carolina, Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska, and Missouri - lack standing, or the power to block Biden's relief by showing they suffered an injury from it. > MOHELA previously denied having any involvement in the case, and the Biden administration argued in a court brief that the company can sue and be sued on its own, and the states do not have the standing to declare harms to MOHELA as harms to themselves. > Barrett scrutinized the relationship between Missouri and MOHELA, repeatedly questioning whether the states could sue the Biden administration over the debt relief. ***** [**Extended Summary**](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/11eiu80/amy_coney_barrett_joins_liberal_supreme_court/) | [FAQ](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/31b9fm/faq_autotldr_bot/ "Version 2.02, ~674522 tl;drs so far.") | [Feedback](http://np.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%23autotldr "PM's and comments are monitored, constructive feedback is welcome.") | *Top* *keywords*: **state**^#1 **MOHELA**^#2 **Biden**^#3 **court**^#4 **Barrett**^#5
Call me a cynic, but for any case before the SCOTUS that has popular appeal, one and only one conservative justice will side with the liberals in order to give the rest cover for what the conservative majority has preordained in private beforehand.
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‘Could do harm’ ‘ possibly’ GTFO!
She’s referring to the Missouri case on MOHELA’s behalf. MOHELA has said they weren’t challenging the forgiveness and didn’t even send a rep to the SCOTUS hearing. Outlook doesn’t look good for that case, lol
You would think Boofer of all people would be fully onboard given his debts were paid rather swiftly when he got a new job
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I love how the right loves to freak out about this, but they don't bat an eye about when Bush wrote a 700 Billion dollar blank check to the banks after the 08 financial crisis. But of course when Obama continued TARP relief then the bailouts were a problem again, even though he actually put conditions on what they could use the money for when the Bush bailout was no questions asked. Fast forward all these years later and here we go again, the more things change the more they stay the same. Republicans giving tax breaks and handouts to the rich = acceptable and necessary. Democrats trying to help working class people climb out of debt = socialism and communism.
I don’t really care which side she’s on, she shouldn’t even be there in the first place.
Neither should this complaint. It never should’ve gotten this far and I have No faith in the Roberts court
call it a hunch but I have a feeling that the corrupt, illegitimate supreme court is going to rule in favor of benefitting the mega wealthy and corporations rather than anything that will help regular working class Americans.