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1 1 (December 16, 2022)

handle is hein.crs/govejul0001 and id is 1 raw text is: Congressional_______ ResearchS .rvice Student Loan Cancellation Reaches the Supreme Court December 16, 2022 Nearly all litigants who successfully petition the Supreme Court to hear their claims do so after losing appeals in another court, such as in a state supreme court or a federal circuit court of appeals. There is, however, a category of federal appeals of such imperative public importance as to justify deviation from normal appellate practice and to require immediate determination in the nation's highest court. Statute and the Supreme Court's rules thus authorize a process, called certiorari before judgment, under which the Court agrees to hear cases on their merits before the lower federal courts finally dispose of them. The Court has exercised this authority to decide some of its most seminal modern cases. Student loan cancellation has prompted further use of this process. In December 2022, the Supreme Court twice exercised this extraordinary authority, without recorded dissent, in litigation challenging the Biden Administration's one-time student loan cancellation policy. On December 1, the Court granted certiorari before judgment in litigation brought by six states, which was then pending in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit (Eighth Circuit). On December 12, the Court used the same procedure to accept jurisdiction over litigation brought by two student loan borrowers who were defending a favorable district court judgment in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit (Fifth Circuit). The Court's orders state that the Court will hear both cases during its February 2023 argument session. This Sidebar provides a first look at the two cases now before the Court. The Sidebar summarizes the cancellation policy targeted by the plaintiffs' claims. Next, the Sidebar introduces and describes the standing and merits questions presented by these two appeals. The Sidebar ends with a summary of next steps, which will inform a more extensive review of the litigation and considerations for Congress. The Cancellation Policy On August 24, 2022, the Biden Administration announced that the Secretary of Education (Secretary) would exercise asserted statutory authority under the Higher Education Relief Opportunities for Students Act of 2003 (HEROES Act) to cancel certain federal student loan debt. The statute authorizes the Secretary to waive or modify any statutory or regulatory provision applicable to the student financial assistance programs under Title IV of the Higher Education Act (HEA) (which authorizes the primary federal student loan programs) as the Secretary deems necessary for a variety of purposes. For example, Congressional Research Service https://crsreports.congress.gov LSB10876 CRS Legal Sidebar Prepared for Members and Committees of Congress

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