Despite a number of legal challenges that aim to block the US government’s student loan forgiveness plan — including a federal appeals court decision to delay the plan — President Joe Biden sounds confident that borrowers who qualify for relief will see their debt canceled within the next couple of weeks.
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“We’re going to win that case,” Biden said in an Oct. 27 interviews with NewsNation. “I think in the next two weeks, you’re going to see those checks going out.”
The case he referred to was an Oct. 21 decision by the US Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit that paused debt relief while the court reviews a lawsuit filed by six Republican-leaning states. It’s uncertain how long that process will take.
Under Biden’s plan, up to $10,000 in federal student debt relief will be provided to individual borrowers with annual incomes below $125,000 in 2020 or 2021, and households with less than $250,000 in income those same two years. Pell Grant recipients are eligible for up to $20,000 in canceled loans.
Although Biden mentioned “checks going out,” much of the relief will come in the form of debt being canceled by loan servicers, with no actual checks involved. However, eligible borrowers who made voluntary payments during the federal student loan payment pause from March 13, 2020 through Dec. 31, 2022 could receive refund payments, according to the Federal Student Aid website.
Since the plan was announced in August 2022, multiple lawsuits have been filed that aim to either alter it or shut it down. So far none have succeeded. As NPR reported, one case filed by a taxpayer group in Wisconsin was rejected by the US Supreme Court. Another was dismissed by a federal judge in Missouri before the US appeals court ordered debt relief to be temporarily put on hold.
That ruling doesn’t prohibit borrowers from applying for relief through the US Department of Education, Bloomberg reported. As of late last week, more than 22 million borrowers had already applied for relief, the president said.
Meanwhile, administration officials continue to assure eligible borrowers that the program will proceed as planned.
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“We promise to fight to protect you from baseless lawsuits trying to stop us from providing you debt relief. We will not stop fighting for you,” Education Secretary Miguel Cardona said in a recent video tweet.
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This article originally appeared on GOBankingRates.com: Student Loan Checks: Biden Updates When You’ll Get Them