Judicial setback for Biden: federal judge again halts his plan to cancel student debt after another court had given him the green light

Joe Biden suffered a court victory and a setback on the same day. Within a 24-hour period, a federal judge allowed him to move forward with his student debt cancellation and another magistrate blocked it in a different court, yet again foiling a long-held desire of the president.

Early Friday afternoon, federal Judge Randal Hall gave the Department of Education the green light to move forward with the plan to cancel student debt, which would reach a total of 25 million people. Hall overturned the restriction he put in place in early September and also ruled that Georgia could not remain in the class-action lawsuit that seven Republican states filed to stop implementation of the White House plan.

"There is no indication that the rule is being implemented to attack the states or their income taxes, so any loss of tax revenue is incidental and insufficient to create legitimacy for Georgia," Hall wrote. The magistrate added that Georgia had not demonstrated how it would be harmed by the White House's plan to eliminate up to $73 billion in student loan debt.

A few hours later, however, Judge Matthew Schelp of Missouri again put the brakes on Biden's initiative. Already without Georgia, the other six states asked Schelp to act swiftly, given that the Department of Education could "unlawfully mass cancel up to hundreds of billions of dollars in student loans as soon as Monday."

As Schelp wrote, the Department of Education is prohibited from "mass canceling student loans, forgiving any principal or interest, not charging borrowers accrued interest, or further implementing any other actions under the Rule or instructing federal contractors to take such actions."

"Balancing the harm and the injury, merged with the public's interest, easily leads this Court to the conclusion that preliminary injunctive relief should issue. The public has an immense interest in its own government following the law," the judge added in his ruling.

"This is yet another victory for the American people. The Court rightfully recognized that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris cannot saddle hard-working Americans with Ivy League debt," celebrated Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey.