Court gets it correct on a moratorium
Last week, the United States Supreme Court struck down the eviction moratorium ordered by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The result was widely anticipated, given the Biden administration’s acknowledgment that such an order had no legal basis. As well-intended as the order might have been, the Biden administration was wrong to substitute good intentions for respect for the law.
Millions of Americans have fallen behind on paying their rent due to the economic disruption caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
Bloomberg, citing an analysis by Goldman Sachs Group Inc., recently reported that “as many as 3.5 million households are behind on rent, with landlords owed as much as $17 billion.”
The federal government has already authorized tens of billions of dollars to help cover the cost of owed rental payments to landlords, but state and local governments have lagged in making sure those funds have been properly disbursed.
Such is the case here in California.
As Jeff Collins reported for the Southern California News Group earlier this month, “As with the rest of the nation, California’s patchwork of rental assistance programs is plagued by complaints that they’re taking too long to dispense money and are mired in bureaucracy.”
With rent relief already set aside in the hands of state and local governments, it should be a priority to put those funds to use.
It’s the right thing to do for landlords, not all of whom are well-off, and for tenants facing the prospect of eviction.
It’s certainly more practical and just than the CDC imposing a moratorium Biden administration officials themselves knew wasn’t legal.
On June 29, the Supreme Court allowed the eviction moratorium to expire on July 31.
Justice Brett Kavanaugh, who joined the majority in allowing the eviction moratorium to expire, rather than strike it down then and there, clearly warned the Biden administration that extending the moratorium would require congressional action.
“The Supreme Court declared on June 29th that the CDC could not grant such an extension without ‘clear and specific congressional authorization,’” White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said on August 2.
The very next day, without “clear and specific congressional authorization,” the CDC ordered a new eviction moratorium. President Biden himself noted that, “The bulk of the constitutional scholarship says that it’s not likely to pass constitutional muster.”
President Biden was certainly right about that, as he knew.
“This claim of expansive authority under §361(a) is unprecedented,” the court ruled, referring to a provision of the Public Health Service Act the CDC officially invoked as justification. “Since that provision’s enactment in 1944, no regulation premised on it has even begun to approach the size or scope of the eviction moratorium.”
President Biden should take a lesson from this and avoid overreaching, especially when he knows that’s what he’s doing.
In the end, it serves no one and sends the wrong message to the public about the importance of adhering to constitutional and legal norms.
Fortunately, the Supreme Court fulfilled its proper function. It’s a shame the same can’t be said for Congress or the executive branch.