Topline
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled Thursday night that the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention does not have the power to impose a sweeping halt to evictions. This decision blocks an updated moratorium President Joe Bidens administration imposed due to Covid-19.
Getty Images of the U.S. Supreme Court
The Key Facts
An earlier court judge had ruled against the eviction moratorium, but she temporarily stayed her decision. On Thursday, the Supreme Court lifted that stay and allowed the moratorium be stopped. The federal government's claim that the eviction ban falls within its legal power to make rules to prevent the spread of communicable diseases was rejected by the Supreme Court. This suggests that law only applies to specific measures such as fumigation or disinfection. Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan, three liberal justices, voted against. They claimed Congress granted the government wide latitude to stop the spread of disease and warned that removing the moratorium could cause public health problems due to an increase in Covid-19 cases. Forbes reached out to CDC for comment.
Important Quote
If Congress had authorized the CDC to take the actions it has, that would be one thing. However, that has not been the case. The Supreme Court wrote that instead, the CDC has imposed a nationwide moratorium against evictions based on a decades-old statute which allows it to use measures such as fumigation or pest extermination. It is difficult to believe that this statute gives the CDC the broad authority it claims.
Chief Critic
Breyer wrote in his dissent that the [majority opinion] states that Congress must be more clear to allow the CDC to address public healthcare crises via eviction moatoria. It is clear that the statute allows the CDC to take significant measures, such as quarantines. These may impose greater restrictions than the eviction limits.
Important Background
The CDCs moratorium prohibits landlords from evicting tenants earning less than $99,000 per annum for non-payment of rent. It also applies to those who live in areas with high or substantial Covid-19 transmission, which covers most of the country. This is a shorter version of a CDC eviction ban, which was in effect for the entire country regardless of coronavirus infections rates. These bans were justified by the CDC because a rise in evictions could threaten public health in a pandemic. This is especially true when large numbers of Americans are struggling to pay rent due to a spike in unemployment. The measures were challenged by landlord groups, who claimed that an indefinite eviction suspension left them in a precarious financial situation. In a 5-4 June decision the Supreme Court allowed a prior version of the CDCs eviction ban to remain in effect. Justice Brett Kavanaugh however stated that he believed the moratorium was likely illegal. He voted to remove it because it was due to expire at July's end. The Biden administration was reluctant to extend the policy, and instead lobbied Congress for a eviction pause to be passed into law. However, after these unsuccessful efforts, the CDC rolledout a two-month shorter moratorium that the Supreme Court rejected on Thursday.
Surprising Fact
Biden presented the CDC's latest eviction pause this month. He acknowledged that it wasn't likely to be constitutionally approved by many legal scholars, but he believed it was worth trying. Later, he clarified that he believed the CDC's latest eviction pause was constitutional. However, he wasn't certain if the Supreme Court would keep it intact.
