Department of Education v. Brown

(Slip Opinion) OCTOBER TERM, 2022 1

Syllabus

NOTE: Where it is feasible, a syllabus (headnote) will be released, as is

being done in connection with this case, at the time the opinion is issued.

The syllabus constitutes no part of the opinion of the Court but has been

prepared by the Reporter of Decisions for the convenience of the reader.

See United States v. Detroit Timber & Lumber Co., 200 U. S. 321, 337.

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

Syllabus

DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION ET AL. v. BROWN

ET AL.

CERTIORARI BEFORE JUDGMENT TO THE UNITED STATES

COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT

No. 22–535. Argued February 28, 2023—Decided June 30, 2023

To alleviate hardship expected to be caused by the impending resump-

tion of federal student-loan repayments that had been suspended dur-

ing the multi-year coronavirus pandemic, Secretary of Education Mi-

guel Cardona announced a substantial student-loan debt-forgiveness

plan (Plan). The Plan discharges $10,000 to $20,000 of an eligible bor-

rower’s debt, depending on criteria such as the borrower’s income and

the type of loan held. The Secretary invoked the Higher Education

Relief Opportunities for Students Act of 2003 (HEROES Act), which

authorizes the Secretary “to waive or modify any provision” applicable

to federal “student financial assistance” programs “as may be neces-

sary to ensure that . . . recipients of student financial assistance” are

no worse off “financially in relation to that financial assistance be-

cause” of a national emergency or disaster. 20 U. S. C. §§1098bb(a)(1),

(a)(2)(A), 1098ee(2)(C)–(D). The HEROES Act also exempts rules

promulgated pursuant to it from the otherwise-applicable negotiated-

rulemaking and notice-and-comment processes.

Before the Plan took effect, various plaintiffs—including respond-

ents here—sued to enjoin it. Respondents Myra Brown and Alexander

Taylor are two borrowers who do not qualify for the maximum relief

available under the Plan. Their one-count complaint alleges that the

Secretary was required to follow notice-and-comment and negotiated-

rulemaking procedures in promulgating the Plan, which all agree he

did not do. Brown and Taylor argue that the HEROES Act’s proce-

dural exemptions apply only when the rule promulgated is substan-

tively authorized by the Act, and because the HEROES Act does not

authorize the Plan (they argue), the Secretary was required to follow

negotiated rulemaking and notice and comment. The District Court

2 DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION v. BROWN

Syllabus

rejected their argument regarding the scope of the HEROES Act’s pro-

cedural exemptions, but nevertheless vacated the Plan as substan-

tively unauthorized. This Court granted certiorari before judgment to

consider this case alongside Biden v. Nebraska, No. 22–506, which pre-

sents a similar challenge to the Plan.

Held: Because respondents fail to establish that any injury they suffer

from not having their loans forgiven is fairly traceable to the Plan, they

lack Article III standing, so the Court has no jurisdiction to address

their procedural claim. Pp. 6–15.

(a) “This case begins and ends with standing.” Carney v. Adams,

592 U. S. ___, ___. The Court’s authority under the Constitution is

limited to resolving “Cases” or “Controversies.” Art. III, §2. The

Court’s jurisprudence has “established that the irreducible constitu-

tional minimum of standing contains three elements” that a plaintiff

must plead and—ultimately—prove. Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife,

504 U. S. 555, 560. Those elements are: (1) a “concrete and particular-

ized” injury that is (2) “fairly traceable” to the challenged action of the

defendant and (3) “likely” to be “redressed by a favorable decision.” Id.,

at 560–561 (alterations and internal quotation marks omitted). But

where, as here, the plaintiff alleges that she has been deprived of a

procedural right to protect her concrete interest, she need not show

that observing the contested procedure would necessarily lead to a dif-

ferent substantive result. Id., at 572, n. 7. Pp. 6–8.

(b) As articulated in this Court, respondents’ claim and theory of

standing are twofold: First, because the HEROES Act does not sub-

stantively authorize the Plan, the Secretary was obligated to follow

typical negotiated-rulemaking and notice-and-comment requirements.

Second, if the Secretary had observed those procedures, respondents

might have used those opportunities to convince him not only that pro-

ceeding under the HEROES Act is unlawful, but also that he should

instead adopt a different loan-forgiveness program under the Higher

Education Act of 1965 (HEA), and to make that program more gener-

ous to respondents than the Plan. Respondents assert there is at least

a chance that this series of events will come to pass now if this Court

vacates the Plan. Pp. 8–9.

(c) Respondents’ standing claim most clearly fails on traceability:

They cannot show that their purported injury of not receiving loan re-

lief under the HEA is fairly traceable to the Department’s (allegedly

unlawful) decision to grant loan relief under the HEROES Act. Pp. 9–

15.

(1) Significantly, respondents are not claiming that they are in-

jured by not being sufficiently included among the Plan’s beneficiaries:

They think the Plan is substantively unlawful and instead seek debt

forgiveness under the HEA. But a decision regarding the lawfulness

Cite as: 600 U. S. ____ (2023) 3

Syllabus

of the Plan does not directly affect respondents’ ability to obtain loan

relief under the HEA; the Department’s authority to grant loan relief

under the HEA (upon which the Court does not pass) is not affected by

whether the Plan is lawful or unlawful. Any connection between loan

forgiveness under the two statutes is speculative.

While it is true that the Court’s procedural-standing case law toler-

ates uncertainty over whether observing certain procedures would

have led to (caused) a different substantive outcome, see Lujan, 504

U. S., at 572, n. 7, the causal uncertainty here is not so limited. In-

stead, the uncertainty concerns whether the substantive decisions the

Department has made regarding the Plan under the HEROES Act

have a causal relationship with other substantive decisions respond-

ents want the Department to make under the HEA. There is no prec-

edent for tolerating this sort of causal uncertainty. Respondents can-

not show that the denial of HEA loan relief—their ostensible injury—

“fairly can be traced to” the Department’s decision to grant loan relief

in the Plan. Simon v. Eastern Ky. Welfare Rights Organization, 426

U. S. 26, 42–43. There is little reason to think that the Department’s

discretionary decision to pursue one mechanism of loan relief under

the HEROES Act has anything to do with its discretionary decision to

pursue (or not pursue) action under the HEA. “The line of causation

between” the Department’s promulgation of the Plan and respondents’

lack of benefits under the HEA “is attenuated at best,” Allen v. Wright,

468 U. S. 737, 757, and all too dependent on “ ‘conjecture,’ ” Summers

v. Earth Island Institute, 555 U. S. 488, 496. Pp. 10–13.

(2) Respondents’ attempts to tie the Plan to potential HEA relief

are unavailing. Although the Department has occasionally referred to

“one-time” student-loan relief in publicizing the Plan, the Plan itself

contains no such reference. And any incidental effect of the Plan on

the likelihood that the Department will undertake a separate loan-

forgiveness program under a different statute is too weak and specu-

lative to show that the absence of HEA-based loan forgiveness is fairly

traceable to the Plan. See, e.g., Simon, 426 U. S., at 42–43. To the

extent the Department has determined that the Plan crowds out other

efforts to forgive student loans, that determination is a discretionary

one that respondents may petition the Department to reconsider. Fi-

nally, respondents cannot demonstrate causation on the theory that

the Department’s failure to observe the requisite procedural rules cost

them a chance to obtain debt forgiveness; they do not want debt for-

giveness under the HEROES Act, and nothing the Department has

done deprives them of a chance to seek debt forgiveness under the

HEA. Respondents cannot meaningfully connect the absence of loan

relief under the HEA to the adoption of the Plan, so they have failed to

show that their injury is fairly traceable to the Plan. Pp. 13–14.

4 DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION v. BROWN

Syllabus

Vacated and remanded.

ALITO, J., delivered the opinion for a unanimous Court.

Cite as: 600 U. S. ____ (2023) 1

Opinion of the Court

NOTICE: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in the

United States Reports. Readers are requested to notify the Reporter of

Decisions, Supreme Court of the United States, Washington, D. C. 20543,

pio@supremecourt.gov, of any typographical or other formal errors.

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

_________________

No. 22–535

_________________

DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION, ET AL., PETITIONERS

v. MYRA BROWN, ET AL.

ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF

APPEALS FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT

[June 30, 2023]

JUSTICE ALITO delivered the opinion of the Court.

In August 2022, the Secretary of Education announced a

large-scale student-loan forgiveness program. He pledged

to discharge hundreds of billions of dollars in student-loan

debt owed by millions of borrowers. According to the Secre-

tary, the discharge was necessary to alleviate hardship

caused by the impending resumption of loan repayments,

which had been suspended during the multi-year corona-

virus pandemic, and he therefore invoked authority that he

claimed he enjoyed under the Higher Education Relief Op-

portunities for Students Act of 2003 (HEROES Act). 117

Stat. 904, codified at 20 U. S. C. §1070 et seq. The following

month, the Secretary directed that specific actions be taken

to implement the loan-forgiveness plan (Plan). The amount

of relief available to a borrower under the Plan depends on

various criteria, including the borrower’s income and the

type of loan the borrower holds.

Before the Plan took effect, however, various plaintiffs—

including respondents here—sued to enjoin it. Respond-

ents are two individual borrowers who, for different rea-

sons, do not qualify for the maximum relief available under

2 DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION v. BROWN

Opinion of the Court

the Plan. They argue that the Department of Education

promulgated the Plan without following mandatory proce-

dures known as (1) negotiated rulemaking and (2) notice

and comment. The District Court held in favor of respond-

ents, and we granted certiorari before judgment to consider

this case alongside Biden v. Nebraska, No. 22–506, which

presents a similar challenge to the Plan.

Ultimately, however, we do not resolve respondents’ pro-

cedural claim because we conclude that they lack standing

to bring it. Accordingly, we vacate the judgment of the

United States District Court for the Northern District of

Texas and remand with instructions to dismiss. We simul-

taneously deny as moot the Department’s application for a

stay pending appeal.

I

A

The Court’s opinion in Biden v. Nebraska, ___ U. S. ___

(2023), recounts the relevant background of the HEROES

Act, so only a brief summary is provided here. The Act au-

thorizes the Secretary of Education “to waive or modify any

provision” applicable to federal “student financial assis-

tance” programs “as may be necessary to ensure that . . .

recipients of student financial assistance” who live or work

in a declared disaster area, or suffer direct economic hard-

ship as a result of a national emergency, “are not placed in

a worse position financially in relation to that financial as-

sistance because” of the disaster or emergency. 20 U. S. C.

§§1098bb(a)(1), (a)(2)(A), 1098ee(2)(C)–(D).

In addition to this substantive grant of authority, the

HEROES Act dispenses with certain procedural rules for

actions taken pursuant to it.

First, the HEROES Act permits the Secretary to imple-

ment any “waivers and modifications authorized or re-

quired” by the Act without engaging in the “negotiated rule-

making” that is typically required before proposing

Cite as: 600 U. S. ____ (2023) 3

Opinion of the Court

regulations relating to student financial assistance.

§1098bb(d). Negotiated rulemaking is a lengthy delibera-

tive process involving many stakeholders. Pursuant to this

process, the Secretary must first obtain “advice of and rec-

ommendations” from a long list of sources, including “indi-

viduals and representatives” of groups “such as students,

legal assistance organizations that represent students, in-

stitutions of higher education, State student grant agen-

cies, guaranty agencies, lenders, secondary markets, loan

servicers, guaranty agency servicers, and collection agen-

cies.” §1098a(a)(1). Then, informed by this consultation,

the Secretary must submit draft regulations for considera-

tion in a negotiation process involving participants who are

“chosen by the Secretary from individuals nominated by”

such groups. §1098a(b)(1). Only after taking these steps

may the Secretary “publis[h] proposed regulations in the

Federal Register,” ibid., accompanied by a summary of the

information the Secretary received throughout the process,

§1098a(a)(2). The HEROES Act, however, permits the Sec-

retary to bypass this onerous process. §1098bb(d).

The HEROES Act also authorizes the Secretary to bypass

notice-and-comment procedures that the Administrative

Procedure Act (APA) would otherwise demand. The APA

typically requires agencies to give the public “[g]eneral no-

tice of [a] proposed rule making” by publication in the Fed-

eral Register, and then to provide “interested persons an

opportunity to participate in the rule making through sub-

mission of written data, views, or arguments” regarding the

proposed rule. 5 U. S. C. §§553(b), (c). The agency may

promulgate a final rule only after providing notice and op-

portunity for comment. §553(c). But the HEROES Act in-

stead permits the Secretary to implement the waivers and

modifications he “deems necessary to achieve the purposes

of ” the Act merely by “publish[ing]” “notice in the Federal

Register.” 20 U. S. C. §1098bb(b)(1).

4 DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION v. BROWN

Opinion of the Court

B

On September 27, 2022, Secretary of Education Miguel

Cardona, invoking authority under the HEROES Act, di-

rected the issuance of waivers and modifications that would

bring about the forgiveness of a substantial amount of

student-loan debt. In particular, he purported to effect the

discharge of (1) $10,000 of eligible, federally held student-

loan debt for any individual borrower with 2020 or 2021 in-

come under $125,000 (or household income under

$250,000), and (2) an additional $10,000 (making a total of

$20,000) for any such borrower who had ever received a Pell

Grant. Pell Grants are Government-funded grants to help

defray the cost of postsecondary education; eligibility for

these grants turns principally on the income of a student’s

family when the student applies to and is enrolled in the

relevant educational program (almost always undergradu-

ate study). See §§1070a(b)(2), 1087mm(a), 1091; see also 34

CFR §690.6(c) (2022) (limited eligibility for students in a

qualifying “postbaccalaureate program”). Secretary Car-

dona directed that these actions be taken via a publication

in the Federal Register, see App. 262; all agree that he did

not observe the generally applicable negotiated-rulemaking

or notice-and-comment processes in devising and announc-

ing the Plan.

Notwithstanding the Plan’s scope and expense, not all

student-loan borrowers were pleased with it. Myra Brown

and Alexander Taylor, plaintiffs in this case, are two such

dissatisfied borrowers, albeit for different reasons. Brown’s

loans are “commercially held,” id., at 171, Complaint ¶10,

meaning that her creditor is an entity other than the Fed-

eral Government. The Plan, however, applies only to bor-

rowers whose loans fall into one or more categories of loans

“held by the Department.” 87 Fed. Reg. 61513 (2022). Con-

sequently, Brown is not entitled to any loan forgiveness un-

der the Plan.

Cite as: 600 U. S. ____ (2023) 5

Opinion of the Court

Taylor, on the other hand, is eligible for loan for-

giveness—but only $10,000, rather than the maximum

$20,000. That is because, despite now having an annual

income of less than $25,000, he never received a Pell Grant.

See App. 183, Complaint ¶61. Thus, individuals with an-

nual income up to five times greater than his are eligible for

twice as much loan forgiveness as he is if they ever received

a Pell Grant.

Accordingly, both Brown and Taylor object to certain ele-

ments of the Plan—Brown to its limitation to federally held

loans, and Taylor to the additional relief it doles out based

on prior Pell Grants, with no regard for current income. Be-

cause the Department did not engage in negotiated rule-

making or notice and comment, however, Brown and Taylor

had no formal opportunity to voice their views on the Plan

prior to its adoption.

Alleging that the law entitles them to such an oppor-

tunity, Brown and Taylor brought this action in the U. S.

District Court for the Northern District of Texas. Their

one-count complaint claims that the Plan is unlawful be-

cause the Department promulgated it without observing

the requirements of negotiated rulemaking and notice and

comment. As a result, they claim, we should “[v]acate and

set aside the” Plan under 5 U. S. C. §706(2)(D). App. 186.

Brown and Taylor recognize that the HEROES Act sup-

plies exemptions from these procedural requirements.

They argue, however, that an action of the Secretary falls

within these exemptions only if it is substantively author-

ized by the Act; the Secretary, in their view, cannot merely

invoke the “HEROES Act” to bypass negotiated rulemaking

and notice and comment. According to Brown and Taylor,

the Act does not substantively authorize the Plan, and so

the Secretary was required to follow these procedures.

The District Court agreed with Brown and Taylor—in

part. It rebuffed their central argument that the HEROES

6 DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION v. BROWN

Opinion of the Court

Act exempts from procedural requirements only those ac-

tions that the Act substantively authorizes. But the Dis-

trict Court nonetheless held that the Plan exceeds the Sec-

retary’s authority under the HEROES Act and therefore

entered judgment vacating it. ___ F. Supp. 3d ___, ___,

2022 WL 16858525, *15 (ND Tex., Nov. 10, 2022).

After the Fifth Circuit denied the Department’s motion

for a stay pending appeal, the Department applied to this

Court for such a stay. The Department advised in the al-

ternative that we could treat its application as a petition for

certiorari before judgment. We did just that, granting the

Department’s petition for certiorari before judgment and

deferring consideration of its application for a stay. 598

U. S. ___ (2022). We now review the judgment in No. 22–

535 and dispose of the pending application in No. 22A489.

II

We ultimately do not address Brown and Taylor’s argu-

ment that the Department failed to observe proper proce-

dures in promulgating the Plan. “We have ‘an obligation to

assure ourselves’ of litigants’ standing under Article III” be-

fore proceeding to the merits of a case. DaimlerChrysler

Corp. v. Cuno, 547 U. S. 332, 340 (2006) (quoting Friends of

the Earth, Inc. v. Laidlaw Environmental Services (TOC),

Inc., 528 U. S. 167, 180 (2000)). And because we conclude

that Brown and Taylor lack standing, “[t]his case begins

and ends with standing.” Carney v. Adams, 592 U. S. ___,

___ (2020) (slip op., at 4). In particular, we hold that Brown

and Taylor fail to establish that any injury they suffer from

not having their loans forgiven is fairly traceable to the

Plan.

A

Our authority under the Constitution is limited to resolv-

ing “Cases” or “Controversies.” Art. III, §2. “The doctrine

of standing,” among others, “implements this” limit on our

Cite as: 600 U. S. ____ (2023) 7

Opinion of the Court

authority. Carney, 592 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 4). Our

jurisprudence has “established that the irreducible consti-

tutional minimum of standing contains three elements”

that a plaintiff must plead and—ultimately—prove. Lujan

v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U. S. 555, 560 (1992). “First,

the plaintiff must have suffered an ‘injury in fact’ ” that is

both “concrete and particularized” and “actual or imminent,

not conjectural or hypothetical.” Ibid. (some internal quo-

tation marks omitted). Second, the plaintiff ’s injury must

be “fairly traceable to the challenged action of the defend-

ant,” meaning that “there must be a causal connection be-

tween the injury and the conduct complained of.” Ibid. (in-

ternal quotation marks and alterations omitted). “Third, it

must be ‘likely,’ as opposed to merely ‘speculative,’ that the

injury will be redressed by a favorable decision.” Id., at 561

(some internal quotation marks omitted).

We have found, however, that when a statute affords a

litigant “a procedural right to protect his concrete inter-

ests,” the litigant may establish Article III jurisdiction

without meeting the usual “standards for redressability

and immediacy.” Id., at 572, n. 7. For example, we hypoth-

esized a person “living adjacent to the site for proposed con-

struction of a federally licensed dam” and explained that

this person “has standing to challenge the licensing

agency’s failure to prepare an environmental impact state-

ment, even though he cannot establish with any certainty

that the statement will cause the license to be withheld or

altered.” Ibid. In this context, the fact that the defendant

might well come to the same decision after abiding by the

contested procedural requirement does not deprive a plain-

tiff of standing.

Regardless of the redressability showing we have toler-

ated in the procedural-rights context, we have never held a

litigant who asserts such a right is excused from demon-

strating that it has a “concrete interest that is affected by

the deprivation” of the claimed right. Summers v. Earth

8 DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION v. BROWN

Opinion of the Court

Island Institute, 555 U. S. 488, 496–497 (2009).

We emphasized this requirement in Summers, where we

were asked to review U. S. Forest Service regulations ex-

empting certain minor land-management decisions from

the typical notice-and-comment process. Id., at 490–491.

The plaintiffs in that case did not have any “concrete plans

to observe nature in [a] specific area” affected by actions the

Service took pursuant to this exemption, id., at 497, and we

therefore held that they lacked standing, id., at 494–497.

As we put it, the “deprivation of a procedural right without

some concrete interest that is affected by the deprivation—

a procedural right in vacuo—is insufficient to create Article

III standing.” Id., at 496.

B

Before applying this framework, we pause to explain both

respondents’ theory of standing and the substance of their

claim, which have not always been readily ascertainable—

or consistently described—during this litigation.

Upon initial inspection, respondents’ merits theory ap-

pears to be in tension with the possibility that the Depart-

ment could redress their injury. Respondents argue simul-

taneously (1) that the Department might have treated them

more generously if it had solicited their input in developing

the Plan and (2) that the Department lacks substantive au-

thority to promulgate broad-based loan forgiveness under

the HEROES Act. It would be quite odd for Brown and Tay-

lor to complain about being unable to seek an increase in

the scope of an administrative action that they think the

Department cannot lawfully take.

Respondents belatedly attempted to address this strange

feature of their argument. Their complaint does not say a

word about standing. But in their reply supporting their

motion in the District Court for an injunction against the

Plan, they ventured a brief attempt to explain their position

on this threshold issue. They insisted that the Department

Cite as: 600 U. S. ____ (2023) 9

Opinion of the Court

cannot adopt the Plan under the HEROES Act regardless

of the procedures it follows. Reply in No. 4:22–cv–908

(ND Tex., Oct. 20, 2022), ECF Doc. 26, pp. 3–4. But they

observed that the Department has claimed it also has au-

thority to forgive loans under a different statute, the Higher

Education Act of 1965 (HEA), which authorizes the Secre-

tary to “compromise, waive, or release any right, title,

claim, lien, or demand.” 20 U. S. C. §1082(a)(6). Thus, re-

spondents argued, there is a chance that vacating the Plan

would prompt the Department to pursue loan relief under

the HEA instead. In this Court, Brown and Taylor discuss

the HEA at length for the first time in this litigation. See

Brief for Respondents 28–32.

Having recounted this history, we now understand re-

spondents’ claim and theory of standing as follows. First,

because the HEROES Act does not substantively authorize

the Plan, the Department was obligated to follow the typi-

cal negotiated-rulemaking and notice-and-comment re-

quirements. Second, if the Department had observed those

procedures, respondents might have used those opportuni-

ties to convince the Department (1) that proceeding under

the HEROES Act is unlawful or otherwise undesirable, and

(2) that it should adopt a different loan-forgiveness plan un-

der the HEA instead, one that is more generous to them

than the HEROES Act plan that they allege is unlawful.

They assert there is at least a chance that this series of

events will come to pass now if we vacate the Plan. Id., at

19.

C

Describing respondents’ claim illustrates how unusual it

is. They claim they are injured because the Government

has not adopted a lawful benefits program under which

they would qualify for assistance. But the same could be

said of anyone who might benefit from a benefits program

that the Government has not chosen to adopt. It is difficult

10 DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION v. BROWN

Opinion of the Court

to see how such an injury could be particular (since all peo-

ple suffer it) or concrete (since an as-yet-uncreated benefits

plan is necessarily “ ‘abstract’ ” and not “ ‘real’ ”).1 Spokeo,

Inc. v. Robins, 578 U. S. 330, 340 (2016); see also Allen v.

Wright, 468 U. S. 737, 755–756 (1984) (rejecting a theory

that would “extend [standing] nationwide”). Nor have we

ever accepted that an injury is redressable when the pro-

spect of redress turns on the Government’s wholly discre-

tionary decision to create a new regulatory or benefits pro-

gram.

Nonetheless, we think the deficiencies of respondents’

claim are clearest with respect to traceability. They cannot

show that their purported injury of not receiving loan relief

under the HEA is fairly traceable to the Department’s (al-

legedly unlawful) decision to grant loan relief under the

HEROES Act.

1

At the outset, we reiterate what respondents’ claim is not.

Respondents are not claiming that they are injured by not

being included in the Plan (or, in Taylor’s case, by being re-

munerated by the Plan less generously than he thinks him-

self entitled to). After all, they think the Plan is substan-

tively unlawful, a merits contention that “we accept as

valid” for purposes of analyzing standing. Federal Election

Comm’n v. Ted Cruz for Senate, 596 U. S. ___, ___ (2022)

(slip op., at 6). It would be quite strange to think that a

party experiences an Article III injury by not being affected

by an unlawful action (in Brown’s case) or not being more

affected by such action (in Taylor’s).

Instead, respondents seek relief under a separate statu-

tory source. They name the HEA as that potential source,

but presumably they would be pleased for the Department

——————

1 In contrast, a claim of unlawful exclusion from an existing benefits

program can be fit for judicial resolution. See, e.g., Trinity Lutheran

Church of Columbia, Inc. v. Comer, 582 U. S. 449, 462 (2017).

Cite as: 600 U. S. ____ (2023) 11

Opinion of the Court

to invoke any other lawful source (if one exists) as grounds

for granting them loan relief. Their interest is in obtaining

loan forgiveness in general.

The Plan, however, is independent of any student-loan

relief the Department might craft under the HEA (or any

other statute). A decision by this Court that the Plan is

lawful would have no effect on the Department’s ability to

forgive respondents’ loans under the HEA.2 Thus, the Plan

poses no legal obstacle to the Department’s choosing to find

other ways to remedy the harm respondents experience

from not having their loans forgiven.

Put differently, the Department’s decision to give other

people relief under a different statutory scheme did not

cause respondents not to obtain the benefits they want. The

cause of their supposed injury is far more pedestrian than

that: The Department has simply chosen not to give them

the relief they want. Ordinarily, a party’s recourse to in-

duce an agency to take a desired action is to file not a law-

suit, but a “petition for the issuance, amendment, or repeal

of a rule.” 5 U. S. C. §553(e). The denial of such a petition

“must be justified by a statement of reasons,” which in turn

“can be appealed to the courts” if the litigant has standing

to maintain such a suit. Auer v. Robbins, 519 U. S. 452, 459

(1997). Contesting a separate benefits program based on a

theory that it crowds out the desired one, however, is an

approach for which we have been unable to find any prece-

dent.

It is true that in procedural-standing cases, we tolerate

uncertainty over whether observing certain procedures

would have led to (caused) a different substantive outcome,

as with Lujan’s example of the dam and the bypassed envi-

ronmental impact statement. See 504 U. S., at 572, n. 7. In

——————

2 We do not opine on the substantive lawfulness of any action the De-

partment might take under the HEA or add anything to our construction

of the HEROES Act as set forth in today’s opinion in Nebraska.

12 DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION v. BROWN

Opinion of the Court

this case, however, the causal uncertainty is not merely

over whether observing certain procedures would have led

to a different substantive outcome. Instead, the uncer-

tainty concerns whether the substantive decisions the De-

partment has made regarding the Plan under the HEROES

Act have a causal relationship with other substantive deci-

sions respondents want the Department to make under the

HEA. There is no precedent for tolerating this sort of causal

uncertainty.

Our other procedural-standing cases demonstrate the

point. In the example posited in Lujan, proceeding with

building the dam as planned and simultaneously sparing

the adjacent landowner from the negative effects of the dam

are mutually exclusive options. See ibid. While it might be

uncertain whether undertaking an environmental impact

statement would prevent the dam from being built, it is

clear that building the dam would directly injure the land-

owner.

Similarly, in a case like Summers, it might be uncertain

whether public comment would alter any particular land-

management decision the Forest Service makes. There

would be no uncertainty, however, that a plaintiff with con-

crete plans to observe nature in a particular area “would be

harmed if the [land-management project] went forward

without incorporation of the ideas he would have sug-

gested” in his comments. 555 U. S., at 494.3

Accordingly, Brown and Taylor need not allege that ob-

serving negotiated rulemaking and notice and comment

would “ ‘force’ ” the Department to reach substantive results

more favorable to them than those embodied in the Plan.

——————

3 Although no plaintiff in Summers had standing because none had al-

leged specific plans to observe nature in one of the areas at issue in the

case, see 555 U. S., at 500, the point remains that, in an equivalent case

featuring those specific plans, environmental damage to such a plain-

tiff ’s esthetic interests could fairly be traced to the Service’s land-

management choices.

Cite as: 600 U. S. ____ (2023) 13

Opinion of the Court

Lemon v. Geren, 514 F. 3d 1312, 1314–1315 (CADC 2008).

But they must still show—pursuant to our customary trace-

ability standards—that the Plan’s substance causes their

injury by impairing loan relief under the HEA.

Brown and Taylor cannot meet this standard. “It is

purely speculative whether the denia[l]” of HEA loan re-

lief—their ostensible injury—“fairly can be traced to” the

Department’s decision to grant loan relief in the Plan. Si-

mon v. Eastern Ky. Welfare Rights Organization, 426 U. S.

26, 42–43 (1976); see also Warth v. Seldin, 422 U. S. 490,

503–504 (1975).

As noted above, HEROES Act loan relief and HEA loan

relief function independently of each other. If the Depart-

ment may lawfully grant loan relief under both the

HEROES Act and the HEA, it is entitled to choose to do

both, neither, or only one (provided that it sufficiently ex-

plains its reasoning, see 5 U. S. C. §706(2)(A)). There is lit-

tle reason to think that its discretionary decision to pursue

one mechanism of loan relief has anything to do with its

discretionary decision to pursue (or not pursue) another.

“The line of causation between” the Department’s promul-

gation of the Plan and respondents’ lack of benefits under

the HEA “is attenuated at best,” Allen, 468 U. S., at 757,

and all too dependent on “ ‘conjecture,’ ” Summers, 555

U. S., at 496.

2

Respondents’ attempts to tie the Plan to potential HEA

relief are unavailing. They point to a handful of documents

related to the Plan that say that the Department is provid-

ing “one-time” student-loan relief. See, e.g., App. 215, 221,

225. Such statements, Brown and Taylor argue, show that

the decision to grant loan relief under the HEROES Act

foreclosed HEA relief.

This is insufficient. The Plan itself—the action under re-

view here—contains no reference to “one-time” relief. See

14 DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION v. BROWN

Opinion of the Court

87 Fed. Reg. 61512–61514. And to the extent that the De-

partment’s decision to adopt the Plan under the HEROES

Act might have some incidental effect on the likelihood that

the Department will undertake a separate loan-forgiveness

program under a different statute, the relationship is not

sufficiently close to persuade us that the latter is fairly

traceable to the former. See, e.g., Simon, 426 U. S., at 42–

43 (accepting that certain tax rules might “ ‘encourag[e]’ ” or

“ ‘discourage’ ” particular behavior, but nonetheless holding

that connection to be insufficient to establish standing

where it was “just as plausible” that actors would “forgo fa-

vorable tax treatment”). Moreover, no one argues that the

existing references to one-time relief are legally binding. To

whatever extent the Department has determined that the

Plan crowds out other efforts to forgive student loans, that,

too, is a discretionary and independent decision that re-

spondents may ask it to reconsider with a §553(e) petition.

Finally, Brown and Taylor also argue that they have

demonstrated causation because the Secretary’s failure to

observe the requisite procedural rules cost them a

“ ‘chance’ ” to “obtain debt forgiveness.” Brief for Respond-

ents 28. But referring in the abstract to a “chance” of ob-

taining “debt forgiveness” does not solve their problem.

They do not want debt forgiveness under the HEROES Act,

which they claim is unlawful. They want debt forgiveness

under the HEA. Nothing the Secretary has done deprives

them of a “chance” to seek that result.

Because respondents cannot meaningfully connect the

absence of loan relief under the HEA to the adoption of the

Plan, they have failed to show that their injury is fairly

traceable to the Plan.

* * *

For these reasons, respondents lack standing, and we

therefore vacate the judgment of the District Court and re-

mand the case with instructions to dismiss. By vacating

Cite as: 600 U. S. ____ (2023) 15

Opinion of the Court

the District Court’s judgment, we obviate the need to grant

the interim relief the Department requests in its applica-

tion in No. 22A489. We therefore deny the application as

moot.

It is so ordered.