The Biden administration on Tuesday announced a new, targeted federal eviction ban to replace the one that expired over the weekend, setting up a potential clash with the Supreme Court.
President Joe Biden had earlier Tuesday teased the announcement to reporters while cautioning that “any call for a moratorium based on the Supreme Court’s recent decision is likely to face obstacles.”
The announcement comes after a dayslong standoff with Congress in which Speaker Pelosi and other top Democrats, along with progressives led by Rep. Cori Bush of Missouri, waged an intense public campaign to goad the White House into action.
The new ban would give state and local programs additional time to distribute rent relief and to increase vaccination rates, the agency said. The moratorium is expected to affect 80 percent of counties and 90 percent of the U.S. population, according to Democrats familiar with the details.
Biden said on Tuesday he had sought out constitutional scholars to determine the CDC’s legal authority and “what could they do that is most likely to pass muster constitutionally.” The “bulk” of the scholarship reviewed by the White House said additional action by the CDC would not pass muster in the courts
he targeted moratorium comes after the White House insisted for days that the CDC didn’t have the authority to act and that it was incumbent upon Congress to pass an extension. But the House left for a multiweek recess Friday after failing to pass an extension, with Pelosi and other top Democrats furious at the White House for putting this at their feet.
On Monday, the White House put the onus on governors and mayors, saying the CDC couldn’t find any legal authority to act even after Biden had asked the agency on Sunday to explore every tool at their disposal.
CDC Director Rochelle Walensky on Tuesday linked the agency’s abrupt about-face to the rise in recent weeks of the highly transmissible Delta variant.
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