By Chris Woodward, The Center Square

Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen is pleased that a federal judge in Kansas has agreed with his request to block President Joe Biden’s student loan relief effort.

“This is great news that a court is blocking the President’s plan to buy votes from young, recent graduates and driving our country deeper into debt,” said Knudsen in a press release.

The Biden administration said the president’s SAVE Plan would cancel over $100 billion in student loan debt and help struggling families make ends meet.

The attorney general views the loan relief effort as more of a “loan cancellation scheme” in an election year.

“Hardworking Montanans should not be forced to foot the bill for anyone’s education, but their own,” the attorney general said.

The ruling comes after a lawsuit from Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach. Knudsen joined that effort with the attorneys general of Alabama, Alaska, Idaho, Iowa, Louisiana, Nebraska, South Carolina, Texas and Utah.

The attorneys general said the Department of Education wrongly interpreted the Higher Education Act and went around the U.S. House and Senate to write its own rules.

“We’re talking about folks who are literally being crushed,” White House Press Secretary Karine Jean Pierre told reporters in May. “They’re trying to get their lives back on track.”

Knudsen argued that cancellation of student loans would harm Montana’s economy through a loss of state tax revenue and jobs, as well as increasing law enforcement costs. Knudsen also points out that the United States Supreme Court told Biden in 2022 that he did not have the authority to unilaterally cancel student loans through the HEROES Act.