Republican Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey told Newsmax on Tuesday that a lawsuit filed against President Joe Biden’s latest student loan debt forgiveness program is an effort to rein in a lawless president who is ignoring a decision by the U.S. Supreme Court.

Bailey and Republican attorneys general from Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, North Dakota, Ohio, and Oklahoma filed the federal lawsuit Tuesday in Missouri following Biden’s announcement Monday of his plan to reduce payments for 25 million borrowers and erase all debt for more than four million Americans.

In June 2023, the Supreme Court in a 6-3 decision rejected Biden’s plan to forgive more than $400 billion in student debt relief, saying the president doesn’t have such power without the authorization of Congress. But facing pressure to live up to a campaign promise made in 2020, and with polls showing withering support among younger voters, Biden is taking another stab at it.

“What’s frightening is that we have a lawless president who is openly flaunting the authority of the third branch of government, the highest court in the land, the United States Supreme Court,” Bailey told “Rob Schmitt Tonight.” “At what point does the mainstream media start calling this what it is – a constitutional crisis when you have a chief executive who took an oath to protect and defend the Constitution and enforce the laws given to him by the legislative branch of Congress, who is now just openly flaunting and consolidating that authority in one person.

“Our Founding Fathers are rolling over in their graves. … I think the way you attack this is by filing another lawsuit, pointing out to the court the hubris and open flaunting of the rule of law by the executive branch and start picking off the administrators of the program itself and holding them in contempt of court and work your way up the chain to the chief executive. But at the end of the day, he’s going to have to be held accountable, and we’ve got to rein in this lawless president.”

Six states, including Missouri under Bailey’s predecessor, Eric Schmitt, now a U.S. senator, were part of Biden v. Nebraska, the lawsuit challenging the president’s initial student loan debt relief program. Chief Justice John Roberts, in his majority opinion, characterized the decision as a straightforward interpretation of federal law.

“How ironic that Joe Biden came to office, promising to protect our democracy and restore integrity to our democracy and yet has done more to undermine the rule of law and our constitutional system than any president in recent memory,” Bailey said; “Yet, he gets a pass on that. Well, he’s not getting a pass for me. We’re not going to let him saddle working Missouri families with Ivy League debt. This is unconstitutional and violates separation of powers.

“Congress has the power of the purse, not the president. The Supreme Court has already told him no once before, under the major questions doctrine, which essentially holds that he is not allowed to redistribute this much wealth without explicit authority from Congress. Where is the authority, Mr. President? Point to the statute? He can’t do it. That’s how you know it’s illegal.”

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Monday in a press gaggle aboard Air Force One that the White House is expecting legal challenges to Biden’s latest proposal.

“We know that Republican officials, obviously, in the past, have done everything that they can to oppose the president’s effort to give millions of Americans a little breathing room,” she said. “So, while we can’t prevent them from filing lawsuits against this plan, the president will never stop fighting on behalf of borrowers, no matter how many times Republicans try to stop them.

“We know what Republicans are going to do. We can’t stop them from [doing] that. But it’s also not going to stop the president on acting and taking action like he’s doing.”

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