CDC Sued Over ‘Unconstitutional’ Nationwide Eviction Ban
October 26, 2020
Landlords, homebuilders accuse agency of ‘sweeping assumption of power’
Landlords and homebuilders filed suit in federal court against the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in an effort to block an eviction moratorium issued last month by the federal public health agency.
The lawsuit, known as Skyworks Ltd. v. CDC, was filed Oct. 23 in federal court in Ohio. It names the agency and its director, Robert R. Redfield, as defendants.
The CDC argues the eviction ban is needed to curb the spread of the CCP virus, which causes the disease COVID-19, although tenants can invoke the ban whether they suffer from virus-related hardships or not.
Tenants establish eligibility under the moratorium by providing their landlords with a CDC-approved declaration stating that they make under $99,000 annually, are unable to pay rent because of a loss of income, have tried to obtain government assistance, will try to make partial rent payments, and will be homeless or will have to move in with others if they are evicted.
Once they submit a declaration, a landlord can’t evict them.
“It’s unconstitutional,” said Luke Wake, an attorney with the Sacramento, California-based Pacific Legal Foundation, a public interest law firm representing landlords in this case, whose properties are occupied by tenants who stopped paying rent when the bans were enacted.
“Federal agencies don’t get to just make up law,” Wake said in an interview with The Epoch Times.
“It’s very strange. The CDC exists to track and monitor epidemics and contagious diseases, as some sort of a resource to public health authorities and whatnot, but they have very limited regulatory powers.”
Among the plaintiffs are Ohio landlord Skyworks Ltd. and the National Association of Homebuilders.
The eviction moratorium, which took effect Sept. 4, prevents landlords from evicting residential tenants during the ongoing pandemic. A previous federal moratorium authorized by the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act covered only tenants living in properties with rent subsidies or federally backed mortgages, but the new order, which runs through year’s end, covers most renters across the United States.
The law was passed with bipartisan support and signed into law by President Donald Trump on March 27. It also provides more than $2 trillion in economic relief, including economic assistance for workers, families, and small businesses.
But the CARES Act didn’t give the CDC the power to block evictions, plaintiffs argue.
The statute, according to the plaintiffs’ legal complaint, allows the CDC “to take certain actions—inspection, fumigation, disinfection, and sanitation, among others—to stop the spread of infectious disease across state lines.”
“Nowhere does it authorize the CDC to impose a nationwide eviction moratorium,” the complaint states.
Although the pandemic “poses a significant threat to many Americans and a serious challenge to government at all levels … [it] does not suspend the normal operations of constitutional government. Under our Constitution, Congress makes the law and the executive branch enforces it.”
The CDC’s moratorium “represents a sweeping assumption of power by an administrative agency that it simply does not possess,” altering “the contractual relationships of perhaps millions of people across the country.”
https://www.citizensjournal.us/cdc-sued-over-unconstitutional-nationwide-eviction-ban/
Re: Epoch Times
https://www.theepochtimes.com/cdc-sued-over-unconstitutional-nationwide-eviction-ban_3553564.html