CDC orders extension to eviction moratorium

WASHINGTON (CN) — The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced Tuesday it has found the legal authority it needs to extend an eviction moratorium that expired last week leaving millions of renters on the brink.

President Joe Biden stopped just short of fully disclosing the impending maneuver when facing questions from reporters gathered at the White House for an update on the state of the Covid-19 pandemic and the now flourishing delta variant rollicking unvaccinated Americans.

“My hope is it’s going to be a new moratorium,” he said.

And it is. At least for now.

The CDC’s order states the moratorium will only last through Oct. 3, will cover 90% of Americans and will be especially targeting areas where “substantial and high levels” of infection from Covid-19 could occur. It is also “subject to further extension, modification or recission based on public health circumstances.”

"The emergence of the delta variant has led to a rapid acceleration of community transmission in the United States, putting more Americans at increased risk, especially if they are unvaccinated,” CDC director Rochelle Walensky said in a statement accompanying the order Tuesday. “This moratorium is the right thing to do to keep people in their homes and out of congregate settings where COVID-19 spreads.”

She added: “It is imperative that public health authorities act quickly to mitigate such an increase of evictions, which could increase the likelihood of new spikes in SARS-CoV-2 transmission. Such mass evictions and the attendant public health consequences would be very difficult to reverse.”

Just 24 hours ago, the White House said it did not have the constitutional authority to extend the ban unilaterally. Biden last week turned to Congress to legislate the moratorium’s new terms instead and urged states to distribute the $46.5 billion in rental assistance funds already allotted and disseminated to states this year.

But the deadline came and went last Friday triggering waves of outrage from Democrats, fair housing and civil rights leaders ultimately sparking a sleep-in protest on the steps of Capitol Hill led by Representative Cori Bush of Missouri.

“I applaud the CDC for imposing an eviction moratorium for the vast majority of the population. I particularly applaud Representative Cori Bush who understands what it’s like to be evicted and who took her passion and turned into amazingly effective action,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said outside of the Capitol after Biden’s remarks.

In a statement, Bush said last Friday, as she came to the Capitol with a chair to sit in for the duration, she “refused to accept that Congress could leave for vacation while 11 million people faced eviction.”

“For five days, we’ve been out here, demanding that our government acts to save our lives. Today, our movement moved mountains,” Bush said via tweet.

Fellow Democratic lawmaker Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York joined Bush in protest along with members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus and Congressional Black Caucus.  Civil rights leaders like Jesse Jackson showed support as well, appearing alongside a steady stream at the Capitol of activists and advocates in and out of Congress.

Representative Maxine Waters, a California Democrat who also chairs the powerful House Committee on Financial Services, also pushed heartily to see the moratorium extended.

“With a surging Covid-19 delta variant, this action by the CDC helps to protect our public health, national security and our economy. And so, as I have said before, this is not only a moral imperative, but it also a public health imperative,” Waters said in a statement late Tuesday.

Amid Bush’s protest, the dynamic shifted quickly.

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi held a call with Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen earlier Tuesday and urged congressional leadership to legislate their way through the bubbling crisis.

Pelosi reiterated to Yellen it was the administration that must make the next move according to widespread reports of the private call Pelosi held with Yellen and leaders of the Democratic caucus.

Biden reportedly called Pelosi later in the day to inform her that a new moratorium would be extended.

The eviction moratorium was first imposed last September under former President Donald Trump. It halted landlords from booting tenants if they failed to pay rent on time but it expired at the end of last December. It was extended by Biden through June shortly after he took office.

Persistent concerns over soaring unemployment and the relentless grip of the Covid-19 pandemic prompted the continuation — much to the chagrin of landlords and property owners.

A group led by the Alabama Association of Realtors said the moratorium was crushing their livelihoods a full year into a public health crisis that failed to show real signs of fully dissipating.

In May, Judge Dabney Friedrich of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, appointed by Trump, sided with the plaintiffs, squashed the moratorium and ruled that it violated the Public Health Service Act.

Dabney placed an emergency stay on her ruling, effectively putting it on hold while the Department of Justice raised its appeal at the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. The realtors asked the Supreme Court to weigh in and vacate the moratorium.

In a 5-4 decision issued in a one-page opinion, Chief Justice John Roberts, Justices Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Brett Kavanaugh voted against lifting the eviction ban.

Kavanaugh however, wrote that he still felt the CDC had exceeded its authority but impressed Congress to act since the July 31 deadline was around the corner.

“Those few weeks will allow for additional and more orderly distribution of the congressionally appropriated rental assistance,” Kavanaugh wrote in late June.

States have been dragging their feet to distribute rental aid, however. Only $3 billion of the $47 billion allotted has been doled out.

White House advisor Gene Sperling said Monday at a press conference that the Supreme Court was “fairly clear” with its ruling though he emphasized the potential health risks posed when millions could become homeless at an already precarious time.

“What we’re all dealing with is the rise of the delta variant and it is particularly harmful for those who are most likely to face evictions,” he said.

Ian Thompson, a senior legislative advocate at the American Civil Liberties Union agreed with that sentiment Tuesday, noting that low-income renters would benefit the most from stable housing. The onus will still fall on states to act now, even as congress and the CDC prepare to work out the legislative kinks or prepare for a fight in court.

“States and localities must also take bold action to protect renters from the devastating, long-lasting effects of eviction by, for example, adopting a right to counsel and protections against screening policies that reject applicants based on prior eviction filings. We need this meaningful action to stop mass evictions during the pandemic and beyond,” Thompson said.

Follow Brandi Buchman on Twitter

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