WASHINGTON • Niara Thompson couldn’t shake her frustration as the Supreme Court debated President Joe Biden’s student debt cancellation. As she listened from the audience Tuesday, it all felt academic. There was a long discussion on the nuances of certain words. Justices asked lawyers to explore hypothetical scenarios.

For Thompson, none of it is hypothetical. A student at the University of Georgia, she grew up watching her parents struggle with student loans and will graduate with about $50,000 of her own student debt.

“It felt like people who could never understand why we would want something like this,” she said. “I wanted to be like, ‘Y’all don’t understand. Y’all are focusing on this, but there’s people out here who are struggling to find food for their families.’”

Much of the discussion in Tuesday’s hearing centered on whether states had the legal right to sue over Biden’s student loans plan. But the justices also were scrutinizing whether Biden had the authority to waive hundreds of billions of dollars in debt without the explicit approval of Congress, which decides how taxpayer money is spent.

It’s not unusual for Supreme Court cases to hang on legal technicalities, even in cases of great public interest.

Yet to borrowers following Tuesday’s arguments, it felt isolating to hear such a personal subject reduced to cold legal language.

Opponents of the plan to wipe away debt held by millions of Americans have denounced it as an insult to those who have repaid their debt and to those who didn’t attend college.

Justice Clarence Thomas, the court’s staunchest conservative, has written about the “crushing weight” of his own student loans, which he paid off after reaching the nation’s highest court.

Student debt relief advocates gather Tuesday outside the Supreme Court on Capitol Hill in Washington.

The Associated Press