© Michael M. Santiago/Getty ImagesA demonstrator holds up a sign as he listens to speakers during a "Resist Evictions" rally on August 10, 2020 in New York City.
A federal judge in Washington on Wednesday declared that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's moratorium on eviction for non-payment must be set aside.
The ruling from Judge Dabney Friedrich says the Public Health Service Act does not give CDC the legal authority to impose the moratorium, which was first issued last year amid the economic fallout of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The CDC referred an inquiry for comment to the Justice Department.
The current federal eviction moratorium was scheduled to end on June 30. It is unclear what will happen now. The Justice Department is appealing a similar ruling in Texas.
"The Court recognizes that the COVID-19 pandemic is a serious public health crisis that has presented unprecedented challenges for public health officials and the nation as a whole. The pandemic has triggered difficult policy decisions that have had enormous real-world consequences. The nationwide eviction moratorium is one such decision," Friedrich wrote in her opinion. "It is the role of the political branches, and not the courts, to assess the merits of policy measures designed to combat the spread of disease, even during a global pandemic. The question for the Court is a narrow one: Does the Public Health Service Act grant the CDC the legal authority to impose a nationwide eviction moratorium? It does not."
There have been several legal challenges to the CDC eviction moratorium. Some courts have said that the CDC has the authority to issue the order and rejected efforts to stop the ban, while others have ruled in favor of landlords. A federal judge in Ohio ruled that the CDC had overstepped its authority in issuing a nationwide eviction ban.
This story is breaking and will be updated.