§5229 Judicial review and related matters

Summary

When the Secretary acts under this law, courts must review those actions under the federal rules that govern agency decisions (chapter 7 of title 5). A court can overturn a final Secretary decision if it is random, unfair, shows clear bad judgment, or breaks the law. Courts generally may not issue injunctions or other fair‑action orders against the Secretary for actions under sections 5211, 5212, 5216, and 5219, except to fix a constitutional violation. Emergency requests for temporary orders must be decided within 3 days. Requests for preliminary or permanent injunctions must be handled quickly under the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure (rules 65(b)(3) and 65(a)(2)). Any injunction against the Secretary for those sections is automatically paused unless the Secretary asks a higher court to keep it paused within 3 calendar days. People who gave up assets tied to the program cannot sue the Secretary, except as allowed by the federal review rules or by a written contract with the Secretary. If the Secretary buys a residential mortgage, the loan keeps the same claims and defenses it always had. The Secretary’s actions do not reduce the rights of others. For pooled residential mortgages, the loan servicer must decide if a loan change will give a better expected return than foreclosure for all investors. A servicer is treated as acting in all investors’ best interests if it agrees to or carries out a loan change after reasonable loss‑mitigation steps, including allowing partial payments.