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Dive Brief:
The U.S. Department of Justice has sued six states over laws that allow in-state tuition rates and scholarships for students regardless of their immigration status. The latest legal challenge was filed Thursday against California for its “California Dream Act.”
The lawsuit seeks to enjoin California laws that allow state residents to receive in-state tuition regardless of immigration status. The lawsuits — also filed against Minnesota, Texas, Kentucky, Illinois and Oklahoma — could impact tuition for dual enrollment, adult education, and career and technical education training programs.
“Federal law prohibits aliens illegally present in the United States from receiving in-state tuition benefits that are denied to out-of-state U.S. citizens,” the Justice Department said in its lawsuit, which is challenging the states under the supremacy clause. “There are no exceptions.”
Dive Insight:
The lawsuits come in light of a February executive order prohibiting federal resources for undocumented immigrants and as the U.S. Department of Education has implemented the order to restrict education-related programs.
As part of those restrictions, which were part of a coordinated effort across agencies, students could be required to undergo a citizenship and immigration status check to qualify for tuition for dual enrollment and similar early college programs for high-schoolers.
According to the Trump administration, that’s “because those programs provide individualized payments or assistance beyond that of a basic public education.”
The administration’s implementation of the executive order also restricted Head Start, the federal early childhood education program meant to level the playing field for low-income families, to “American citizens.” That policy change was successfully challenged in court in multiple lawsuits and is currently on pause in states that sued the government.
However, other program areas impacted by the Education Department’s enforcement of the order are still in effect in some places, including high school students’ eligibility for college-level and career courses.
“California is illegally discriminating against American students and families by offering exclusive tuition benefits for non-citizens,” said U.S. Attorney General Pamela Bondi in a Thursday statement, adding that her department “will continue bringing litigation against California until the state ceases its flagrant disregard for federal law.”
California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office, however, called the DOJ’s efforts “meritless, politically motivated lawsuits.”
“Good luck, Trump,” said Marissa Saldivar, Newsom’s spokesperson, in an email to K-12 Dive. “We’ll see you in court.”
The office maintains that its tuition exemption applies to all residents who meet the criteria, regardless of where they were born, and it is not discriminating against U.S. citizens.
Out of the states sued so far, Texas and Oklahoma have complied, with Texas suddenly ending a 24-year-old law within hours of the Justice Department filing a lawsuit in June.
Prior to the Justice Department’s lawsuits, 25 states and the District of Columbia allowed in-state tuition for undocumented students, according to the Higher Ed Immigration Portal, which tracks the issue. That number has fallen to 22 in addition to Washington, D.C.
There are an estimated 620,000 undocumented K-12 students in the United States, with most states home to thousands of such students, according to 2021 data from Fwd.us.
According to federal data, nearly 2.5 million high school students were enrolled in at least one dual enrollment course from a college or university in 2022-23.
The U.S. Department of Justiceis suing California over its lawsallowing certain undocumented college students to pay in-state tuition rates at public colleges and receive state-administered scholarships.
In a Thursday court filing, the agency argued that in-state tuition rates for undocumented students illegally provide benefits not offered to all U.S. citizensand asked a federal judge to rule California’s laws unconstitutional.
The lawsuit, which also names as defendants Gov. Gavin Newsomand the governing boards of California’s three public college systems, marks the sixth the DOJ has brought against states with in-state tuition policies for certain undocumented students.
Dive Insight:
California is home to roughly 103,000 undocumented residents enrolled in higher education — accounting for about a fifth of some 510,000 undocumented students in the U.S. — according to the Higher Ed Immigration Portal.
Since 2001, a California law known as AB 540 has allowed students to pay in-state tuition at its three public higher ed systems if they attended a state high school for at least three years and earned their high school diploma or equivalent in California.Undocumented students must also sign an affidavit saying they have either filed an application to gain legal status or plan to once they are eligible.
A 2017 law broadened that eligibility and permits students to reach the three-year attendance threshold by combining any time spent at a California high school, community college, adult school or carceral education program.
It also allows students who completed at least three years full-time high school coursework anywhere to qualify for the waiver if they attended at least three years of their K-12 education in California.
Leaders from the state’s public college systems — the University of California, California State University, and California Community Colleges — supported the expansion of the in-state tuition policy.
Both laws apply to both U.S. citizens and immigrants without legal status.
But U.S. Attorney General Pamela Bondi said in a Thursday statement that policies are “illegally discriminating against American students and families”and that California is demonstrating “flagrant disregard for federal law.”
Since 1998, U.S. law has prohibited immigrants without legal status from receiving any higher education benefit based on their residency, “unless a citizen or national of the United States is eligible for such a benefit … without regard to whether the citizen or national is such a resident.”
The agency’s lawsuit is not the first time California’s in-state tuition law has faced legal opposition.One challenge to AB 540 that similarly argued the policy violated federal law made it to the California Supreme Courtin 2010.
However, the court upheld AB 540, ruling it did not violate federal law because students seeking in-state tuition status did not need to be California residents.
The DOJ argued Thursday that this decision was incorrect and that federal courts should reject it.
“Allocating lower tuition rates on the basis of high school attendance is a proxy for residence,” running afoul of federal law, the agency said.
Using the same argument, the DOJ lawsuit also targets a 2011 law permitting AB 540-eligible undocumented students to receive state-administered scholarships and aid and a law passed in 2014 establishing a student loan program for them.
Gaining an in-state tuition waiver for California can have big cost implications for prospective students, as the state’s public colleges charge some of the highest out-of-state tuition premiumsin the U.S., according to the College Board.
The University of California published tuition and fees for out-of-state students who started in 2025-26 were $37,602 more a year than for their in-state counterparts.
At the University of California, Berkeley, that means out-of-state, full-time undergraduates who first enrolled this fall would pay $55,080 if they did not receive financial aid or scholarships — more than double the $17,478 their in-state counterparts would pay sans aid.
Even with aid and institutional scholarships, out-of-state students saw a stark difference. U.S. News & World Report estimated that the average total cost of attendance at UC Berkeley for those receiving need-based aid was $16,636 for in-state students and $66,625 for those from outside of California.
The Cal State system’s published tuition and fees for out-of-state are also higher than for in-state students. Its 23 campuses charge a base rate of $6,450 for in-state undergraduate tuition and fees for the 2025-26 academic year. This year, out-of-state students pay at least $444 more per credit.
Immigrant students and their advocates are working to reopen federal lawsuits that ended in-state tuition benefits for undocumented students in two states and another state where the same outcome seems imminent. Advocates say the judges ruled in favor of the government without a public hearing and the affected students weren’t given the opportunity to defend the policies.
Since the summer, the U.S. Department of Justice challenged in-state tuition policies in Illinois, Kentucky, Minnesota, Oklahoma and Texas, claiming state laws extending in-state tuition prices to undocumented students breach federal law.
In Texas and Oklahoma, attorneys general quickly sided with the DOJ and judges swiftly ruled to end in-state tuition benefits for undocumented students. As a result, tuition tripled for some undocumented students this fall, forcing them to make difficult choices about whether they could afford to stay enrolled.
Kentucky’s undocumented students could soon face the same dilemma. The Kentucky Council on Postsecondary Education agreed to end in-state tuition benefits for local undocumented students in a settlement filed in September, but a judge has yet to make a ruling. Meanwhile, legal battles in Minnesota and Illinois are ongoing as these states defend their policies.
Since these lawsuits first emerged, civil rights groups and students have sought to intervene or become parties to them. They’re hoping to reopen the quickly closed cases to have their say in court.
A Latino civil rights organization, the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, was the first to file a motion to intervene on behalf of undocumented students in Texas in June. A month later, the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas, the Texas Civil Rights Project, Democracy Forward and the National Immigration Law Center followed suit. They filed their own emergency motions to intervene on behalf of the activist group La Unión del Pueblo Entero, the Austin Community College District’s Board of Trustees and Oscar Silva, a student at the University of North Texas.
MALDEF filed a similar motion on behalf of a group of undocumented students in Kentucky in August. And last week, the organization moved to intervene for students in Oklahoma, as well.
Thomas A. Saenz, MALDEF president and general counsel, said undocumented students in Kentucky, Oklahoma and Texas “were promised regular tuition, and as a result of that promise, made the decision to attend public higher education institutions in those states,” but “that promise was stripped away wrongfully” and without public input.
He stressed that, except for in extreme circumstances, such as cases involving national security, federal courts are meant to do their work in the public eye. But the Texas and Oklahoma laws got the ax without a public hearing. He also argued state lawmakers who dislike these policies can seek to repeal them, like any other state law, but there’s “no basis for legally challenging them.”
“They’re not allowed to close the public out, do things behind closed doors,” Saenz said. “We ought to expect our courts to conduct their work in public. And that did not happen in Texas. It did not happen in Oklahoma.”
A Bumpy Road
Despite students and advocates’ efforts, the motions to intervene have hit a legal setback.
In Texas, U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor denied both MALDEF’s and the other groups’ motions to intervene. O’Connor, a George W. Bush appointee, said in court filings he agreed with the federal government and Texas that the motions were “legally futile” because federal law “pre-empts” the challenged Texas law. All of the groups seeking to intervene appealed the decision to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.
Saenz pushed back on the judge’s reasoning, saying O’Connor agreed with Texas and the DOJ’s conclusion “without any argument” or a public hearing where he could have heard a defense of the Texas Dream Act, the 24-year-old law that offered in-state tuition to undocumented students.
“No administration of either party in nearly a quarter century has ever challenged the Texas Dream Act, so his conclusion of futility is simply ludicrous,” Saenz said.
The law was never “presented,” according to Saenz. “That’s the way the courts are supposed to work. You’re supposed to have [an] argument presented in an adversarial manner. He simply signed off on a concocted agreement” between the Texas and U.S. attorneys general, he said.
A group of higher ed institutions and organizations have rallied behind MALDEF and other advocacy groups. The Presidents’ Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration filed a 43-page amicus brief with the Fifth Circuit last week, defending interveners in Texas. Thirty-seven colleges, universities, higher education and immigrant rights organizations also signed on to the amicus brief, including the American Association of Colleges and Universities and the Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities.
The district court decision “violates democratic principles by denying all interested parties their right to be heard,” the amicus brief read.
Whether or not intervention efforts succeed, the stakes of these overturned state laws are too high not to try everything possible, said Miriam Feldblum, president and CEO of the Presidents’ Alliance.
“This is about workforce development and supporting our domestic—including immigrant—talent pipeline that colleges and universities train, educate, nurture, and that go on to fuel the workforces … in communities and states,” she said.
She also described intervening as a matter of “fairness.”
“This is not about special treatment of undocumented students,” Feldblum said. “The tuition-equity challenges are targeting students who have grown up in the U.S., who have graduated from local high schools to pursue postsecondary education. This is what we want them to do. This is why we’re investing in their education.”
Despite the roadblock, Saenz said he’s still confident motions to intervene will ultimately triumph.
“I’m very hopeful, because it’s the law,” he said. “Intervention is legally required to be granted in all of these cases. And when we get to the merits of whether the tuition-equity laws are pre-empted or not, the law is absolutely on our side.”
The California Supreme Court chose not to review a lower court’s decision that concluded the University of California system is discriminating against undocumented students by not allowing them to work in on-campus jobs. As a result, the lower court decision stands, the Los Angeles Timesreported.
The California Supreme Court’s move not to take up the case is the latest development in a lawsuit filed by a University of California, Los Angeles, alumnus and lecturer last year. The plaintiffs are represented by attorneys from Altshuler Berzon LLP, UCLA’s Center for Immigration Law and Policy, and the National Day Laborer Organizing Network.
Undocumented students, backed by a legal theory developed by scholars at the Center for Immigration Law and Policy, have argued that state entities, such as the public university system, are permitted to hire undocumented individuals. But the UC Board of Regents rejected the idea last year.
A three-judge panel for the Court of Appeal for the First District ruled in August that the UC system’s employment policy “facially discriminates based on immigration status and, in light of applicable state law, the discriminatory policy cannot be justified.” The ruling asked the system to reconsider its hiring policy. But the UC Board of Regents appealed that decision two months ago.
UC spokesperson Rachel Zaentz said in a statement that the California Supreme Court’s decision “creates serious legal risks for the University and all other state employers in California.”
But undocumented students and their advocates are celebrating. Iliana G. Perez, a plaintiff and former UCLA lecturer, said as a formerly undocumented immigrant, she’s seen how employment restrictions can hold immigrant students back.
“The California Supreme Court’s decision not only reaffirms that discriminating against undocumented immigrants from accessing on-campus employment cannot continue to be tolerated, but it also gives the UC the clarity to finally unlock life-changing opportunities for the thousands of immigrant students who contribute to its campuses, and to the state’s economy and workforce,” Perez said in a news release from the Center for Immigration Law and Policy.
Brian Sandoval, former Republican governor and president of University of Nevada at Reno, is standing up for the university’s undocumented student support program, despite threats of an investigation from the federal government.
Photo illustration by Justin Morrison/Inside Higher Ed | Cheriss May/NurPhoto/Getty Images | Brycia James/iStock/Getty Images
Centers and programs for undocumented students are caught in a politically precarious moment after the Department of Justice called for an investigation of the University of Nevada at Reno’s undocumented student services. Immigrant students’ advocates say the move marks an escalation in the Trump administration’s ongoing crackdown on higher ed benefits for these students. And they worry campus programs supporting undocumented students might pre-emptively scale back or close altogether.
In a letter late last month, DOJ officials directed Education Secretary Linda McMahon to investigate the Nevada university over UndocuPack, its support program for undocumented students.
According to the letter, the DOJ had received reports of the university’s “efforts to assist illegal immigrants” by providing referrals to on- and off-campus resources, student aid, and academic and career support, including helping students find “career opportunities that do not require applicants to provide a Social Security Number.”
“We are referring this matter to the Department of Education to investigate whether UNR is using taxpayer funds [to] subsidize or promote illegal immigration,” the letter read.
The U.S. Department of Education did not respond to a request for comment; Inside Higher Ed received an automatic out-of-office message citing the government shutdown.
But UNR is pushing back. Brian Sandoval, a former Republican governor of Nevada and the university’s first Hispanic president, responded with a forceful defense of the program.
He stressed to students and staff that the UndocuPack program offers supports to all students, regardless of citizenship status, and uses no federal funds. He also emphasized that several state-funded scholarships don’t take immigration or residency status into account; the university doesn’t dole out state or federal aid to anyone ineligible.
“The University has remained in compliance with federal and state law, as well as the Nevada and United States Constitutions regarding adherence to federal and state eligibility requirements for undocumented students for federal aid and scholarships,” Sandoval wrote. “In addition, we have made good, and will continue to make good on our commitment in ensuring a respectful, supportive, and welcoming environment on our campus where all our students have access to the tools they need for success.”
He said the university plans to respond to the proposed investigation “through the appropriate legal channels.”
A ‘Test Case’
The threat to UNR brings fresh worries for undocumented students’ advocates, who say it’s the latest in a string of federal efforts to curb public higher ed benefits for such students.
The Justice Department has already sued five states over policies allowing undocumented students to pay in-state tuition, successfully quashing state laws in Texas and Oklahoma after their attorneys general swiftly sided with the federal government. Over the summer, the Education Department announced it would investigate five universities for offering scholarships intended for undocumented students, claiming such programs violated civil rights law. The department also ended Clinton-era guidance that allowed undocumented students to participate in adult and career and technical education programs in response to Trump’s February executive order demanding that “no taxpayer-funded benefits go to unqualified aliens.”
Diego Sánchez, director of policy and strategy at the Presidents’ Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration, said going after UNR’s UndocuPack program is “part of a broader effort by the administration to intimidate colleges and universities that seek to serve undocumented students.” But it also takes the campaign a step further, “targeting any form of campus support for undocumented students,” including academic and career services. “It’s definitely a pattern of escalating attacks via different avenues of law.”
The DOJ’s letter cites the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996, which bars undocumented immigrants from many public benefits, but Sánchez maintains that “no court has ever interpreted PRWORA to bar universities from offering support offices, mentoring resource centers for undocumented students.”
Those kinds of supports for undocumented students exist at colleges and universities across the country. A 2020 study found at least 59 undocumented student resource centers on campuses nationwide, mostly in California but also in other states including Arizona, Colorado, Florida, New Jersey, Oregon, Texas, Utah and Washington.
Sánchez worries that colleges and universities could modify or scrap perfectly lawful programs out of fear after seeing the DOJ chide UNR for such common supports. He also expects the Trump administration to target more programs like UndocuPack.
UNR feels like “a test case,” he said.
Gaby Pacheco, president and CEO of TheDream.US, a scholarship provider for undocumented students, said other colleges and universities with undocumented student supports are already weighing what to do in response to the developments in Nevada.
“Do we duck and hide and lay low so that we don’t get picked on, or do we stand together with others and potentially become a target of this? It’s a question that a lot of people and institutions … are asking themselves,” Pacheco said.
She worries canceling or minimizing undocumented student support programs will send those students a message—“that they don’t belong.” And she doesn’t believe trying to lie low or scale back programs will deflect federal attention.
“This is just month nine into this administration. We still have a full three more years to go,” she said. And the administration seems like it plans to “continue full force until, in essence, there are no policies left where undocumented students have access to higher education.”
Kentucky Attorney General Russell ColemanThe U.S. Department of Justice and the Kentucky Council on Postsecondary Education have reached a preliminary settlement agreement that would end the state’s policy of offering in-state tuition rates to undocumented students who graduate from Kentucky high schools.
The agreement comes after the DOJ filed a federal lawsuit in June challenging Kentucky’s practice of extending in-state residency status—and the accompanying lower tuition rates—to any student who completes high school in the state, regardless of immigration status. The Justice Department argued this policy creates unequal treatment by providing financial benefits to undocumented immigrants while denying the same rates to U.S. citizens living in other states.
“No state can be allowed to treat Americans like second-class citizens in their own country by offering financial benefits to illegal aliens,” Attorney General Pamela Bondi said in announcing the federal lawsuit.
The legal challenge reflects broader federal immigration enforcement priorities under the Trump administration, which has issued executive orders aimed at preventing undocumented immigrants from accessing taxpayer-funded benefits or preferential treatment in government programs.
Kentucky’s Republican Attorney General Russell Coleman has supported the federal position, arguing that state policy conflicts with federal law prohibiting undocumented immigrants from receiving college benefits unless identical benefits are available to all U.S. citizens. In July, Coleman urged the Council on Postsecondary Education to voluntarily withdraw the regulation rather than pursue costly litigation.
“The federal government has set its immigration policy, and the Council must regulate in accordance with it,” Coleman wrote to the CPE. “To that end, I urge the Council to withdraw its regulation rather than litigate what I believe will be, and should be, a losing fight.”
Under the tentative settlement terms, the Kentucky Council on Postsecondary Education has acknowledged that its tuition policy violates federal law and agreed to terminate it immediately. However, the agreement remains pending approval from U.S. District Court Judge Gregory Van Tatenhove in the Eastern District of Kentucky.
The Kentucky case mirrors a similar federal challenge resolved earlier this year, when Texas reached a settlement with the DOJ over comparable in-state tuition policies for undocumented students.
The Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF), a prominent Latino civil rights organization, has filed a motion seeking to intervene in the Kentucky lawsuit on behalf of affected students. The motion remains under judicial review. MALDEF was previously denied intervention rights in the parallel Texas case.
The policy change could significantly impact college affordability for undocumented students who have spent their formative years in Kentucky’s educational system. In-state tuition rates are typically substantially lower than out-of-state rates, making higher education more accessible for students from families with limited financial resources.
Kentucky became the third state to end its in-state tuition policy for undocumented students when a settlement was announced Monday.
Photo illustration by Justin Morrison/Inside Higher Ed | amriphoto/E+/Getty Images | klyaksun and SAHACHAT/iStock/Getty Images
The Kentucky Council on Postsecondary Education agreed to terminate its offering of in-state tuition to undocumented students, according to a settlement filed in court Monday, WKU Public Radio reported.
The termination of reduced tuition remains tentative, as the settlement has yet to be signed by a district court judge, but if it does come to fruition, Kentucky would be the third state to capitulate to demands of the Trump administration on the issue.
President Trump’s Department of Justice has sued multiple states over their policies that provide in-state tuition to undocumented students, arguing that doing so discriminates against out-of-state Americans. Republican-led states that were sued quickly agreed to scrap the policies. But Kentucky, governed by a Democrat, took longer. (Similar lawsuits against Minnesota and Illinois are still pending.)
The state attorney general, a Republican, told the council that the lawsuit would be a “losing fight,” WKU reported.
The Trump administration and state Republicans leaders have used these lawsuits to go around state legislatures and Congress to change policies and programs.
Some higher education and legal experts have called the practice unlawful collusion and tried to intercede on behalf of the immigrant students in court, but they’ve had little luck so far.
MALDEF, the same Latino civil rights group that tried and failed to intervene in the Texas lawsuit, has filed a motion to intervene in Kentucky, but the court has yet to rule on that request.
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Dive Brief:
The U.S. Department of Justice is suing Illinois over state laws allowing certain undocumented college students to pay in-state tuition rates at public colleges and receive state-administered scholarships.
Under Illinois law, an undocumented student is eligible for in-state tuition if they attended a high school in the state for at least three years, graduated from high school or earned a GED in Illinois, and sign an affidavit saying they will apply to become a permanent U.S. resident as soon as possible.
U.S. Attorney General Pamela Bondi on Tuesday argued that in-state tuition rates for undocumented students illegally provide benefits not offered to all U.S. citizens. A spokesperson for Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker’s office defended the policy on Wednesday, saying it is consistent with federal law.
Dive Insight:
As of May, Illinois was one of at least 25 states that, along with Washington, D.C., had policies making undocumented students eligible to pay in-state rates at some or all public colleges.
Over 27,600 undocumented students attended Illinois colleges in 2023, according to the Higher Ed Immigration Portal.
Illinois has had its in-state tuition policy for eligible undocumented students in place since 2003. And in 2011, the state General Assembly established the Illinois DREAM Fund Commission, which raises private donations to fund scholarships for those students.
Since June, the DOJ has sued at least five states, including Illinois, over the practice.
The same day the DOJ filed a lawsuit against Texas, the state attorney general’s office partnered with the department to ask the court to strike down the policy.A federal judge declared it unconstitutional shortly afterward,though civil rights groups are seeking to intervene and challenge the ruling.
In Oklahoma, the state attorney general similarly worked with the DOJ to end its policy, a request approved by a federal judge on Friday.Florida repealed its policy through legislation this year independent of federal intervention.
“This Department of Justice has already filed multiple lawsuits to prevent U.S. students from being treated like second-class citizens — Illinois now joins the list of states where we are relentlessly fighting to vindicate federal law,” Bondi said in a Tuesday statement.
Steven Weinhoeft, U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Illinois, similarly alleged that Illinois’ law unlawfully disadvantages the state’s citizens and uses tax funding to incentivize illegal immigration.
“Illinois has an apparent desire to win a ‘race to the bottom’ as the country’s leading sanctuary state,” he said in a statement. “Illinois citizens deserve better.”
Sanctuary jurisdictions, such as cities and states, are generally considered areas with policieslimiting local authorities’ cooperation with federal immigration enforcement efforts. Bondi has promised to “eradicate” such policies across the country.
Weinhoeft in February took over as the district’s attorney for Rachelle Aud Crowe, following Trump’s promise to fire all U.S. attorneys appointed by former President Joe Biden.
Unlike Texas and Oklahoma, Illinois is a solidly blue state, with Democratic control over the governor’s mansion and both chambers of the Legislature.And Pritzker has been one of the most outspoken opponents of President Donald Trump.
A spokesperson for the governor’s office called the lawsuit “yet another blatant attempt to strip Illinoisans of resources and opportunities.”
“While the Trump Administration strips away federal resources from all Americans, Illinois provides consistent and inclusive educational pathways for all students — including immigrants and first-generation students — to access support and contribute to our state,” the spokesperson said in an email Wednesday. “All Illinoisans deserve a fair shot to obtain an education, and our programs and policies are consistent with federal laws.”
The DOJ’s lawsuit names as defendants:
The state of Illinois.
Pritzker.
Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul.
Southern Illinois University’s board of trustees.
Rend Lake College’s board of trustees.
The University of Illinois’ board of trustees.
Chicago State University’s board of trustees.
Eastern Illinois University’s board of trustees.
Illinois State University’s board of trustees.
Northeastern Illinois University’s board of trustees.
Illinois Student Assistance Commission.
Illinois DREAM Fund Commission.
The University of Illinois system said Wednesday it is reviewing the complaint and had no comment. Chicago State said it does not comment on pending litigation. And Rend Lake declined to comment on the lawsuit, citing ongoing talks with its legal counsel.
The remaining colleges did not immediately respond to requests for comment Wednesday.
The difference between in-state and out-of-state tuition can be substantial.
In-state students who enrolled full time at Illinois State in fall 2025 paid $12,066 for a year of tuition.For out-of-state students, the cost was $24,132.
At Chicago State, new in-state students paid $352 per credit hour, while incoming out-of-state students paid $697.
The 18-year-old from Houston was going to start college in the fall at the University of Texas at Tyler, where she had been awarded $10,000 a year in scholarships. That, she hoped, would set her up for her dream: a Ph.D. in chemistry, followed by a career as a professor or researcher.
“And then the change to in-state tuition happened, and that’s when I knew for sure that I had to pivot,” said Ximena, who was born in Mexico but attended schools stateside since kindergarten. (The Hechinger Report is referring to her by only her first name because she fears retaliation for her immigration status.)
In June, the Texas attorney general’s office and the Trump administration worked together to end the provisions in a state law that had offered thousands of undocumented students like her lower in-state tuition rates at Texas public colleges. State and federal officials successfully argued in court that the long-standing policy discriminated against U.S. citizens from other states who paid a higher rate. That rationale has now been replicated in similar lawsuits against Kentucky, Oklahoma and Minnesota — part of a broader offensive against immigrants’ access to public education.
At UT Tyler, in-state tuition and fees for the upcoming academic year total $9,736, compared to more than $25,000 for out-of-state students. Ximena and her family couldn’t afford the higher tuition bill, so she withdrew. Instead, she enrolled at Houston Community College, where out-of-state costs are $227 per semester hour, nearly three times the in-district rate. The school offers only basic college-level chemistry classes, so to set herself up for a doctorate or original research, Ximena will still need to find a way to pay for a four-year university down the line.
Her predicament is exactly what state lawmakers from both political parties had hoped to avoid when they passed the Texas Dream Act, 2001 legislation that not only opened doors to higher education for undocumented students but was also meant to bolster Texas’s economy and its workforce long-term. With that law, Texas became the first of more than two dozen states to implement in-state tuition for undocumented students, and for nearly 24 years, the landmark policy remained intact. Conservative lawmakers repeatedly proposed to repeal it, but despite years of single-party control in the state legislature, not enough Republicans embraced repeal even as recently as this spring, days before the Texas attorney general’s office and the federal Department of Justice moved to end it.
Now, as the fall semester approaches, immigrant students are weighing whether to disenroll from their courses or await clarity on how the consent agreement entered into by the state and DOJ affects them.
Immigration advocates are worried that Texas colleges and universities are boxing out potential attendees who are lawfully present and still qualify for in-state tuition despite the court ruling — including recipients of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, asylum applicants and Temporary Protected Status holders — because university personnel lack immigration expertise and haven’t been given clear guidelines on exactly who needs to pay the higher tuition rate.
At Austin Community College, which serves an area as large as Connecticut, members of the board of trustees are unsure how to accurately implement the ruling. As they await answers, they’ve so far decided against sending letters asking their students for sensitive information in order to determine tuition rates.
“This confusion will inevitably harm students because what we find is that in the absence of information and in the presence of fear and anxiety, students will opt to not continue higher education,” said Manuel Gonzalez, vice chair of the ACC board of trustees.
A billboard promoting Austin Community College in Spanish sits on a highway that leads to Lockhart, Texas. Credit: Sergio Flores for The Hechinger Report
Policy experts, meanwhile, warn that Texas’s workforce could suffer as talented young people, many of whom have spent their entire education in the state’s public school system, will no longer be able to afford the associate’s and bachelor’s degrees that would allow them to pursue careers that would help propel their local economies. Under the Texas Dream Act, beneficiaries were required to commit to applying for lawful permanent residence as soon as possible, giving them the opportunity to hold down jobs related to their degrees. Without resident status, it’s likely they’ll still work — just more in lower-paying, under-the-radar jobs.
“It’s so short-sighted in terms of the welfare of the state of Texas,”said Barbara Hines, a former law school professor who helped legislators craft the Texas Dream Act.
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For retired Army National Guard Maj. Gen. Rick Noriega, a Democrat who served in the Texas Legislature at the time, that reality hit close to home when he learned of a young yard worker in his district who wanted to enroll at the local community college for aviation mechanics but couldn’t afford out-of-state tuition.
Noriega called the school chancellor’s office, which was able to provide funding for the student to attend. But that experience led him to wonder: How many more kids in his district were running up against the same barriers to higher education?
So he worked with a sociologist to poll students at local high schools about the problem, which turned out to be widespread. And Noriega’s district wasn’t an outlier. In a state that has long had one of the nation’s largest unauthorized immigrant populations, politicians across the partisan divide knew affected constituents, friends or family members and wanted to help. Once Noriega decided to propose legislation, a Republican, Fred Hill, asked to serve as a joint author on the bill.
To proponents of the Texas Dream Act, the best argument in support of in-state tuition for undocumented students was an economic one. After the state had already invested in these students during K-12 public schooling, it made sense to continue developing them so they could eventually help meet Texas’ workforce needs.
“We’d spent all this money on these kids, and they’d done everything that we asked them to do — in many instances superstars and valedictorians and the like — and then they hit this wall, which was higher education that was cost prohibitive,” said Noriega.
The legislation easily passed the Texas House of Representatives, which was Democratic-controlled at the time, but the Republican-led Senate was less accommodating.
“I couldn’t even get a hearing,’” said Leticia Van de Putte, the then-state senator who sponsored the legislation in her chamber.
To persuade her Republican colleagues, she added several restrictions, including requiring undocumented students to live in Texas for three years before finishing high school or receiving a GED. (Three years was estimated as the average time it would take a family to pay enough in state taxes to make up the difference between in-state and out-of-state tuition.) She also included the clause mandating that undocumented students who accessed in-state tuition sign an affidavit pledging to pursue green cards as soon as they were able.
Van de Putte also turned to Texas business groups to hammer home the economic case for the bill. And she convinced the business community to pay for buses to bring Latino evangelical conservative pastors from Dallas, San Antonio, Houston and other areas of the state to Austin, so they could knock on doors in support of the legislation and pray with Republican senators and their staff.
After that, the Texas Dream Act overwhelmingly passed the state Senate in May 2001, and then-Gov. Rick Perry, a Republican, signed it into law the following month.
Yet by 2007, even as immigrant rights advocates, faith-based groups and business associations formed a coalition to defend immigrants against harmful state policies, the Texas legislature was starting to introduce a wave of generally anti-immigrant proposals. In 2010, polling suggested Texans overwhelmingly opposed allowing undocumented students to pay in-state tuition rates.
By 2012, a new slew of right-wing politicians was elected to office, many philosophically opposed to the law — and loud about it. Perry’s defense of the policy had come back to haunt him during the 2012 Republican presidential primary, when his campaign was dogged by criticism after he told opponents of tuition equity during a debate, “I don’t think you have a heart.”
Still, none of the many bills introduced over the years to repeal the Texas Dream Act were successful. And even Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, a Republican border hawk, at times equivocated on the policy, with his spokesperson saying in 2013 that Abbott believed “the objective” of in-state tuition regardless of immigration status was “noble.”
Legislative observers say that some Republicans in the state continue to support the policy. “It’s a bipartisan issue. There are Republicans in support of in-state tuition,” said Luis Figueroa, senior director of legislative affairs at the public policy research and advocacy nonprofit Every Texan. “They cannot publicly state it.”
Meanwhile, as the topic became more politically charged in Texas, the Texas Dream Act ended up amplifying a larger conversation that eventually led to the creation of DACA, the Obama-era program that has given some undocumented immigrants access to deportation protections and work permits.
Even before DACA, many immigrants worked, and those who remain undocumented often still do, either as independent contractors for employers that turn a blind eye to their immigration status or by starting their own businesses. A study from May 2020 found that unauthorized residents make up 8.2 percent of the state’s workforce, and for every dollar spent toward public services for them, the state of Texas recouped $1.21 in revenue.
But without the immediate legal permission to work, undocumented college graduates who had benefited from the Texas Dream Act found themselves limited despite their degrees. As the fight for tuition equity spread to other states, so did the fight for a legal solution to support the students it benefited.
When these young people — affectionately dubbed Dreamers — took center stage to more publicly advocate for themselves, their plight proved sympathetic. By 2017, the same year Trump began his first term, polling had flipped to show a plurality of Texans in support of in-state tuition for undocumented students. More recently, research has indicated time and time again that Americans support a pathway to legal status for undocumented residents brought to the U.S. as children.
But arguments against in-state tuition regardless of immigration status also grew in popularity: Critics contended that the policy is unfair to U.S. citizens from other states who have to pay higher rates, or that undocumented students are taking spots at competitive schools that could be filled by documented Americans.
The DOJ leaned on similar rhetoric in the lawsuit that killed tuition equity in Texas, saying the state law is superseded by 1996 federal legislation banning undocumented immigrants from getting in-state tuition based on residency. That argument has become a template as the Trump administration has sued to dismantle other states’ in-state tuition policies for undocumented residents.
In Kentucky, state Attorney General Russell Coleman, a Republican, has followed in Texas’ footsteps, recommending that the state council overseeing higher education withdraw its regulation allowing for access to in-state tuition instead of fighting to defend it in court.
At the same time, the Trump administration has found other ways to cut back on higher education opportunities for undocumented students, rescinding a policy that had helped them participate in career, technical and adult education programs and investigating universities for offering them scholarships.
Back in Texas, the sudden policy change regarding in-state tuition is causing chaos. Even the state’s two largest universities, Texas A&M and the University of Texas, are using different guidelines to decide which students must pay out-of-state rates.
Clouds fill the sky behind the tower at the University of Texas. Credit: Sergio Flores for The Washington Post via Getty Images
“Universities, I think, are the ones that are put in this really difficult position,” Figueroa said. “They are not immigration experts. They’ve received very little guidance about how to interpret the consent decree.”
Amid so much confusion, Figueroa predicted, future lawsuits will likely crop up. Already, affected students and organizations have filed motions in court seeking to belatedly defend the Texas Dream Act against the DOJ.
In the meantime, young scholars are facing difficult choices. One student, who asked to remain anonymous because of her undocumented immigration status, was scrolling through the news on her phone before bed when she saw a headline about the outcome of the DOJ court case.
“I burst in tears because, you know, as someone who’s been fighting to get ahead in their education, right now that I’m in higher education, it’s been a complete blessing,” she said. “So the first thing that I just thought of is ‘What am I going to do now? Where is my future heading?’ The plans that I have had going for me, are they going to have to come to a complete halt?’”
The young woman, who has lived in San Antonio since she was 9 months old, had enrolled in six courses for the fall at Texas A&M-San Antonio and wasn’t sure whether to drop them. It would be her final semester before earning her psychology and sociology degrees, but she couldn’t fathom paying for out-of-state tuition.
“I’m in the unknown,” she said, like “many students in this moment.”
Contact editor Caroline Preston at 212-870-8965, via Signal at CarolineP.83 or on email at [email protected].
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In a battle over undocumented students’ access to public schooling — and, frankly, their futures — the Trump administration agreed this week to pause new federal rules designed to bar immigrants from Head Start and other education programs.
My colleague Jo Napolitano reports the reprieve, through Sept. 3, applies in 20 states and Washington, D.C., after state attorneys general sued to stop new rules designed to give undocumented preschoolers and other immigrant students the boot.
Health and Human Services Secretary Robert. F. Kennedy Jr. visits a Head Start program on May 21 to promote healthy eating. On July 10, he issued a directive barring undocumented students from the federally funded early education program. (Facebook/HeadStart.gov)
Those regulations could end up restricting educational opportunities for the youngest learners. But as Jo explains in her newest analysis, it’s just one part of a multifaceted approach to bar undocumented students from learning from cradle to career.
Read Jo’s full analysis — and learn how the changes could undercut the chance immigrant youth get for a better life.
In the news
More on Trump’s immigration crackdown: In Arizona, unaccompanied minors are facing immigration judges alone — without help from lawyers — after the administration cut off access to funding for their defense. A court order has restored the money temporarily through September. | Arizona Republic
The Trump administration instructed federal agents to give detained migrant teenagers the option of voluntarily returning to their home countries instead of being confined in government-overseen shelters. | CBS News
Attorneys for immigrant children say youth and families are being detained in “prison-like” facilities even as the administration seeks to terminate rules that mandate basic safety and sanitary conditions for children. | CBS News
The Denver school district says fear of federal immigration enforcement led to a surge in student absences. A review of attendance data by The Denver Gazette suggests a more nuanced picture. | The Denver Gazette
Undocumented students who attended K-12 schools in the U.S. last year before getting deported share their stories. | USA Today
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Penny Schwinn, who was in line to be the Education Department’s second in command, has dropped out of consideration following critiques of her conservative bona fides, including for past support of campus equity initiatives. | The 74
‘Trampling upon women’s rights’: The Oregon Department of Education is the latest agency to come under federal investigation over allegations the state allows transgender students to compete in women’s sports. | Oregon Public Broadcasting
New Education Department guidance encourages the use of federal money to expand artificial intelligence in classrooms, which the agency said has “the potential to revolutionize” schools. | Education Week
The Trump administration’s “AI Action Plan” comes after the Senate failed to pass rules in the “big, beautiful” tax-and-spending bill designed to prevent states from regulating AI. Instead, Trump’s guidance directs the Federal Communications Commission to evaluate state regulations and block any “AI-related federal funding” to any states with rules deemed “burdensome.” | The White House
How a 45-second TikTok video portraying a campus shooting — created by middle school cheerleaders — led to criminal charges. | ProPublica
A phishing campaign has taken advantage of mass layoffs at the Education Department by mimicking a portal maintained by the agency to manage grants and federal education funding. | DarkReading
Drones are being pitched as the next big thing to thwart school shootings — but district leaders are balking at the million-dollar price tag. | WCTV
‘Critical gaps’: An inspector general report in Washington, D.C., uncovered flaws in the city school system’s gun violence prevention efforts, including a backlog on repairs to security equipment. | The Washington Post
Wisconsin schools are installing controversial license plate readers that have been used by law enforcement to track down undocumented immigrants. | Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
