The Justice Department Challenges Arizona’s In-State Tuition Policy for Dreamers
The U.S. Department of Justice has initiated legal proceedings against Arizona and several other states over their policies that permit “Dreamers” to benefit from in-state college tuition rates.
In 2022, Arizona’s electorate approved Proposition 308, a measure granting noncitizen students the opportunity to pay in-state tuition provided they attended an Arizona school for at least two years and graduated from an Arizona high school.
According to the Department of Justice, such provisions for financial aid and in-state tuition to “illegal aliens” are discriminatory against U.S. citizens who lack equivalent opportunities.
Aliento, the advocacy group backing Prop. 308, has urged Dreamers to continue their educational pursuits in Arizona, expressing confidence that the lawsuit will not succeed.
The Department of Justice’s legal filings claim that the policy contravenes a 1998 federal statute and violates a directive from an executive order by former President Trump. This order mandates action against states providing benefits to aliens that are not extended to all U.S. citizens, specifically mentioning “state laws that provide in-state higher education tuition to aliens but not to out-of-state American citizens.”
Assistant Attorney General Garrett Greene, who has endorsed this new lawsuit, noted that similar legal challenges have been brought against over a dozen states, resulting in judges nullifying such policies in five states.
The litigation not only targets the Board of Regents responsible for the tuition policies at Arizona’s three universities but also seeks to have Prop. 308 overturned. Federal attorneys argue that this would also impact the policies of Maricopa and Pima community colleges, which currently use criteria based on Arizona high school graduation rather than immigration status for determining financial aid eligibility.
