Dive Summary:
- On Tuesday, Arizona filed a lawsuit to block the Maricopa County Community College District from providing in-state tuition to immigrant students granted deferred deportation by the Obama administration, a policy that Arizona officials say is in violation of state law.
- The state of Arizona doesn't define what makes a resident "legal," and while it lists a work visa as acceptable proof of legal status and the deferred deportation program makes young immigrants eligible for those visas, Gov. Jan Brewer insists that they are still not legal residents under state law.
- Tucson's Pima Community College also recently adopted a similar in-state tuition policy, and the Arizona Board of Regents has requested that its legal staff figure out a way to lower tuition rates to immigrant students without violating state law.
From the article:
... Arizona officials argue that extending reduced tuition to those youths violates state law, which prohibits any immigrant without legal status from receiving public benefits. Attorney General Tom Horne's office had been threatening to sue the school system over its tuition policy for months.
Officials from the school district had directed Horne in April to seek clarity from a judge on the state law to avoid conflicting interpretations. They said the students are legal immigrants and should receive reduced tuition. ...