Minnesota triumphs over Trump in lawsuit on illegal immigration tuition

A federal judge has sided with Minnesota in ruling that the state’s policy of offering in-state tuition to illegal immigrant students is not trumped by federal law.

This federal law generally states that states cannot offer a special rate to illegal immigrants who reside in a state unless they also allow the same rate to be paid by anyone, including those from other U.S. states.

U.S. District Judge Katherine Menendez, however, said Minnesota law ties the special rates to a student who attended a high school in the state. This does not specifically require residency in the state.

And because that means someone who lives out of state could qualify, it doesn’t violate federal law.

“Under Minnesota’s statutory scheme, nonresidents can — and do — qualify for tuition: by living in a neighboring state and attending Minnesota high schools, by attending a Minnesota boarding school, or by attending and graduating from a Minnesota high school before leaving the state,” wrote Judge Menendez, a Biden appointee.

The move is the latest in a series of losses for the Trump administration in its attempt to use federal laws to try to roll back state policies that offer special leniency to illegal immigrants.

Orders to deny federal funding to sanctuary jurisdictions have been blocked by other courts. And an attempt to repeal New York’s law banning arrests in state courthouses failed late last year.

The administration had some success reversing tuition policies in Texas and Oklahoma, but in those cases state officials colluded with the federal government and entered into consent decrees to invalidate their own policies.

Judge Menendez said the Oklahoma case did not go into the merits of federal law.

Texas does, but Judge Menendez said the state’s law differs from Minnesota’s because Texas specifically ties tuition to in-state residency rather than school location.