June 25 (UPI) — The Trump administration on Wednesday filed a lawsuit challenging Minnesota laws that provide some undocumented immigrants with higher-education tuition benefits not offered to U.S. citizens.
The lawsuit is the third time the Justice Department has challenged states’ laws this month amid the Trump administration’s crackdown on immigration.
The filing challenges the Minnesota Dream Act, which was signed into state law in May 2013 to make illegible some undocumented immigrants in the state for in-state tuition rates, privately funded financial aid and state financial aid.
Federal prosecutors allege the Dream Act discriminates against U.S. citizens from other states who must pay higher out-of-state tuition rates while violating federal law that states “an alien who is not lawfully present in the United States shall not be eligible on the basis of residence within a state … for any postsecondary education benefit unless a citizen or national of the United States is eligible for such a benefit.”
“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 a statement.
“The Department of Justice just won on this exact issue in Texas, and we look forward to taking this fight to Minnesota in order to protect the rights of American citizens first.”
Earlier this month, federal prosecutors filed lawsuit challenging a similar law in Texas. Instead of a legal fight as is anticipated in Minnesota, Texas’ Republican-led government joined the Trump administration seeking the enjoin the Texas Dream Act of 2001.
And the court sided with them, handing the Trump administration a win in its fight against immigration.
“Ending this discriminatory and unAmerican provision is a major victory for Texas,” the state’s attorney general, Ken Paxton, said in a June 4 statement.
On Tuesday, however, the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas and several civil rights and pro-democracy organizations filed a motion to intervene in the Texas case on behalf of students and related groups, arguing the order “creates sweeping uncertainty for impacted students and colleges and universities.”
“The Texas Legislature passed the Texas Dream Act with overwhelming bipartisan support because Dreamers represent the best of us in our classrooms, board rooms and communities,” David Donatti, senior staff attorney at the ACLU of Texas, said in a statement.
“While the attorney general normally would defend state laws, the decision not to means that somebody must. We are proud to advocate for our Dreamers alongside Texas schools and students.”
The Justice Department last week also filed a lawsuit against a similar law in Kentucky.
The lawsuits follow President Donald Trump signing several immigration-related executive orders including “Protecting American Communities from Criminal Aliens,” which directed the attorney general to identify laws “favoring aliens over any groups of American citizens,” including “State laws that provide in-State higher education tuition to alines but not to out-of-State American citizens.”
Twenty-three states and the District of Columbia provide in-state tuition to their undocumented students, according to the Higher Ed Immigration Portal. Eighteen states and D.C. also provide access to state financial aid.
