Trump Cracks Down on Colleges Giving Tuition Breaks to Illegal Aliens

The Trump administration is using a long-overlooked federal statute to crack down on states that offer in-state tuition to illegal immigrants while charging higher rates to out-of-state students who are American citizens. The move marks the first serious enforcement of a 1996 immigration law that has sat dormant for nearly three decades.

At the center of the effort is 8 U.S. Code § 1623, a provision of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996. The law plainly states that no illegal alien may receive a postsecondary education benefit “on the basis of residence within a State” unless that same benefit is made available “in no less an amount, duration, and scope” to U.S. citizens regardless of where they live.

That seems like common sense: an illegal alien in Texas shouldn’t get a better rate on tuition at a Texas state college than an American citizen from Oklahoma. But many Democrat and even some Republican states have openly flouted the statute.

But now the Department of Justice under Attorney General Pam Bondi has initiated a string of lawsuits against states that violate the law. Texas was the first target. After the DOJ filed suit, the state quickly entered into a consent decree to end the practice. Kentucky and Minnesota were next, with cases filed in June.

The lawsuits reveal stark tuition disparities. In Minnesota, illegal aliens attending a public four-year university pay an average of $12,873 per year. An American citizen from neighboring Wisconsin or Michigan pays more than double that – $26,719. In Kentucky, the spread is similar, at $11,299 for in-state illegals, $26,640 for out-of-state Americans.

Hans von Spakovsky, a senior legal fellow at the Heritage Foundation, has long contended that the Justice Department had a duty to end this injustice by enforcing the statute and could have done so years ago. As far back as 2011, von Spakovsky was writing about the need for the federal government to step in to stop states from providing in-state tuition to illegal aliens.

However, without a private right of action, only the federal government could bring lawsuits – meaning that von Spakovsky and other conservative legal scholars could do little more than try to pressure the DOJ to act. As a result, the law remained on the books but was largely forgotten until this recent effort from the Trump administration, which is gaining momentum.

At least 23 states currently offer in-state tuition rates to illegal aliens. Many of those states, including Maryland, Colorado, and Illinois, do not offer equivalent rates to U.S. citizens from out of state.

In Illinois, the disparity is shocking. The state’s public universities enroll more than 27,000 illegal immigrants. In-state tuition averages $14,921, while out-of-state students pay $30,027. That difference, multiplied across the illegal immigrant student population, amounts to more than $418 million in annual subsidies, all paid for by taxpayers and the families of American citizen students who are paying full tuition.

On July 10, the Department of Education joined DOJ’s effort to end preferential treatment for illegal aliens, issuing a new interpretation of welfare law that reversed a 1997 Clinton-era policy that had allowed illegal aliens to access certain adult and technical education benefits under federal law.

“Postsecondary education programs funded by the federal government should benefit American citizens, not illegal aliens,” Education Secretary Linda McMahon said in a statement. “Under President Trump’s leadership, hardworking American taxpayers will no longer foot the bill for illegal aliens to participate in our career, technical, or adult education programs.”

The interpretive rule classifies such education programs as “federal public benefits” under the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act, meaning they are off-limits to illegal aliens.

Critics of the DOJ lawsuits claim the enforcement is punitive or anti-immigrant. But the law itself does not prohibit in-state tuition for illegal aliens (as justified as such a policy may be), it simply requires that if a state offers an in-state tuition benefit, that benefit must be offered to all Americans, regardless of residency.

As college costs continue to soar, the idea that taxpayers and law-abiding Americans are subsidizing the education of those in the country illegally is likely to inflame political tensions heading into 2026. With 20 or more states still in violation of federal law, the issue is far from resolved.

But the Trump administration is finally taking a firm stance on enforcing federal immigration law, and their message is clear – states that disregard their legal obligations won’t get a pass, and American students and taxpayers shouldn’t subsidize the tuition of students who have no right to be in this country to begin with.

Sarah Katherine Sisk is a proud Hillsdale College alumna and a master’s student in economics at George Mason University. You can follow her on X @SKSisk76.