Judge: Fla. can’t charge students with undocumented parents higher, out-of-state tuition

 Students at Florida’s public colleges and universities cannot be charged higher out-of-state tuition simply because their parents are in the U.S. illegally, a federal judge ruled.

U.S. District Judge K. Michael Moore determined the policy violates the equal protection clause of the Constitution by forcing those students to unfairly pay three times as much as Florida residents. Children born in this country are citizens whether or not their parents have legal immigration status.

“The state regulations deny a benefit and create unique obstacles to attain public post-secondary public education for U.S. citizen children who would otherwise qualify for in-state tuition,” Moore wrote.

The ruling Friday came in a lawsuit filed by the Montgomery, Ala.-based Southern Poverty Law Center on behalf of several Florida students who were denied in-state tuition because they could not prove their parents are in this country legally. The center’s deputy legal director, Jerri Katzerman, said Tuesday that Moore’s ruling could give thousands of students greater access to an education.

“He has said in no uncertain terms that these youngsters are citizens and they have been discriminated against,” she said.

State education officials said lawyers were reviewing the ruling and no decision had been made on a possible appeal. There are 28 public two-year colleges and 11 four-year universities in Florida.

Children of illegal immigrants have won similar battles in other states.

Last month in New Jersey, a state appeals court ruled that an American-born student whose parents could not prove legal status was wrongly denied financial aid. The American Civil Liberties Union said that ruling could affect thousands of New Jersey students seeking state assistance to attend college.

In California, a challenge was resolved in favor of the students. Similarly, the Colorado attorney general issued an opinion in 2007 determining that legal state residents were eligible for in-state tuition even if their parents were residing in the country illegally.

The Florida policy, which has been in effect for several years, applies to students under age 24 who are also claimed as dependents by parents. According to a Florida International University law professor’s analysis of U.S Census figures, nearly 9,000 children of illegal immigrant parents are enrolled in Florida public colleges and universities in a given year.

Attorneys for the state argued mainly that classifying children of illegal immigrants as eligible for in-state tuition would cost financially-strapped colleges and universities millions of dollars each year. That argument, however, assumed Florida would be forced to offer in-state tuition to all students who lived out of state.

“This is simply incorrect,” Moore wrote, adding that his ruling “would not prevent the state from continuing to distinguish between in-state residents and out-of-state non-residents.”

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