Arizona State University students cross the University Bridge. /Photo by Arizona State University /Flickr
By Laura Gómez | Arizona Mirror
State Attorney General Mark Brnovich can bring back a claim in court to recover public money that he claims the Arizona Board of Regents illegally spent when granting in-state tuition to some public university students who have no immigration status.
No public university or community college in Arizona currently grants in-state tuition to undocumented immigrants. But the Maricopa County Community College District did for over four years and so did the state’s three public universities for about two years.
The claim is part of a larger case where Brnovich sought to expand the scope of his office, which the state Supreme Court rejected on Nov. 25. Brnovich claims that ABOR illegally expended public funds when in 2015 it allowed some state residents, who have a federally-issued work permit and protections from deportation through a 2012 program known as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, to pay in-state tuition.
A lower court had dismissed that illegal expenditures claim, but the Arizona Supreme Court allowed for the issue to be reconsidered.
