California Court Says: No Resident Tuition for Illegals...

...unless all the legals get resident tuition, too.

Hat tip to Michelle Malkin for the story, which stems from the San Fransisco Chronicle. And, yeah, the lede is what you’d expect:

A state appellate court has put a financial cloud over the future of tens of thousands of undocumented California college students, saying a state law that grants them the same heavily subsidized tuition rate that is given to resident students is in conflict with federal law.

Translation: the court says California can’t give tuition breaks to illegal immigrants when they don’t give the same breaks to actual U.S. citizens who don’t happen to live in California.

Later in the story:

On Monday, three justices of the Third District Court of Appeal in Sacramento said that a 2001 state law, AB540, conflicts with federal law. The state law provides the benefit of in-state tuition to undocumented students while the federal law says an illegal immigrant cannot receive that benefit unless the same benefit is extended to all U.S. citizens without regard to California residency.

According to Eugene Volokh, the federal law is “title 8 of the United States Code (U.S.C.) section 1623.” The pertinent paragraph:

“Notwithstanding any other provision of law, an alien who is not lawfully present in the United States shall not be eligible on the basis of residence within a State (or a political subdivision) for any postsecondary education benefit unless a citizen or national of the United States is eligible for such a benefit (in no less an amount, duration, and scope) without regard to whether the citizen or national is such a resident.”

Translation: you can’t give it to illegals unless you’re giving it to legals. All of them.

I wasn't aware of that law before. Now I am. And so are you.