WICHITA FALLS, TX —A Latino civil rights organization filed an appeal of a federal district court decision that denied some immigrant students the opportunity to defend a law allowing them to pay the same tuition as most students at public schools and universities in Texas.
MALDEF (Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund) filed the notice of appeal on behalf of Students for Affordable Tuition (SAT), an association of students who would be forced to pay higher tuition because of their immigration status. The appeal, filed with the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, challenges an August 15 ruling by U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor that denied SAT’s motion to intervene in the case.
“Denying intervention on the basis of purported futility — when the district court held no hearing and received no briefing on the legal propriety of striking down the Texas law – is Star-Chamber justice,” said Thomas A. Saenz, MALDEF president and general counsel. “When the state law struck down was on the books and in effect for nearly a quarter century without serious legal challenge, the precipitous and conclusory demise of that law is simply ludicrous.”
The request to intervene challenges the consent judgment entered between the state of Texas and the federal government to end the Texas Dream Act. Passed in 2001, the act allowed eligible immigrants attending public universities and colleges in Texas to pay the same tuition as students born in the state. In the motion to intervene, attorneys argue that the federal and state governments used a “contrived legal challenge” to circumvent the normal legal process, which prevented sufficient notice or consideration before taking away the benefit so many students depended on.
“In denying SAT’s motion to intervene for the purpose of appeal, the district court decided that it should have the final say in the case,” said MALDEF Attorney Fernando Nuñez. “With this appeal, we are asking the Fifth Circuit to do what the state and district judge did not, and give our clients their day in court.”
In a related matter, last month, MALDEF filed a motion to intervene in a federal government lawsuit seeking to eliminate the regular tuition rates paid by most students in Kentucky for students without lawful immigration status who grow up in that state.