Kansas Attorney General
Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach today announced a decisive victory in federal court. U.S. District Judge Holly L. Teeter ruled that federal law preempts a Kansas law giving in-state tuition to illegal immigrants. The ruling permanently prohibits Kansas from enforcing its law granting in-state tuition to illegal immigrants.
“For years, Kansas universities have been violating federal law by giving in-state tuition rates to illegal aliens, while nonresident U.S. citizens have to pay much more in tuition. The governor tried to intervene in this case, because she wanted to continue giving in-state tuition benefits to illegal aliens. With this decision, the court rejected her illogical arguments, and once again, U.S. citizens will be treated better than illegal aliens by Kansas universities,” Kobach said.
The United States Department of Justice sued Kansas on June 24, 2026, alleging that the 2004 statute unlawfully extended in-state tuition to immigrants who are not lawfully present in the United States while U.S. citizens from other states pay higher nonresident rates.
Attorney General Kobach immediately joined the United States in a joint motion for consent judgment..
Judge Teeter held that the Kansas statute confers a postsecondary education benefit on unlawfully present immigrants on the basis of a state-defined residency determination without making the same benefit generally available to United States citizens and nationals regardless of residence.
That arrangement violates federal law. The court denied as futile the motions to intervene filed by Governor Laura Kelly and Kansas Students for Affordable Tuition.
In February 2026, Attorney General Kobach issued Attorney General Opinion 2026-5 concluding that K.S.A. 76-731a conflicts with federal law.
The statute deems certain persons without lawful immigration status to be Kansas residents for tuition and fees if they attended an accredited Kansas high school for three or more years, graduated or earned a Kansas GED, and filed a required affidavit.
The court agreed that this residency-deeming mechanism, not merely high-school attendance, is what triggers the benefit—and that isolated exceptions for military members or reciprocity agreements do not satisfy the federal law.