Washingtontimes.com
RICHMOND — Efforts by Attorney General Jerry Kilgore to encourage Virginia colleges and universities to begin charging out-of-state tuition rates to all illegal immigrants have drawn the ire of a Northern Virginia lawmaker.
"We should not punish children for the mistakes of their parents," said Delegate L. Karen Darner, Arlington Democrat. "Other states have recognized this, and so should we."
Miss Darner is sponsoring legislation that would allow Virginia colleges to offer in-state tuition rates to illegal immigrants, provided they graduated from a high school in Virginia and agreed to file for the appropriate paperwork within 90 days of becoming eligible to become a permanent resident.
"We are talking about people who [may have been] kids when they came here and have gone through Virginia schools. You would not say to [a native-born American] we are going to make you pay more if your parents were convicted of speeding or got a parking ticket," Miss Darner said.
Miss Darner's bill comes in response to a memo released by Mr. Kilgore, a Republican, in September that says illegal immigrants are not eligible for in-state rates.
"Because an undomiciled alien is not lawfully present in the United States, and is therefore subject to deportation, undocumented aliens, cannot as a matter of law meet Virginia's statutory requirement" for in-state tuition consideration, Mr. Kilgore wrote in the memo to state college administrators.