Legal Experts Dispute King's, GOP Certainty that Immigrant Bill Violates Federal Law

Keith King is convinced that Colorado cannot make in-state tuition rates at its colleges and universities available to the children who are undocumented immigrants.

In a video released by the Republican senate caucus Wednesday the veteran legislator and first-term senator argued that SB 170 violates federal law.

The Colorado Springs Republican senator is not alone in his view.

Attorney General John Suthers (R) issued an opinion in 1996, arguing that the state is forbidden to charge resident tuition to kids brought across an international border by their parents without permission from Washington.

The issue is driving an animated debate at the capitol, as Democratic Sen. Chris Romer of Denver and Rep. Joe Miklosi, D-Denver, are sponsoring a measure that would allow immigrant children who have attended a Colorado high school for at least three years and who earned a diploma, or passed the General Educational Development (GED) test, to pay in-state tuition at any of the state's institutions of higher learning.

Despite GOP certainty on the issue, though, some legal experts believe federal law poses no obstacle at all to the passage of SB 170.

At the core of the dispute is the meaning of two federal statutes enacted in 1996.

The first of those federal laws, called the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996, says that undocumented immigrants are ineligible for state-based “public benefits,â€