TRENTON, N.J. — The Department of Justice sued New Jersey on April 30, seeking to invalidate state laws that grant in-state tuition and financial aid to undocumented students who completed three years of NJ high school, graduated, and filed an affidavit seeking legal status.
The complaint, filed in U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey as case 3:26-cv-04862, names the state, the Higher Education Student Assistance Authority, the Secretary of Higher Education, and the Commission on Higher Education as defendants.
It marks the fourth federal lawsuit the Trump administration has lodged against New Jersey in three months, following challenges to Governor Mikie Sherrill's executive order limiting immigration enforcement on state property, a state law requiring disclosure of federal agents' identities, and a mask ban on federal agents.
The DOJ argues that two state laws violate 8 U.S.C. § 1623: a 2013 statute signed by Republican Governor Chris Christie that grants in-state tuition to certain undocumented students, and a 2018 expansion by Democratic Governor Phil Murphy extending state financial aid.
§ 1623, a 1996 federal provision, bars states from offering residency-based benefits to undocumented immigrants unless the same benefit goes to all U.S. citizens regardless of state residence. The complaint also raises Equal Protection and Supremacy Clause claims. The DOJ seeks a declaratory judgment and permanent injunction.
Robert O. Lindefjeld, an assistant director in the DOJ Civil Division's Enforcement and Affirmative Litigation Branch, signed the complaint. Lindefjeld has filed all four federal suits against New Jersey since February 2026.
The DOJ complaint cites three federal courts that have found § 1623 preempts state tuition laws. One of those decisions, from the Eastern District of Texas in Young Conservatives of Texas Foundation v. Smatresk, was reversed on appeal by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, and its injunction was vacated. The Fifth Circuit later denied an en banc review 15-1. The DOJ does not note this appellate history in its complaint.
New Jersey Attorney General spokesperson Michael Symons called the suit "the fourth lawsuit filed by the Trump Administration against the State of New Jersey in recent months" and said "another judge already held in rejecting a similar challenge."
Senate Majority Leader Teresa Ruiz, a Democrat from Essex who sponsored both the 2013 tuition law and the 2018 aid expansion, called the lawsuit "cruel, shortsighted, and wrong." She noted the 2013 law "earned bipartisan support and was signed by a Republican governor, because good government recognizes that investing in human capital yields far greater returns than punishment." Christie, who left office in 2018, signed the bill after conditionally vetoing an earlier version to strip out financial aid provisions.
The lawsuit comes as NJ public institutions face concurrent fiscal pressure. Governor Sherrill's proposed FY2026 budget cuts $401.1 million from higher education operating aid and $50.4 million from student financial aid, including the elimination of $21 million in summer Tuition Aid Grants.
University presidents testified before the Legislature in April 2026 that international student enrollment, a separate revenue stream, is declining for the first time in years under federal visa policy changes. Montclair State President Jonathan Koppell told lawmakers he expects international enrollment to drop, "and that's going to put additional financial pressure on us." Felician University President Mildred Mihlon described a "precipitous decline." The DOJ tuition suit adds a third pressure point on institutional operations and student access.
The Higher Education Student Assistance Authority's most recent annual report shows that 373 undocumented students received state financial aid in academic year 2024-2025, totaling $758,579. HESAA has not published 2025-2026 enrollment figures; the 373-student count reflects the most recent completed academic year. HESAA's public report also does not specify which aid programs the 373 students accessed.
NJ public institutions charge out-of-state premiums ranging from roughly $6,400 at TCNJ to more than $20,000 at Montclair State. HESAA does not break down the 373-student cohort by institution, so the total potential cost increase for individual students cannot be calculated from public data.
NJ's tuition equity architecture contains a structural bottleneck in its merit aid programs. NJ STARS, the scholarship for county college students, requires U.S. citizenship or eligible non-citizen status for initial qualification. NJ STARS II, which funds transfer to four-year institutions, allows eligibility regardless of immigration status, but only for students who already qualified for the base program. This means undocumented students who cannot access the county college scholarship face a barrier to the transfer scholarship, even though the transfer program itself does not require citizenship. County college base tuition access varies by institution; the STARS bottleneck applies specifically to merit aid.
Assembly Republicans Gregory Myhre and Erik Peterson introduced A4645 on March 10, 2026, to repeal in-state tuition and financial aid for undocumented students. The bill was referred to the Assembly Higher Education Committee on March 10, 2026, and has not been scheduled for a hearing in the eight weeks since. It runs parallel to the federal litigation but lacks legislative momentum in a Democratic-controlled legislature.
At the K-12 level, a parallel effort has also stalled. The DOJ higher-education suit is politically convergent with, but legally distinct from, a national push to challenge Plyler v. Doe, the 1982 Supreme Court decision guaranteeing K-12 education regardless of immigration status. Assemblywoman Dawn Fantasia sponsored A5233 in 2025 to require tuition for undocumented K-12 students; the bill failed without a hearing.
The Heritage Foundation published a model for K-12 repeal legislation in February 2026 that cited Fantasia's bill. Six states introduced similar K-12 bills in 2025-2026; none were enacted. The DOJ suit relies on § 1623, a 1996 federal statute governing higher-education benefits, and not Plyler's equal-protection framework for K-12.
The case had not been assigned to a judge as of May 3, four days after filing. No scheduling order or response deadline is publicly visible.
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Sources
DOJ Office of Public Affairs, May 1, 2026.
DOJ Complaint, U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey, 3:26-cv-04862, April 30, 2026.
Politico NJ, May 1, 2026.
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MyCentralJersey, May 1, 2026.
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Inside Higher Ed, March 30, 2026.
Young Conservatives of Texas Foundation v. Smatresk, 73 F.4th 304 (5th Cir. 2023).
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Yale Law Journal, January 2026.
HESAA Annual Report FY2024-25.
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