Last week I wrote a column about the community colleges deciding (again) to admit illegal immigrants as long as they pay out-of-state tuition. A key argument I made was that proponents of the idea would never be satisfied until the new students were made eligible for in-state tuition, given that few illegal aliens would be able to swing the much-higher tuition as long as they were considered out-of-state students:

Violating the nation?s immigration laws is a
serious offense, but it hardly justifies being denied police protection
after an assault or an ambulance ride to the hospital after a car
crash. As for public education and other services to children, it would
be wrong to punish them for their parents? misdeeds.

Once you get past these two exceptions, however, it becomes very
difficult to justify the extension of any other government services to
illegal aliens. There are three compelling reasons why.

First, while illegal residents do pay some state and local taxes, their
status prohibits them from shouldering the same tax burden that legal
residents do. Extending services to them essentially compels taxpayers
to subsidize lawbreakers. That?s wrong ? and they?ll never stand for
it. And don?t feed me any bunk about how illegal residents would have
to pay out-of-state tuition to attend colleges, thus fully covering
their costs. Very few of them will enroll on such terms. The clear
intention, already well telegraphed by the past statements and actions
of sympathetic politicians, is to keep the current policy for a while
and then push for in-state tuition status.

There was already plenty of evidence that this is the direction the activists want to take North Carolina eventually, but two have thoughtfully provided a restatement of their position. Subtlety is lacking. From a News & Observer reaction story:

“We cannot call this a victory,” said Andrea Bazan, a longtime activist
who has pushed for in-state tuition for illegal immigrants. “We are
continuing to shut the doors for bright kids.”

And

Board member Allen Wellons, a Smithfield lawyer, said he would have
liked to do more for undocumented students, many of whom came here as
young children. He said he hoped for a policy at least in line with the
state’s university system, which does not give illegal immigrants lower
priority, and would eventually like to offer in-state tuition to
undocumented students under 21.

Admitting illegal residents to North Carolina colleges in unpopular. Admitting them and compelling taxpayers to subsidize their educations to the tune of thousands of dollars a year is very unpopular.