A federal appeals court upheld Texas’s ban on in-state tuition for undocumented students, maintaining an injunction against the state’s “Texas Dream Act” benefit. The Fifth Circuit said federal law preempts the policy when it grants higher-education advantages tied to residency that are not available to out-of-state U.S. citizens. The case involves a long-running dispute that dates to Texas’s 2001 in-state tuition law, which required eligibility conditions including Texas high school graduation and residency duration. After the U.S. Department of Justice sued to invalidate the benefit, the state’s attorney general supported the federal position, prompting the original court to block the program. Students and college districts—including Austin Community College District and interveners such as students at Austin Community College District and the University of North Texas—had sought to defend the statute, but the court found intervention futile under preemption doctrine.