Report: Virginia Taxpayers Will Pay $20,000 Per Undocumented Student

RICHMOND, Va.— Virginia classrooms this school year will include as many as 2,800 new undocumented children, who will cost state taxpayers $54 million.

The cost for school-eligible children who crossed the U.S.-Mexico border and have been released in Virginia—often to extended family members—is among the highest per-capita in the nation, according to the Federation for American Immigration Reform. FAIR, a research group opposed to illegal immigration, said the feds reimburse the state and localities about 10 percent.

That works out to nearly $20,000 per student—as opposed to about $11,000 per student the state averages overall.

Why so high?

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