In recent weeks, top House Republicans have accused the state’s public universities and colleges of “harboring an unknown number of illegal aliens” and admitting them as students at the exclusion of legal New Hampshire residents. They’ve claimed that the number of unlawful students is so vast that the schools can’t even count them.
In fact, enrollment numbers made available Wednesday show that a total of three students — out of a system-wide student body of about 22,000 — fall into a category that includes undocumented students and those in the federal Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program. Neither federal nor state law bars those students from attending college.
And those three students have not prevented any New Hampshire residents from enrolling at the University System’s schools — which includes the University of New Hampshire, Plymouth State University and Keene State College — because all qualifying in-state residents are admitted, said Cathy Provencher, chancellor of the University System of New Hampshire.
The allegations by House Majority Leader Jason Osborne and his deputy, Republican Rep. Joe Sweeney, come as their party aims to cut state funding for the University System by 30 percent in the next state budget — and as higher education institutions nationally have become a target in debates over immigration, activism and diversity initiatives.
In a string of social media posts in recent weeks, Sweeney has accused university officials of essentially creating a safe haven for an “unknown number” of undocumented students and hiding that information from the public. In one post, he wrote that New Hampshire residents “deserve to know whether their children are being turned away while (the University System) opens its doors to those in the country illegally.”
University officials reject that categorization and say the facts flatly contradict Sweeney’s claims.
Provencher said in an email that in-state students are denied admission only if the school determines they are not prepared to succeed in college. She said the University System has increased financial aid and recruitment for in-state students in the last three years and created a new academic remediation program to prepare in-state students denied for the fall semester for admission in the spring.
She said essentially all in-state applicants — more than 95% — were admitted to a USNH school over the last four years.
“I want to be clear here,” Provencher said in an email. “We want more in-state residents to be at our campus.”
In a statement Wednesday, Sweeney — who is himself a graduate of UNH — called the presence of the three undocumented students “unacceptable.” He suggested that the University System should work with federal immigration authorities to remove those students. He also reasserted his claim that those three students have led New Hampshire residents to be denied admission.
“It’s time we put New Hampshire first and ensure that our public institutions prioritize the people they were built to serve,” he said.
UNH post welcoming undocumented students prompted inquiry
Sweeney turned his attention to the University System’s enrollment numbers in late April after learning that UNH said it “encourages” undocumented students to apply on its admissions website.
Sweeny emailed Provencher on April 24 requesting the number of undocumented students at the system’s various campuses. Provencher responded on May 6, telling Sweeney that her staff was collecting those numbers, according to emails NHPR obtained through a right to know request.
Provencher told Sweeney that some of the information he was seeking is not tracked or maintained in the University System’s student information databases. She said staff had requested the numbers from the online program that students use to apply to college. Provencher closed her email to Sweeney by telling him she expected to have the information that week and encouraged him to call with questions in the meantime.
That is not how Sweeney publicly recounted his communication with Provencher.
Rather, Sweeney issued a press release that same day, on State House letterhead, accusing the University System of “harboring an unknown number of illegal aliens” and “admitting” it did not know how many undocumented students were on campus. The release, which he also posted on his X feed, did not disclose that Provencher had told him she was actively gathering those numbers at his request.
House Majority Leader Jason Osborne shared Sweeney’s X post, writing, “BREAKING: UNH has so many illegal aliens enrolled that it cannot track them.”
USNH: Non-citizens are not taking spots from Granite State students
New Hampshire’s public campuses turn away few in-state applicants. Between 2021 and 2024, Plymouth State University admitted nearly 99% of in-state applicants, according to numbers provided by Provencher. Keene State College admitted about 96%. UNH was the lowest, at 85%, but that’s still higher than most institutions.
Those numbers, however, include students who applied to more than one of the state’s institutions. When Provencher looked at the number of in-state students versus the number of in-state applications, the acceptance rate across all institutions stood at 95.2%.
Provencher did not agree to be interviewed for this story, but via email she said in-state students are denied admission only if the school they apply to determines they are not prepared enough to succeed.
“I tell parents — because I have conversations with a couple of parents of denied students every single cycle — they think the worst thing I could do to their family is to deny their child admission,” she said in an email. “But really the worst thing I could do would be to admit a student when all the data we have tells me that student is going to get here and fail out, causing that family to pay for semesters that may not lead to a college degree.”
She said there is room in every incoming class for more in-state students.
Colleges are not required to ask about an applicant’s immigration status
Federal law does not prohibit undocumented students from attending college, but they are ineligible for federal aid.
Three states block undocumented students from attending public universities and colleges, according to the Higher Ed Immigration Portal. New Hampshire is not one of them.
Meanwhile, 24 states make undocumented students eligible for in-state tuition, and 19 of those also provide them access to state financial aid.
In New Hampshire, students are eligible for in-state tuition only if they’ve lived in the state for at least a year and if they sign an affidavit swearing that they are a legal U.S. resident.
Students are asked to self-disclose their immigration status on the Common Application program, which most students across the country use to apply to college. A student’s answer to the question of their immigration status, however, does not follow them to the school they enroll at.
For non-citizens, there are a couple of options when they fill out their immigration status on the Common Application. One category is “refugee” or someone granted asylum. A second is a broad category that includes “undocumented” individuals and people in the country with “deferred enforced departure,” “temporary protected status” or “Deferred Action for Childhood Applicants.” That last group, often known as DACA, includes individuals who were brought to the U.S. illegally as children.
To answer Sweeney’s questions, Provencher’s staff asked the Common Application team for the number of students in the latter category. The answer was three students, out of about 22,000 students enrolled across the state University System.
Provencher’s staff also reached out to the federal student aid office for the second category that includes refugees and asylees, who are documented, in the country legally and eligible for federal aid. There are 109 of those students at USNH schools.
University System says out-of-state students are good for NH
Provencher said there is value in recruiting students from outside the state and the country.
“Our campuses are places where we are training students to live, work and thrive in the real world,” she said. “Because of that, we work hard to bring students from all over New England, all over the country and all over the world together.”
There are roughly 649 international students attending the state’s public universities. They are not included in the group Sweeney has targeted, and they must return to their home country after they finish their studies.
The campuses also host nearly 13,000 students from elsewhere in the U.S. each year, Provencher said. Nearly half remain in the state after graduation. “We are the largest importer of talent to the New Hampshire workforce,” she said.
State Republicans are pursuing several immigration bills this session
The scrutiny of the status of New Hampshire’s public university students is one of a handful of GOP-backed efforts this year focused on immigration. Sweeney and Osborne are also backing bills that would restrict drivers licenses from being issued to non-citizens. Sweeney is the lead sponsor on another bill that would ban so-called "sanctuary cities" in New Hampshire.
He promoted the latter effort on X in April, saying “Mass deportations now” and “If you are here illegally, you are not welcome in New Hampshire.”
Osborne, the House majority leader who has joined Sweeney in the allegations that the University System harbors undocumented students, said Wednesday: “A week ago, they said they don’t track their illegals. Now they say they found three. How many more will they find if they keep looking?”
Asked about the allegations about enrollment at public universities last Wednesday, Gov. Kelly Ayotte said she was more concerned about securing sufficient state funding for New Hampshire's colleges and universities in the next budget cycle. She said she welcomes students who are in the country legally.
“We have great educational institutions and we have a diverse student population," she said. “I think that is positive for New Hampshire.”
