The U.S. House of Representatives has passed a bill to deport illegal immigrants charged with minor crimes.
The bill, called the Laken Riley Act, passed Tuesday on a 264-159 vote, with 48 Democrats joining Republicans, will be in the Senate on Friday.
The bill, if passed into law, will require Immigration and Customs Enforcement to expand the deportation net by detaining undocumented immigrants charged with less serious crimes, including burglary, theft, larceny or shoplifting.
It will also provide for state attorneys general to sue the U.S. government if federal authorities set free an illegal immigrant who is later arrested for committing other crimes.
“The death of Laken Riley was a senseless and preventable tragedy, and now that her murderer is behind bars, we owe it to Laken to do everything we can to ensure any migrant who enters the country illegally and commits a crime is never given the opportunity to harm innocent Americans,” John Cornyn, a senator from Texas, said in a statement.
Meanwhile, the law in place provides for the arrest and deportation of both illegal immigrants and legal permanent residents charged with serious or violent crimes, including aggravated felonies, drug possession or drunk driving.
The bill was named after Laken Riley, a 22-year-old nursing student at Augusta University in Georgia, killed in February 2024 by José Antonio Ibarra, a 26-year-old Venezuelan man who crossed the U.S.-Mexico border through El Paso in 2022.
The suspect, who had been arrested for shoplifting at a Georgia Walmart months prior, was, in November, sentenced to life in jail for killing the student without the possibility of parole.
