Trump's campaign uses Bill Clinton's comments about Laken Riley as an indictment of Harris' handling of immigration

CNN
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Former President Donald Trump's campaign is underscoring former President Bill Clinton's comment on Sunday that the death of Georgia nursing student Laken Riley “probably wouldn't have happened” if all migrants, including her suspected killer, “had all been properly vetted.” .

Clinton's comments came as he criticized Trump for defeating a bipartisan border security bill earlier this year. The bill failed in January when Trump's opposition to it caused Republican support to weaken. Vice President Kamala Harris, seeking to blunt Trump's attacks on immigration, has vowed to revive that bill and sign it into law if she wins the White House.

Clinton said the bill would have led to “full pre-entry screening” at the U.S.-Mexico border.

“Now Trump has killed the bill,” he said.

He then pointed to Riley, a 22-year-old Augusta University nursing student who was killed while jogging in February. The suspect, Jose Antonio Ibarra, an undocumented immigrant from Venezuela, was arrested in 2022 after illegally entering the United States but was released pending further processing, according to an Immigration and Customs Enforcement statement.

“You got a case in Georgia not long ago – right? They did an ad about it – a young woman who had been killed by an immigrant. “Well, if they had all been properly vetted, this probably wouldn't have happened,” Clinton said. “But if they're all properly vetted, that doesn't happen, and America isn't having enough children to maintain our population, so we need immigrants who have been vetted to work.”

But Trump's campaign interpreted Clinton's comments as an indictment of President Joe Biden and Harris' handling of border security, noting that Riley's alleged killer entered the United States in 2022, long before that bill was drafted.

“Kamala Harris claimed the border was 'secure' just days after Laken Riley's illegal immigrant killer Jose Ibarra crossed the country. “Ibarra was captured at the border and then released into the country by Kamala Harris,” the Trump campaign said in a statement. “President Trump will secure the border and stop catch and release. That’s why he just got support from the Border Patrol Union.”

The back-and-forth showed how Democrats have tried to grapple with what polls show are among Trump's most pressing issues – and how the former president has pushed back by blaming Biden and Harris, far too late and only before the upcoming presidential election to have taken action.

Riley's killing and the suspect's immigration status reignited debate about the country's immigration policy at the highest levels. Biden held up a pin with Riley's name at the State of the Union address in March.

Ibarra was charged in May with murder and aggravated assault with intent to commit rape. Ibarra was also charged for a previous incident in which he allegedly looked into a student's window. He pleaded not guilty in the case.