OPINION:
The recent killing of 22-year-old nursing student Laken Riley has understandably shaken the state of Georgia and the nation.
Make no mistake, her death is the direct result of the intentional border policies of the Biden administration. That’s not hyperbole; it is a demonstrable fact. It is interesting to note, however, that The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has gone to outrageous lengths to hide this. According to Georgia’s largest newspaper, the suspect is merely an “Athens resident.”
Here is the reality: Jose Ibarra, who is charged with murder in the young woman’s death, is not from Athens nor anywhere else in Georgia, and he’s not an American. He is from Venezuela, and he made an asylum claim after crossing the southern border illegally and being apprehended in 2022, knowing that the Biden administration would release him into American communities.
That is exactly what happened, even though historical data indicates the asylum claim would be denied. Comments his wife recently made to the media suggest that they orchestrated their asylum claims to exploit Biden administration policies. Less than two years later, a promising young life is gone because of the failed policies of the Biden administration and dangerous sanctuary city policies in far-left cities and states.
If America First border security policies had been in place, Mr. Ibarra would have never been allowed into the United States. According to reports, he was apprehended by the U.S. Border Patrol while crossing the southern border unlawfully with his wife and young child. The detention of families is indeed challenging, and further restrictions have been imposed by a single federal district court judge who improperly reinterpreted the law.
These obstacles are precisely why the Trump administration’s migrant protection protocols (or its Remain in Mexico policy) was so effective in deterring families from coming to the southern border, because they were required to wait in Mexico throughout their immigration court proceedings. This was obviously an undesirable reality for economic migrants hoping to exploit the asylum system, and the number of families coming to the southern border plummeted once the Trump administration had the Remain in Mexico policy fully operational.
Yet over the objections of career Border Patrol officials, one of the first executive actions the Biden administration took was to terminate the protocols. If this proven policy had remained, Mr. Ibarra and his family would either still be waiting in Mexico or would not have made the journey in the first place.
The Biden administration compounded this problem by closing the family detention centers established by the Trump administration. By removing all deterrence policies toward migrant families, the Biden administration created the environment to overwhelm the system, and Mr. Ibarra seized that opportunity.
Next, the Biden administration put forward a policy that ignored the law and streamlined the release of illegal aliens into our communities. According to the Department of Homeland Security, Mr. Ibarra was released from custody through immigration parole because of insufficient U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention capacity.
Lack of bed space is not a permissible reason to parole an illegal alien. The law clearly states that parole is a narrow authority that may be used only on a case-by-case basis for an urgent humanitarian reason or a significant public benefit. Based on publicly available information, Mr. Ibarra should not have qualified for parole. Yet he was quickly processed out of Border Patrol custody and released into the community of his choice, New York City.
It is unknown why Mr. Ibarra wanted to be taken to New York, but its status as a sanctuary city is a probable explanation. For those unfamiliar with the term, sanctuary cities defy federal immigration law and protect criminal illegal aliens by refusing to cooperate with Immigration and Customs Enforcement removal efforts. At some point last year, Mr. Ibarra was in New York Police Department custody for endangering the life of a child. But because of the misguided policies of far-left prosecutors to excuse criminal misconduct, he was released back onto the streets without charges even being filed against him.
Despite the serious allegation, he was released so quickly that ICE did not have time to issue a request that New York detain Mr. Ibarra until the agency could take custody. Even if a detainer had been submitted, it is doubtful the city would have assisted ICE in transferring him to immigration authorities.
These policy failures gave Mr. Ibarra the opportunity to relocate to Athens, Georgia, where his brother was living after also being unlawfully paroled out of Border Patrol custody after illegally crossing the southern border. Mr. Ibarra and his brother, who had a driving under the influence charge, were caught shoplifting. Like New York, Athens is a sanctuary city, and no charges were filed against either brother despite their previous encounters with law enforcement.
Last month, Laken Riley went out for her morning run but never made it home because of Mr. Ibarra’s alleged actions. As we have been saying for years, there is nothing compassionate about open borders.
Because of the historic humanitarian and security crisis caused by Biden administration policies, every state is a border state. Laken Riley is dead because of two failed Biden administration and progressive left policies — the open border and a soft-on-crime approach that prioritizes criminal suspects over innocent Americans.
President Biden should be honest and take responsibility for this border crisis and the death of Laken Riley, and outline a new approach to secure the border. Americans deserve nothing less.
• Chad Wolf is the former acting secretary of homeland security and executive director and chair of the Center for Homeland Security & Immigration at the America First Policy Institute. Doug Collins serves as chair of the America First Policy Institute — Georgia, represented Georgia’s 9th Congressional District from 2013 to 2021, and is the former ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee.
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