Dem Senators From Laken Riley’s Home State Won’t Say How They’ll Vote on Namesake Bill
9th January 2025
The two Democratic senators representing Laken Riley’s home state of Georgia remain noncommittal on legislation bearing her name nearly a year after she was murdered by an illegal migrant.
The Senate is slated to hold a procedural vote on the Laken Riley Act, legislation that requires Immigration and Customs Enforcement and local law enforcement to detain illegal migrants who commit theft-related crimes, as early as Friday. Most Senate Democrats, including Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock of Georgia, have refrained from supporting the bill, according to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s multiple inquiries to every Democratic lawmaker on whether they back the Laken Riley Act’s passage.
The Laken Riley Act is named in honor of the 22-year-old University of Georgia nursing student who was murdered by an illegal migrant while out on a run near her college campus in February 2024. The legislation is notably backed by members of Riley’s family and is sponsored by the entire Senate Republican conference as well as Democratic Sens. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania and Ruben Gallego of Arizona.
Ossoff and Warnock have notably refrained from expressing support for the bill despite Riley previously being one of their constituents.