House passes Laken Riley Act, sending it to Trump for first legislative win

The House on Wednesday passed the Laken Riley Act, sending the immigration-related bill to President Trump’s desk in what is poised to be his first legislative victory since returning to the White House this week.

The chamber cleared the bill in a 263-156 vote. Forty-six Democrats voted with all present Republicans in favor of the legislation. Passage in the House came two days after the Senate approved the measure in a bipartisan 64-35 vote.

Trump is expected to sign the measure, marking the first bill enacted in his second administration on a topic — immigration and the border — he and Republicans made a priority on the campaign trail.

“The Laken Riley Act will now go to President Trump’s desk for him to sign into law,” Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) wrote on X after the vote. “Criminal illegal aliens must be detained, deported, and NEVER allowed back into our country. The American people demand and deserve safety and security.”

The White House has not announced if there will be a signing ceremony for the bill; the president is set to leave for North Carolina on Friday.

The bill requires the detention of a broad swath of migrants without legal status, including those permitted to enter the U.S. to seek asylum, if they have been accused of theft, burglary or shoplifting.

It is named for Georgia nursing student Laken Riley, who was killed by a Venezuelan migrant who was arrested for shoplifting ahead of the attack after he was paroled into the country.

But the sweeping bill has alarmed critics, who object to the provision requiring a person be detained after being charged for a crime, rather than after they are convicted.

“Under this bill, a person who has lived in the United States for decades, say for most of her life, paid taxes and bought a home, but who is mistakenly arrested for shoplifting would not be free to resume her life, but rather would be detained and deported, even if the charges are dropped,” House Judiciary Committee Chair Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) said when the House first debated the bill earlier this month.

House passage marks the culmination of a months-long push by Republicans to enact the legislation. House GOP lawmakers first cleared the bill in March, less than a month after Riley was killed. That effort, however, languished in the Democratic-controlled Senate.

The House approved the legislation again earlier this month as its first bill of the 119th Congress. The newly minted Senate GOP majority quickly took up its version of the bill, which had some technical differences from the House’s copy.

Senators also added two amendments to the bill: One from Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) that would add the assault of a law enforcement officer to the list of offenses that would lead to detainment, and another from Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) known as Sarah’s Law, which would expand the bill to include the detainment of migrants without legal status charged with crimes causing death or serious bodily injury. The proposal was named after Sarah Root, who was killed in a 2016 car crash that involved a migrant who did not have legal status who proceeded to post bond and flee the U.S.

Twelve Democrats voted with all Republicans to clear the final measure in the Senate, sending it to the House for final passage.

In bringing up the bill, Republicans succeeded in splitting Democrats, still smarting from their defeat at the ballot box in November, on one of Trump's signature issues. Republicans — including Trump — leaned into the issue of immigration and the border on the campaign trail, matters that several polls said were top of mind to voters throughout the campaign.

The president spoke about Riley’s case in particular on the campaign trail as her death became a flashpoint, with Republicans blaming the Biden administration’s immigration efforts.

When a Georgia judge in November sentenced Jose Ibarra, a 26-year-old migrant from Venezuela, to life in prison for killing Riley, Trump weighed in and called the verdict “justice.”

“The Illegal who killed our beloved Laken Riley was just found GUILTY on all counts for his horrific crimes,” the president, who had won the election days earlier, said at the time.

In another sign of how important the issue of immigration is to Republicans, Trump signed a flurry of executive orders on his first day in office enacting a series of new restrictions at the border.

One places a pause on refugee admissions, while another reinstates a program pairing local law enforcement with immigration agents.

Another declares a national emergency, clearing the way for greater use of active-duty military along the southern border and funneling resources to help build the border wall.

Additionally, he signed an order that deems migration an “invasion” and seeks to end asylum processing by deeming migrants a public health and national security threat.

Alex Gangitano contributed.

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