WASHINGTON — Republican lawmakers pressed forward this week on an immigration bill with bipartisan support as a first push on a tough-on-immigration approach promised by President-elect Donald Trump and Republicans in the 2024 election.

The House on Tuesday voted 264-159 to pass the legislation known as the Laken Riley Act, with 48 Democrats joining all Republicans in voting for it. House leadership had included the bill in its initial package of rules for the 119th Congress.

A procedural vote in the Senate could take place soon as Friday on that chamber’s version of the bill, said a spokesperson for Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D. The bill has Pennsylvania Democratic Sen. John Fetterman as a supporter.

The measure is named for a 22-year-old woman murdered last year by an undocumented immigrant who had been released after an arrest. Her story has become a rallying cry for right-wing criticism of the Biden administration’s immigration policies.

The focus on the single immigration bill instead of a broader legislative package on the issue appears to be an early test of Senate Democrats, who likely will face political messaging if they block floor action on the bill. Republicans would need to pick up eight Democrats or independents to overcome a filibuster.

In a statement after the House vote, Will Reinert, a spokesperson for the National Republican Congressional Committee, chided the remaining 159 House Democrats who opted to vote against the bill.

“It’s striking that one of House Democrats’ first votes in Congress is against keeping families safe,” Reinert said. “They want an America where illegal migrants can murder, rape or steal without fear of punishment — despite their empty rhetoric about ‘border security.’”

Sen. Katie Britt, R-Ala., said in a news release Tuesday that Congress “has an obligation” to act on the legislation on behalf of Riley and her family as well as those affected by negative consequences of illegal immigration. Senate Democrats in the previous Congress blocked it from getting unanimous support to move forward, according to a statement from Britt’s office.

“The American people did not just deliver a mandate on November 5th, they delivered a verdict,” Britt said. “They made it clear they want to remove criminal illegal aliens and protect American families. We will soon know whether Democrats hear, respect, and obey that verdict.”

Sen. Gary Peters, D-Mich., has signaled he would support the legislation. Two key lawmakers to watch are the newly sworn-in Sens. Ruben Gallego, D-Ariz., and Elissa Slotkin, D-Mich., who are former House members and voted for a version of the bill last year. Their offices didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on Tuesday.

Fetterman, in a statement included in a GOP news release, called Riley’s story “a tragic reminder of what’s at stake when our systems fail to protect people.”

“No family should have to endure the pain of losing a loved one to preventable violence. Immigration is what makes our country great,” Fetterman said. “I support giving authorities the tools to prevent tragedies like this one while we work on comprehensive solutions to our broken system.”

The measure has two main components. One part requires the secretary of Homeland Security to issue a detainer for undocumented immigrants arrested for or convicted of burglary, theft or shoplifting. The other part lets states sue the federal government if they feel U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement doesn’t enforce the previous component of the bill.

Ahead of the vote, Rep. Tom McClintock, R-Calif., said on the House floor that Trump can put a similar policy in place once he takes office on Jan. 20.

“But without this law, a future Democratic president could once again release dangerous illegal aliens back onto our streets to prey on our people and destroy innocent young lives like Laken Riley,” McClintock said. “This bill will stop them.”

In the House floor debate, North Carolina Republican Rep. Mark Harris brought up the story of Riley and her killer, Jose Ibarra, saying he was caught shoplifting in 2023 but was released despite prior crimes and his immigration status. Months later, he murdered the 22-year-old nursing student, Harris said.

“There’s just no other way to put it. Her death is a direct result of President Biden’s direct refusal to enforce our laws,” Harris said. “We in this Congress must ensure there are no future Laken Rileys.”

Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., called the bill “an empty and opportunistic measure” and listed several reasons why Democrats oppose it, including that it never went through the committee process or was open for amendment. The measure would be a “radical departure” from current law that for years has generally required mandatory detention only for criminal convictions or for admissions to having committed certain serious crimes, Raskin said.

Congress has never even appropriated sufficient resources to detain all noncitizens under the currently serious mandatory detention categories, Raskin said, and even Trump during his first term never tried to detain all migrants theoretically subject to mandatory detention.

“So this extremely elastic new provision adds nothing to the equation other than more empty rhetoric and greater bureaucratic bloat,” Raskin said. “This allows us to get up and demonize immigrants without doing anything to fix the immigration system and to act tough without actually making America safer or solving any of the problems within immigration laws.”

Under the bill, Raskin said, “a person who has lived in the United States for decades, saved for most of her life, paid taxes and bought a home, but who was 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, and even if the police admit that the arrest was mistaken.”

_____

©2025 CQ-Roll Call, Inc., All Rights Reserved. Visit cqrollcall.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.