Josh Hawley says Laken Riley's suspected killer Jose Ibarra was released into US due to 'lack of detention capacity'

Senator Josh Hawley grilled Biden's Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas in the US Senate on Thursday, holding him to account for the release of Venezuelan illegal immigrant Jose Ibarra into the US. Ibarra is suspected in the murder of Georgia nursing student Laken Riley.

Hawley said that the only reason Ibarra was released into the US was due to a lack of detention space at the border. He spelled it out, saying that Ibarra came to the US in September 2022, was encountered by US Border Patrol at El Paso, "and was paroled into the United States due to lack of detention capacity."

Hawley said that this is "a proviso, a rule that is not permitted under the statute." He accused Mayorkas of lying to other senators and congressmen about the case, the border, and the policies.

Hawley continued, saying that on "July 19, 2023, Ibarra reports for a biometric appointment and was fingerprinted. This is now in New York. The results come back and indicate he has a criminal history. So he's in this country. He has a criminal history. September 14: he is arrested in New York by NYPD for what? For injuring a child."

"He is arrested for injuring a child," Hawley continued. "What happens, the offense was never prosecuted, and the arrest was expunged and— reading right out of the profile— expunged. Nothing is done to this guy. He had a criminal record to start with. He's in the country on illegal grounds. You have falsely and illegally allowed him in. He commits a crime against a child: he's not prosecuted, it's expunged. In November, Ibarra files an Application for Employment Authorization and unbelievably on December the 9, 2023, it's approved.

"So this is your policies and action. Mr. Secretary, a criminal is permitted into this country on ground flatly not permitted, flatly contradictory to the statute. He commits a crime against a child and then gets a work permit. He gets a work permit. You want to know why all of the jobs in the last two or three years have gone to illegal migrants? Working people in this country can't get a job, their unemployment rates high why, because of things like this and then once you do well, we all know, then in February, he commits the heinous crime against Lincoln Riley. Is this a record that you are proud of?"

This questioning comes as illegal immigration continues its surge under the Biden administration and just after Mayorkas dodged an impeachment hearing in the Senate, which refused to take up the articles after they were delivered by the House.

Ibarra, an illegal immigrant from Venezuela, crossed into the US with his wife and her child before they made their way to New York City. In an interview after Riley's murder, his wife said that they married in order to combine their asylum claims.

Once in New York, he was arrested on child endangerment charges for having ridden with the child on a moped without the child wearing a helmet. That case was not prosecuted and Ibarra, without his family, made his way to Georgia where his brother was living and working on forged papers at the University of Georgia.

It was here that he saw Laken Riley, a nursing student, and allegedly murdered her when she was out for a run near her home.

Biden and his open border policies have been blasted for allowing such a crime to take place. In addition to Ibarra's release into the US, Venezeula is one of the countries on Biden's preferred list, from which 30,000 extra illegal immigrants are admitted each month.