White House claims Biden did not apologize for using 'illegal' to describe Laken Riley murder suspect

The White House has insisted that President Joe Biden "did not apologize" for calling the suspected killer of nursing student Laken Riley an "illegal" immigrant in the State of the Union after the president said he regretted using the term and said he should have used "undocumented" instead.  

"I shouldn’t have used illegal, it’s undocumented," Biden said in an interview with MSNBC on Saturday. The White House has responded to reports calling the interview an "apology" saying that he simply "used a different word" to describe the illegal immigrant, per the Daily Mail.  

Biden's White House deputy press secretary Olivia Dalton was asked about the apology and responded, "First of all, I want to be really clear about something: The President absolutely did not apologize. There was no apology anywhere in that conversation. He did not apologize. He used a different word." 

Dalton added that during the SOTU, when Biden mispronounced Laken Riley's name as "Lincoln Riley," that he spoke "passionately about knowing what it means to lose a child and extended his deep grief and condolences to Laken Riley's family in front of the entire country, in the House chamber. And beyond that, I think it's unconscionable that there are some people who are playing politics with this young woman's tragic murder."  

During Saturday's MSNBC interview, Biden went on to explain that illegal immigrants have "built the country" and that he did not want to "disrespect" any of them by using the term "illegal." 

Right after Biden botched the name of the deceased nursing student in the SOTU, he downplayed the murder, comparing it to the murders that happen across the country by people who are legally in the United States, saying, "Lincoln Riley, an innocent young woman who was killed by an illegal – that’s right. But how many of thousands of people are being killed by legals?"