“Say her name!” Many are familiar with Georgia Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene’s outburst at former President Biden’s 2024 State of the Union. Few are familiar with the details behind this exclamation. Laken Riley was a twenty-two-year-old nursing student at Augusta University College of Nursing when she was killed by Jose Antonio Ibarra on February 24th, 2022. Ibarra, an undocumented immigrant, was found guilty of Riley’s murder and sentenced to life in prison without parole. In the short while after her death, Laken Riley’s name became a rallying cry for drastic immigration reforms from conservative Congress members and President Donald Trump, who, at the time, was campaigning for his re-election. These reforms came to fruition when President Trump signed the Laken Riley Act into law on January 29th, 2025–his first piece of legislation since his inauguration on January 20th. The act requires the mandatory detention of undocumented immigrants who are accused or arrested of committing a crime of burglary, theft, larceny, or shoplifting without the possibility of bail or provision for release even if charges are dropped. [1] It also “authorizes states to sue the federal government for decisions or alleged failures related to immigration enforcement,” endowing standing for states to challenge federal policy and enforcement of immigration policy within their borders. [2] While there is precedent to support strong federal oversight of immigration policy, the Laken Riley Act and the likely decision of the U.S. Supreme Court to rule in its favor, as they did in Trump v. Hawaii (2018), presents an unconstitutional foundation for the removal of due process and equal protection vested in the United States Constitution.

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