Senate Republicans pass Laken Riley Act with support from 12 Democrats

CV NEWS FEED // The Senate passed the Laken Riley Act, a border security measure aimed at reducing the number of criminal illegal migrants in the country, hours after President Donald Trump was sworn into office Monday.

The legislation passed by a wide vote margin of 64-35, with 12 Democrats joining all 52 Republicans in voting for the bill. The remaining 35 members of the Senate Democratic caucus voted against it, including some who had voted to break filibuster on the legislation on Jan. 10th.

The bill had previously easily passed in the House Jan. 7th, and now is heading back to the lower chamber for a final vote on Wednesday. If the bill passes the final vote as expected, it will then head to the desk of the newly inaugurated President Trump, who is almost certain to sign the measure into law. 

POLITICO called the act passing by a comfortable margin in the Senate “a likely early win” for Trump’s young second presidency.

The dozen Democratic senators who supported the Laken Riley Act were Sens. John Fetterman, D-PA, Ruben Gallego, D-AZ, Maggie Hassan, D-NH, Mark Kelly, D-AZ, Catherine Cortez Masto, D-NV, Jon Ossoff, D-GA, Gary Peters, D-MI, Jacky Rosen, D-NV, Jeanne Shaheen, D-NH, Elissa Slotkin, D-MI, Mark Warner, D-VA, and Raphael Warnock, D-GA.

Both Democratic senators from Georgia – the state where the bill’s namesake was murdered – voted for the Laken Riley Act.

>> JAN. 10th: LAKEN RILEY ACT ONE STEP CLOSER TO BECOMING LAW <<

Earlier this month, Fetterman became the first Democratic Senator to co-sponsor the bill. A day later, Gallego joined him as the legislation’s second Democratic co-sponsor in the upper chamber.

Per POLITICO, Gallego signaled that his support for the act “could be just the first of many votes he takes with Republicans on immigration and border issues — the reason he believes Democrats lost so broadly in 2024.”

“I’m bringing the perspective of working class Latinos from Arizona,” the senator said, as reported by POLITICO. “And that perspective, I think, has been missing.”

In addition, Gallego indicated that there “has been this misunderstanding about where Latinos are when it comes to border and border security.”

“I’m here to bring some more real truth about what people are thinking,” he added, “and so people here and senators here aren’t necessarily reliant on these immigration groups that are, I think, a lot of times, largely out of touch with where your average Latino is.”

>> JAN. 8th: GALLEGO CO-SPONSORS LAKEN RILEY ACT <<

The Laken Riley Act “requires the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to detain certain non-U.S. nationals … who have been arrested for burglary, theft, larceny, or shoplifting,” CatholicVote previously reported.

Also per CatholicVote, the “legislation is named for slain Georgia nursing student Laken Riley, who was brutally murdered on her college campus by Jose Ibarra, an illegal migrant from Venezuela. Ibarra had previously been arrested for shoplifting and released.”