President Signs The Laken Riley Act Into Law |
On January 29, 2025, President Trump signed into law a bill named the Laken Riley Act which targets undocumented immigrants for deportation if they are “charged” with crimes including nonviolent crimes such as shoplifting. Contents of the Immigration Bill The law mandates detention of people who are arrested, charged or admit to committing such a crime, without requiring that they first be convicted. The law further allows Attorney Generals of each of the 50 states to sue the U.S. Attorney General and the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) if an immigrant with uncertain or contested legal status who is paroled into the country commits a crime that harms either the state or one of its residents physically or financially, if the value of the harm is more than $100. It is unclear whether this section of the law is Constitutional.
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A majority of Democrats and immigrant rights groups criticized the bill, saying that it is an anti-immigrant proposal disguised as a public safety measure. “Mandatory detention has always been reserved for people who are convicted of crimes and actually commit crimes,” Maryland Representative Jamie Raskin said. “Expanding the requirement to include people who have been accused of – and not charged for — minor crimes such as shoplifting collapses the distinction” between those offenses and more serious crimes. |
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