Missouri Republican Senator Josh Hawley revealed that Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas violated the law by releasing Jose Ibarra, the illegal immigrant accused of the murder of Laken Riley, on the grounds that there was not enough space to hold him.
This Thursday, Hawley read before the Senate parts of Ibarra’s confidential immigration file, exposing that the man accused of the Feb. 22 murder was released by Homeland Security on parole, a measure that is supposed to be used only when there is an urgent humanitarian need or significant benefit to the public community.
“Now we all know that the reason he was paroled into this country is because of lack of detention capacity, which you and I both know is not a valid reason,” the senator told Mayorkas.
According to the file disclosed by Hawley, Ibarra entered the United States in September 2022 and was paroled. It was not until July of the following year that Ibarra appeared before immigration authorities in New York to provide his fingerprints and was found to have a criminal record.
On top of this, in September, Ibarra was arrested in New York on charges of injuring a child, but the case was not prosecuted.
“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, it’s expunged,” Hawley criticized.
An extraordinary 7:38 of @HawleyMO exposing Alejandro Mayorkas lying multiple times about the murder of Laken Riley https://t.co/tgjmOCh0Mh
— Conn Carroll (@conncarroll) April 18, 2024
According to the senator, in November, Ibarra applied for a permit to work legally in the United States with the Department of Homeland Security, which was approved in December despite knowledge of his criminal record.
Mayorkas refused to address the case details during the Senate hearing, claiming he could not speak due to the pending process. This prompted the senator to expose the Homeland Security secretary again for providing inconsistent answers about Ibarra’s case in previous testimony.
Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul also questioned Mayorkas on the legality of the decision to parole Ibarra.
“There are different bases for parole. I am not a legal expert in this regard, but let me assure you that when an individual is encountered at the border, and they are deemed to be at the time of encounter a threat to public safety or national security, they are a priority for detention,” he said.
Today, I confronted Mayorkas over the damage inflicted upon America and the families who have tragically lost loved ones due to the abject failure of the Biden administration's border policies. https://t.co/q2ejsC69NV
— Rand Paul (@RandPaul) April 18, 2024
