Connect with us

News

Biden says her name — Laken Riley — at urging of GOP Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene

Published

2 years ago

on

WASHINGTON (AP) — It was what the Republicans demanded, but never expected.

President Joe Biden said her name.

“Laken Riley.”

Even before Biden started speaking, the topic of border security was certain to rise as one of the most tense moments in the State of the Union address.

Biden was confronted as he walked into the House chamber by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, the hardline Republican, decked out in a red Trump MAGA hat and a t-shirt emblazoned with the message, which was also on a button she pressed into his hand.

“Say her name,” it said, the phrase evoking the language used by activists after the death of George Floyd and others at the hands of police.

The death of Laken Riley, a nursing student from Georgia, has become a rallying cry for Republicans, a tragedy that they say encompasses the Biden administration’s handling of the U.S-Mexico border amid a record surge of immigrants entering the country. An immigrant from Venezuela who entered the U.S. illegally has been arrested and charged with murder.

Midway through the speech, Biden started talking about border security and called on Congress to pass legislation to secure the border and modernize the country’s outdated immigration laws, praising the bipartisan effort that collapsed when his likely Republican presidential rival, Donald Trump, opposed it.

Greene interjected, “Say her name!”

The congresswoman from Georgia yelled, pointing a finger, and jabbing it toward Biden.

And then Biden did just that.

He held up the white button, and said: “Laken Riley.”

Biden spoke briefly of her death and he made reference to his own family’s trauma — his first wife and young daughter were killed in 1972 after an automobile crash. His son, Beau, died of brain cancer in 2015.

And then he urged Congress to work together to pass a border security compromise.

“Get this bill done!” Biden said.

He even called on Trump to stop fighting against any border deal.

“We can do it together,” he said.

With immigration becoming a top issue in the presidential election, Republicans are using nearly every tool at their disposal — including impeaching Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas — to condemn how the president has handled the border.

Hours earlier, the House voted to pass the “Laken Riley Act,” which would require the Department of Homeland Security to detain unauthorized migrants who are accused of theft.

Authorities have arrested on murder and assault charges Jose Ibarra, a Venezuelan man who entered the U.S. illegally and was allowed to stay to pursue his immigration case. He has not yet entered a plea to the charges.

Trump has used Riley’s death to slam Biden’s handling of the border and at one event this month told the crown that the president would never say her name.

Biden has also adopted some of the language of Trump on the border, and on Thursday night, he called the man charged with murdering Riley an “illegal.”

That was disappointing to Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. “I wish he hadn’t engaged with Marjorie Taylor Greene and used the word illegal,” she told the AP after the speech.

Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif, the speaker emeritus, said afterward on CNN, “Now he should have said ‘undocumented,’ but it’s not a big thing.”

Greene had handed out the buttons earlier in the day. Biden also looked up to the gallery where many guests were seated, but Riley’s parents were not there.

Rep. Mike Collins, a Georgia Republican, said this week that he had invited Riley’s parents to the State of the Union address, but they had “chosen to stay home as they grieve the loss of their daughter.”

__

Associated Press writers Farnoush Amiri and Jill Colvin contributed to this story.

Texas Guardian News
Latest posts by Texas Guardian News (see all)
Related Topics:
Continue Reading
Click to comment

Leave a Reply

News

Bizarre Epstein files reference to Trump, Putin, and oral sex with ‘Bubba’ draws scrutiny in Congress

Published

2 weeks ago

on

November 14, 2025

By

The latest tranche of emails from the estate of late convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein includes one that contains what appear to be references to President Donald Trump allegedly performing oral sex, raising questions the committee cannot answer until the Department of Justice turns over records it has withheld, says U.S. Rep. Robert Garcia, the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee.

Garcia insists the Trump White House is helping block them.

In a Friday afternoon interview with The Advocate, the out California lawmaker responded to a 2018 exchange, which was included in the emails released, between Jeffrey Epstein and his brother, Mark Epstein. In that message, Mark wrote that because Jeffrey Epstein had said he was with former Trump adviser Steve Bannon, he should “ask him if Putin has the photos of Trump blowing Bubba.”

“Bubba” is a nickname former President Bill Clinton has been known by; however, the email does not clarify who Mark Epstein meant, and the context remains unclear.

Texas Guardian News
Latest posts by Texas Guardian News (see all)
Continue Reading

News

USDA head says ‘everyone’ on SNAP will now have to reapply

Published

2 weeks ago

on

November 14, 2025

By

Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins on Thursday said the Trump administration is planning to have all Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP) beneficiaries reapply for the program due to alleged fraud.

The secretary said after receiving data on SNAP recipients from 29 red states that “186,000 deceased men and women and children in this country are receiving a check.”

“Can you imagine when we get our hands on the blue state data what we’re going to find?” she asked during a Thursday appearance on Newsmax’s “Rob Schmitt Tonight.”

“It’s going to give us a platform and a trajectory to fundamentally rebuild this program, have everyone reapply for their benefit, make sure that everyone that’s taking a taxpayer-funded benefit through SNAP or food stamps, that they literally are vulnerable, and they can’t survive without it,” she added.

Every state has a periodic recertification process that requires SNAP or food stamp recipients to update their whereabouts and earnings, according to the Department of Agriculture (USDA). Most municipalities require updated data every six to 12 months.

“Secretary Rollins wants to ensure the fraud, waste, and incessant abuse of SNAP ends,” a USDA spokesperson said in a statement to The Hill. “Rates of fraud were only previously assumed, and President Trump is doing something about it. Using standard recertification processes for households is a part of that work. As well as ongoing analysis of State data, further regulatory work, and improved collaboration with States. “

Earlier this month, food stamps were threatened amid the government shutdown as the Trump administration argued against using contingency funds to fuel the welfare program.

Texas Guardian News
Latest posts by Texas Guardian News (see all)
Continue Reading

News

Trump orders Bondi to investigate Epstein’s ties to Clinton and other political foes

Published

2 weeks ago

on

November 14, 2025

By

NEW YORK (AP) — Acceding to President Donald Trump’s demands, U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi said Friday that she has ordered a top federal prosecutor to investigate sex offender Jeffrey Epstein’s ties to Trump political foes, including former President Bill Clinton.

Bondi posted on X that she was assigning Manhattan U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton to lead the probe, capping an eventful week in which congressional Republicans released nearly 23,000 pages of documents from Epstein’s estate and House Democrats seized on emails mentioning Trump.

Trump, who was friends with Epstein for years, didn’t explain what supposed crimes he wanted the Justice Department to investigate. None of the men he mentioned in a social media post demanding the probe has been accused of sexual misconduct by any of Epstein’s victims.

Hours before Bondi’s announcement, Trump posted on his Truth Social platform that he would ask her, the Justice Department and the FBI to investigate Epstein’s “involvement and relationship” with Clinton and others, including former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers and LinkedIn founder and Democratic donor Reid Hoffman.

Trump, calling the matter “the Epstein Hoax, involving Democrats, not Republicans,” said the investigation should also include financial giant JPMorgan Chase, which provided banking services to Epstein, and “many other people and institutions.”

“This is another Russia, Russia, Russia Scam, with all arrows pointing to the Democrats,” the Republican president wrote, referring to special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation of alleged Russian interference in Trump’s 2016 election victory over Bill Clinton’s wife, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Asked later Friday whether he should be ordering up such investigations, Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One: “I’m the chief law enforcement officer of the country. I’m allowed to do it.”

In a July memo regarding the Epstein investigation, the FBI said, “We did not uncover evidence that could predicate an investigation against uncharged third parties.”

The president’s demand for an investigation — and Bondi’s quick acquiescence — is the latest example of the erosion of the Justice Department’s traditional independence from the White House since Trump took office.

It is also an extraordinary attempt at deflection. For decades, Trump himself has been scrutinized for his closeness to Epstein — though like the people he now wants investigated, he has not been accused of sexual misconduct by Epstein’s victims.

None of Trump’s proposed targets were accused of sex crimes

Texas Guardian News
Latest posts by Texas Guardian News (see all)
Continue Reading

Trending