Washington (AP) – President Donald Trump signed the law of Riley’s law on Wednesday and gave the federal authorities the broader authority to illegally deport immigrants in the United States, which were accused of crimes. He also announced at the ceremony that his government was planning to send the “worst criminal foreigners” to a detention center in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
The cross-party law, the first law approved during the second term of trump, was named after Riley, a 22-year-old nursing student in Georgia, who was killed by a Venezolan man in the USA last year.
“It was a light of warmth and friendliness,” said Trump during a ceremony, which included Riley’s parents and sister. “It is an enormous homage to her daughter, which takes place today, that’s all I can say. It’s so melancholy that we have to do it. “
Trump has promised to drastically augment deportation, but also said when signing that some of the people who are sent back to their home countries could not count on staying there.
“Some of them are so bad that we don’t even trust the countries to keep them because we don’t want to come back, so we will send them to Guantanamo,” said Trump. He said he would instruct federal officials to receive institutions in Cuba to receive criminals with a migration background.
“We have 30,000 beds in Guantanamo to capture the worst criminal aliens that threatens the American people,” said the president.
The White House announced a brief time later that Trump had signed a memorandum of the president about Guantanamo. Groups of migrant rights quickly expressed dismay.
“The abusive history of Guantanamo Bay speaks for itself and is in no way ensured that the physical and mental health of people is at risk,” said Stacy Suh, program director of the internment manager, in an explanation.
Trump said the move would double the capacities between the US cunning penalties, and Guantanamo was “a difficult place from which one comes out.”
The establishment of Guantanamo could record “dangerous criminals” and people who are “difficult to deport”, an official from the Trump administration said on the condition of anonymity because they were not justified to speak publicly about the matter.
Defense Minister Pete Hegseth said that his department could “set up a internment camp very quickly” and called Guantanamo Bay “a perfect place”.
“We don’t want illegal criminals in the USA, not a minute longer than necessary,” he said on Wednesday evening about Fox News’ “Jesse Watter’s Primetime”. “Move them to Guantanamo Bay, where they can be maintained until they are deported to their final location, their country of origin.”
Kristi Noem, secretary of the homeland protection authority, said that the administration would obtain the Bills Congress expenses according to financial resources.
The US military base has been used for years to accommodate prisoners from the US war against terrorism. The authorities have also arrested migrants at sea in a facility called Migrant Operations Center in Guantanamo, a place where the United States has long leased from the Cuban government. There were many of the subborn migrants from Haiti and Cuba.
The United States has rented Guantanamo Land from Cuba for more than a century. Kuba rejects the rental agreement and usually rejects the nominal US rent payments. Cuban President Miguel DÃaz-Canel said that Trump wants to send immigrants to the island is “an act of brutality”.
“The decision of the US government to detain migrants in the Guantanamo Marine base in an enclave in which torture and indefinite adhesion are created, shows contempt for human condition and international law,” wrote the Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno RodrÃguez in one post on X .
The Supreme Court decided in 2008 that enemy fighters had the right to question their detention before a federal court in the war without charges in the military prison in Guantanamo. But the judges did not decide whether the president had the authority to hold people at all.
Before Trump took office, the democratic administrations of Barack Obama and Joe Biden worked to reduce the number of terrorist suspects held in Guantanamo.
Riley sheep was traveling for a run in February 2024 when she was killed by Jose Antonio Ibarra, a Venezuelan citizen who was illegal in the country. Ibarra was found guilty in November and convicted without probation.
In September 2022, Ibarra was arrested and released near El Paso, Texas, for illegal entry to pursue his case before the immigration court. Federal officials say he was arrested and released by the New York police in August 2023. The police say that in October 2023 he also issued a quote for shoplifting in Georgia.
The law quickly passed the recent Republican controlled congress with some democratic support, although the opponents said that he could possibly lead to great contexts of people for crimes who could be as slight as shop theft.
The quick passage and Trump quickly sign them to the forceful symbolism for conservatives. For critics, the measure has exploited a tragedy and could lead to chaos and cruelty, while they do little to facilitate fight the crime or to revise the immigration system.
Riley’s mother thanked Trump as he held tears.
“He said he would secure our borders and he would never forget sheep and he didn’t have it,” she said.
Several Republican legislators and NoEM took part in the signing ceremony, as did the democratic Senator John Fetterman from Pennsylvania, a cosponsor.
According to the recent law, the federal officials would have to capture an immigrant who was arrested or was charged with crimes such as theft or attack on a police officer, or crimes that violate or kill someone. Attorney General could sue the US government for damage caused by the federal government, which enables leaders of conservative states to dictate the immigration policy specified by Washington.
Some Democrats asked if it is constitutional. The ALCU says that the law can enable people to “have been accused of violent crimes decades ago years ago.”
Hannah Flamm, Interim Senior Director of Policy at the international refugee support project, said that the measure violates the fundamental rights of immigrants by allowing people who were not accused of misconduct.
“The latent fear of the election cycle of the appearance of crime has prompted itself to support and promote Trump’s complete merger of immigration with crime,” said Flamm.
She also noticed: “I think it is crucial to understand: This legislative template, which is associated with a tragic death, is the pretext of strengthening a mass deportation system.”
___
Rebecca Santana and Ellen Knickmeyer contributed to this report.
