In an interview aired Monday, Laken Riley’s father criticized the politicization of his daughter’s death.
NBC News reports that Jason Riley feels that she is being used politically. “She was much better than that. She should be raised up for the person that she is.”
The father of Laken Riley, a Georgia nursing student killed while she was jogging, is remembering her as a “strong person” who excelled in academics but fears her death is being exploited as a political wedge that has “incited people” for the November election.
While politicians have evoked her name at campaign rallies, in speeches and in an eponymous immigration-related bill, turning it into an election year flash point after she was killed, police say, by a suspect who entered the U.S. illegally two years ago, Jason Riley has taken the past month following her death to reflect.
“I wish I would have been there to protect her,” he said in an interview that aired Monday on NBC’s “TODAY” show — the first time he has spoken publicly since his daughter was killed. “I wish it would have been me.”
Riley was jogging early in the morning on the University of Georgia campus when she was attacked and killed by blunt force trauma, according to Jeff Clark, the University of Georgia Police Chief.
Laken Riley was murdered by an illegal alien.
Her father is speaking out.
She would still be here if we had a secure border.
Must watch
pic.twitter.com/tVuHXuewhJ
— House Judiciary GOP (@JudiciaryGOP) March 18, 2024
Laken Riley’s murder intensified an already heated debate over failed and unenforced immigration policies with the Biden administration, and the case gained further attention this month when Biden failed to say her name correctly during the State of the Union. Riley told NBC these actions made dealing with his daughter’s death even more difficult.
But in reaction to what Biden said, Jason Riley feels overwhelmed over how politicized the circumstances surrounding his daughter’s death have become.
“I think it’s being used politically to get those votes,” Jason Riley said. “It makes me angry. I feel like, you know, they’re just using my daughter’s name for that. And she was much better than that, and she should be raised up for the person that she is. She was an angel.”
“I’d rather her not be such a political, how you say — it started a storm in our country,” Jason Riley said of his daughter’s death, “and it’s incited a lot of people.”
As a result of the divisiveness, he said, “there’s people on both sides that have lashed out at our families,” referring to him and Riley’s mother.
While he and her mother divorced when Riley was young, he and his daughter remained close, calling each other often, he said. She spoke about wanting to graduate from Augusta University’s nursing college and work at a children’s hospital. She wrote down her goals for the year, which included going on a date after she had been such a “study bug,” her father said.
While Jason Riley supports President Donald Trump, he wishes the death of his daughter “did not become so political.” Still, it has led to discussions about how to secure the southern border and help women, including those who are trafficked.
WATCH
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