U.S. Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala., on Wednesday described AL.com as a “failed, progressive, liberal outlet” in response to a story about elected officials tying the alleged rape of a 14-year-old girl by an undocumented immigrant to politics and President Joe Biden’s border policy.
“Alabama’s failed, progressive, liberal outlet, known as AL.com accused me of being political for pointing out vicious crimes like these ... have been committed by illegal aliens all across - not just our state but across the country,” Tuberville told reporters during his weekly media call when referring to the alleged rape in Enterprise, according to 1819 News, a website that was once owned by the Alabama Policy Institute. “Try telling that to the parents of Laken Riley or other families whose loved ones have been murdered by illegal immigrants.”
Jason Riley, Laken Riley’s father, told NBC News he would rather his daughter’s death “not be so political.”
“I think it’s being used politically to get those votes,” Jason Riley told the outlet. “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.”
AL.com’s story pointed out that while the cases involving Riley and the 14-year-old girl in Enterprise have been seized on by Republicans as validation of their political views , data show undocumented immigrants are convicted of fewer crimes than native-born Americans.
Tuberville was among several Republicans who seized on the Enterprise suspect’s immigration status.
“This is Pablo Mendoza. He is an illegal alien who was just arrested in South Alabama for raping a mentally incapacitated 14 year old girl. @JoeBiden is aiding and abetting these monsters. #SayHerName,” Tuberville posted to X, the social media site formerly known as Twitter.
Victims of sexual assaults are generally not publicly identified by law enforcement or journalists.
U.S. House Reps. Jim Jordan of Ohio, who chairs the House Judiciary Committee, and Tom McClintock of California, chairman of the committee’s Subcommittee on Immigration Integrity, Security, and Enforcement, were the latest Republicans to inject politics into the case of Pablo Mendoza, 23.
Mendoza, who is accused of sexually abusing and sodomizing a 14-year-old girl March 25 in Enterprise, is undocumented, Coffee County Sheriff Scott Byrd told WDHN.
The complaint against Mendoza, filed in Coffee County District Court said his alleged victim could not consent “by reason of being physically helpless or mentally incapacitated.”
Prosecutors initially charged Mendoza with rape but have since dropped the charge. They refiled the case, charging Mendoza with sodomy, sexual abuse and human trafficking, according to WTVY.
Laken Riley, a nursing student whose body was found on the University of Georgia campus and was allegedly killed by an undocumented immigrant Jose Antonio Ibarra while Riley was out jogging, was exploited by the GOP for political purposes.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., shouted at Biden to say Riley’s name during his State of the Union address last month, and Sen. Katie Britt mentioned the Riley case in her rebuttal to Biden’s speech, saying the president was to “blame” for Riley’s murder.
The CATO Institute, a libertarian think tank, conducted a study in 2020 showing that undocumented immigrants were convicted of crimes at a lower rate than native-born Americans, although undocumented immigrants did have higher conviction rates than immigrants in the country legally.
The CATO study was based on crime data in Texas, which the institute said was the only state to record and keep immigration status for arrests.
“It could be that illegal immigrants in Texas are the most law‐abiding illegal immigrant population in the country – or the least law‐abiding. Until other states start recording and keeping the data, we won’t know for sure. But there is much suggestive evidence that the illegal immigrant criminal conviction rate in Texas is comparable to their crime rates across the country,” CATO’s Alex Nowrasteh said of the study.
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