The White House called on Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker on Wednesday to cooperate with immigration enforcement, after the killing of a student in Chicago.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt blamed congressional Democrats for the ongoing U.S. Department of Homeland Security shutdown. DHS has been shut down since Feb. 14, as Congressional leaders have yet to agree on funding priorities.
Leavitt said former President Joe Biden’s immigration policies caused the death of college student Sheridan Gorman in Chicago.
A Venezuelan national was charged with killing Gorman, a college student at Loyola University, last Thursday.
Leavitt said the Biden administration apprehended Gorman’s alleged killer at the southern border in 2023, but released him shortly thereafter.
“That is not happening anymore under this president, but there are still tens of thousands, if not millions of illegal aliens in our country,” Leavitt said.
Leavitt said the alleged killer was arrested again in 2023 on a shoplifting charge in Chicago. She called for the Department of Homeland Security to be funded and said President Donald Trump agrees.
“The president will also continute to call on Democrat leaders in sanctuary cities and states, like J.B. Pritzker, where this young, beautiful girl was murdered, to cooperate with ICE and stop releasing illegal alien criminals into American neighborhoods,” Leavitt said.
Policies in Chicago prevent the local police department from cooperating with federal immigration enforcement. This means Chicago police cannot detain, arrest or transfer individuals solely based on immigration issues.
When told Gorman’s parents said government policies led to their daughter’s murder, Pritzker said policy failures go beyond Illinois, placing blame on Trump.
“There are national failures, a failure to have comprehensive immigration reform, a failure of the president to follow his own edict to go after the worst of the worst,” Pritzker said.
In a post on social media Monday, Pritzker called for Gorman’s alleged killer to be held responsible “to the fullest extent of the law.”
