Immigration is on Americans' minds. And politicians are seizing the opportunity

When I saw Donald Trump take an interest in the horrible killing of a Georgia nursing student, I was swept by a profound sense of having been here before.

- Clarence Page

In 2015, Trump made a national cause out of the fatal shooting of Kate Steinle in San Francisco, allegedly by Jose Ines Garcia-Zarate, a migrant in the U.S. illegally. Garcia-Zarate, was later acquitted of murder and manslaughter charges after a 2017 trial in which his defenders argued the death was an accident.

Flash forward nine years, and the victim Trump now is fixating on is Laken Hope Riley, 22, a nursing student whose body was found on February 22 in the woods near a jogging trail on the University of Georgia campus. And again, the suspect is an immigrant — 26-year-old Jose Ibarra, a Venezuelan citizen now charged with the killing.

Former and possibly future President Trump is back, calling Ibarra a “monster” on social media and promising to immediately “seal the border” if elected president.

Trump, who famously launched his first presidential bid with promises to build a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border, now is using the issue to galvanize other Republicans in a united front against the illegal border crossings that have occurred since President Biden took office in 2021.