WASHINGTON, D.C. – As the Senate prepares to take a final vote on the Laken Riley Act, FWD.us President Todd Schulte released the following statement:

“The Laken Riley Act has been presented as a response to an awful tragedy. However, this bill represents a harmful, counterproductive effort to exploit grief and fear to advance punitive and ineffective policies.

“If enacted, this bill will not improve public safety or border security for American communities. Instead, it will subject millions of immigrants—many of whom are long-time community members, children, and those who have already been vetted and received temporary legal status, like Dreamers and people fleeing conflict abroad—to indefinite incarceration based merely on their being arrested or simply accused of an offense.

“Moreover, this legislation seeks to fundamentally upend the federal government's role as the central arbiter of immigration policy, strip away due process and essential protections for millions of people, and grant state officials unprecedented powers to veto and override the federal government's immigration authorities, enforcement actions, and decisions.

“The financial costs are just as staggering: the Laken Riley Act is estimated to cost taxpayers approximately $400 billion over the next decade without considering additional costs that state and local governments would bear.

“Congress must begin to focus on proven solutions that actually strengthen public safety and produce a safe, orderly, and fair immigration system. We need immigration policies that create an earned path to citizenship for the undocumented, build legal pathways, and secure the border, not policies that fail to meet American interests.”