Student's murder inflames immigration debate in southern US

Along the edge of a peaceful lake in the southern US state of Georgia, a pile of sneakers forms a makeshift memorial to Laken Riley, a nursing student who was murdered nearby while out on a morning jog.

Riley's death, blamed on a 26-year-old undocumented migrant from Venezuela, has catalyzed the immigration debate in Georgia, one of the key swing states in November's US presidential election.

"It makes me afraid for myself," said Emma Turner, a 23-year-old university student in Athens, the site of the murder 90 minutes east of Atlanta.

Riley's body was found in a wooded area near a lake on the University of Georgia campus, and authorities determined the 22-year-old died of blunt force trauma to the head and asphyxiation.

The suspect was charged with murder, aggravated assault and intent to rape Riley, a student at Augusta University in Athens.

As hundreds flocked to a vigil to honor her life, Riley's death was quickly pulled into the debate over immigration that has split the country.

For Turner, Riley's murder should not be seen through the lens of immigration.

"We need to look at him as an individual, as a person," she said, referring to the suspect. "America was founded on the basis of freedom for people to come."

But to Will Schlief, the problem is the policy that allowed him into the country.

"The dude that killed her, he came across the border," said the 20-year-old physics student at the University of Georgia.

"How is this not a political issue? So that totally goes into my vote in November," Schlief added, asserting that the suspect was released from an overcrowded detention center in Texas "because there's so many people coming across."

- 'Say her name' -

Both Democrats and Republicans are battling for votes in Georgia, a state that Joe Biden won over Donald Trump four years ago by the thinnest of margins -- 12,000 votes.

Trump, the Republican presidential nominee who made a border wall with Mexico a major element of his first White House bid, mentioned Riley specifically at the party's national convention in July and spent time there with her parents.

Republicans have spotlighted other deaths blamed on undocumented immigrants, including that of 12-year-old Jocelyn Nungaray who was strangled and dumped in a Houston creek in June. Two Venezuelan migrants face murder charges in the case.

At his campaign rallies, Trump slams immigrants as "killers, drug dealers and human traffickers" who have been released by the "hundreds of thousands" to "invade" the United States, placing the blame squarely at the feet of his election rival, Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris.

According to several studies, however, there is no evidence immigrants commit more crimes than native-born Americans.

That didn't stop US Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Republican from Georgia, from shouting "Say her name!" in reference to Riley during President Joe Biden's annual State of the Union address in March.

- 'Weaponized' -

The Biden administration has been struggling to address immigration, and the Democratic Party is walking a fine line of seeking to be tougher on migrants while also introducing reforms to the country's inefficient immigration system.

Republicans seized on Riley's death to build a narrative that "one of the reasons you should vote for Donald Trump is because Joe Biden is not protecting the country," Charles Bullock, a political science professor at the University of Georgia, told AFP.

"What Republicans are trying to do is to make the immigration problem something which is geographically more widespread than along the border," he said.

Kelly Girtz, the Democratic mayor of Athens, decried the politicization of Riley's death, saying there's "a lot of trauma" in the city of 130,000, a third of whom are university students.

Given Trump's rhetoric, however, Girtz was not surprised "that it was going to be weaponized."

"The politicization seemed more to come from outside forces," said Girtz, who said social media has helped spread the narrative.

He said several Athens residents who hailed from Latin America told him they were concerned they would be targeted for their ethnicity.

Kim Willingham, an Athens native who works at a middle school, thinks these high-profile cases distract from more pressing problems.

"I just be feeling like sometimes the locals get left behind," she told AFP.

"We have, like, a lot of gang violence, in Athens, a lot of youth dying, but nobody shines a light on it."

For Willingham, "It's just an excuse to speak out about the immigration... to get some votes."