The campaign of former president Donald Trump highlights Bill Clinton’s Sunday comment that the death of Georgia nursing student Laken Riley “probably would not have happened” had migrants, including Riley’s alleged killers, been “all properly vetted.”

Clinton made the comment as he criticized Trump for having scuttled a bipartisan bill on border security earlier this year. In January, Trump’s opposition caused Republican support to diminish. Kamala Harris has promised to bring back the bill and sign it if she is elected president. She wants to counter Trump’s immigration attacks.

Clinton said that the bill would have resulted in “total vetting” before people were allowed to enter the US-Mexico Border.

He said, “Now Trump has killed the bill.”

Riley, 22, a nursing student from Augusta University who died while jogging on February 2, was then named by the officer. Jose Antonio Ibarra was an undocumented Venezuelan immigrant who entered the United States illegally in 2022. He was arrested and released to be processed.

“You heard about a case that happened in Georgia a few months ago, didn’t they? They ran an advertisement on it. A young woman was killed by an illegal immigrant. Clinton stated that if all immigrants had been thoroughly vetted, this would not have happened. “But if all of them are properly vetted that does not happen. And America doesn’t have enough babies to maintain our population, so we need to bring in immigrants who have been vetted for work.”

Trump’s campaign interpreted Clinton’s remarks as an indictment against President Joe Biden’s and Harris’ handling border security. They noted that Riley’s suspected killer entered the United States long before this bill was drafted, in 2022.

“Kamala Harris said the border was secure just days after Laken’s illegal immigrant killer Jose Ibarra entered the country. Ibarra, who was captured at the border by Kamala and released back into the country after being caught by Harris,” Trump campaign stated in a press release. “President Trump is going to secure the border, and stop catch-and release.” It is for this reason that he has just been endorsed by Border Patrol Union.”

The Trump War Room on X uploaded a video Monday of Clinton’s comments, which was described by the Harris campaign as “deceptively edited.”

In a separate post, Ian Sams, a spokesman of the campaign, said that Clinton said Trump had killed a border security bill which was bipartisan and would have strengthened vetting procedures for those entering the country.

The back and forth demonstrated that Democrats were trying to address issues which polls showed Trump was most passionate about. But the former president reacted by accusing Biden of Harris for taking action too late, and just as the presidential elections loomed.

Riley’s murder and the immigration status of the suspect re-ignited the debate at the highest levels on immigration policies in the United States. Biden displayed a pin that had Riley’s face on it during the State of the Union Address in March.

Ibarra, who was arrested in May for murder and aggravated assault resulting in rape as well as an incident where he allegedly peered into a window of a fellow student, has pleaded not guilty. He has pleaded innocent in the case.