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Steve Scalise Blasts Hakeem Jeffries for His Response to the Murder of Sheridan Gorman

Dmitri Bolt
Dmitri Bolt  |  March 25, 2026 2:00 PM

House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-LA) hammered House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries after Jeffries declined to say whether the illegal immigrant accused of murdering Loyola University student Sheridan Gorman should be deported. 

Scalise seized on the response as emblematic of a broader shift within the left, arguing it shows “how far the Democrat party has gone off the rails."

"Sheridan Gorman, beautiful young girl with her future before her, murdered by an illegal who was let in during the Joe Biden open border. And Hakeem Jeffries, the Democrat leader, can't even say he would have wanted him deported after he committed more crimes after he came here illegally, before he murdered her," Rep. Scalise said. "This is how far the Democrat party has gone off the rails. They are a party that has lost their way. And millions of people are suffering."

"It's not just the 100,000 workers at the Department of Homeland Security that are working without pay," he added. "It's the millions of Americans who are having flights canceled, who are showing up at an airport and waiting in a parking garage in a line that's going to be over three hours long. And by the time they finally get through security, they find out that they missed their flight."

Other Democrats have drawn criticism for what many see as tone-deaf responses to Gorman’s murder, with some appearing to blame the victim by describing it as a “wrong place, wrong time” tragedy. Others have sought to pin responsibility on President Trump, despite the suspect having been captured and released twice under the Biden administration’s immigration policies.