Last year the Laken Riley Act couldn’t even get a sniff of action in the Senate.

On Thursday, the bill sailed onto the Senate floor in a strong bipartisan vote, signaling just how much immigration politics has changed.

“My Democratic colleagues have heard the American people. They understand we need action right now,” said Sen. Katie Britt, Alabama Republican and chief sponsor of the bill, the first to see action in the new GOP-led Congress.

The bill, named after the 22-year-old nursing student murdered last year at the hands of an illegal immigrant, is the symbolic embodiment of President-elect Donald Trump’s immigration policy.

It would require Homeland Security to try to arrest, detain and deport illegal immigrants arrested for even somewhat minor crimes of theft, larceny or shoplifting.

The Senate voted to head off an initial filibuster on a 84-9 vote. Thirty-three members of the Democratic Caucus joined Republicans in support, including the party’s top leaders in the chamber.

Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, New York Democrat, said that’s not to say he backs the bill in full, but he said it’s at least worth the debate.

“Democrats want to have a robust debate where we can offer amendments and improve this bill,” he said.

Republicans said Mr. Schumer could have had that same opportunity last year, when he controlled the chamber and could have brought the bill to the floor.

“He would not bring this bill up,” said Sen. James Lankford, Oklahoma Republican.

The legislation will likely face another filibuster vote before passage, and that tally won’t be as bipartisan as Thursday’s vote — though Republicans were confident they will muster the support to pass the bill.

Riley was slain by Jose Ibarra, a Venezuelan who was caught and released at the border in 2022 under a Biden “parole” program.

He went on to tally several arrests in New York City and Georgia, including one for shoplifting. But he was never deemed a priority for detention and deportation under Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas’s directives, so he was free on the streets when he accosted and murdered Riley.

Ibarra was convicted late last year and has been sentenced to life in prison.

The Laken Riley Act would push U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to arrest and detain illegal immigrants who commit shoplifting, burglary, larceny or theft offenses.

It would also create an avenue for states to bring a civil case in court against federal officials who refuse to enforce immigration law. That would reverse a 2023 Supreme Court ruling that said Texas didn’t have standing to sue to stop Mr. Mayorkas’s more relaxed enforcement priorities, even if they did conflict with the law.

A version of the bill passed the House earlier this week, with 48 Democrats joining Republicans in support.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, New York Democrat, acknowledged the shifting winds but tried to downplay them.

“It’s my understanding that there were approximately 8 to 10 additional Democratic votes this year as compared to last year. There are 30 new members of the House Democratic Caucus,” said Mr. Jeffries, who opposed the bill but did not impose a party position on his members.

In fact, there were 11 more Democratic votes for the bill this year, and the freshmen Democrats were far more likely than other party members to side with Mr. Trump and Republicans.

Meanwhile six House Democrats who opposed the bill last year switched to back it this week.

The new supporters gave several reasons for their stance, including the bipartisan nature of the bill and the growing attention to crimes committed by illegal immigrants.

“We have to keep our communities safe. This bill is a step in the right direction,” first-term Rep. Kristen McDonald Rivet, Michigan Democrat, told media in her state.

Rep. Laura Gillen, a first-term Democrat from New York, said she was “proud” to back a bipartisan answer on immigration.

“It’s long past time for Democrats and Republicans to work together on common-sense solutions to our current immigration and border challenges,” she said in a statement.

Those sorts of comments have dismayed immigrant-rights leaders, who are apoplectic over the bill’s resurgence.

Angelica Salas, executive director of the Los Angeles-based Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights, called it a “hateful bill” that “seeks to scapegoat and racially profile immigrants.”

Activists were, if anything, even more worried about the other part of the bill that would give states the power to sue in federal court to force the administration to carry out the letter of immigration law.

“This bill would empower state anti-immigrant zealots, like Ken Paxton and Kris Kobach,” said Vanessa Cardenas, executive director of America’s Voice, as she name-checked the Republican attorneys general in Texas and Kansas, both of them backers of strict immigration enforcement.

Murad Awawdeh, president of the New York Immigration Coalition, said the bill stomps on illegal immigrants’ due-process rights.

“If this bill becomes law, immigrants who are swept up in this enforcement, without even being convicted of a crime, could be permanently separated from their families before having the opportunity to defend themselves in a court of law – in direct violation of their Constitutional rights,” he said.

But the bill’s backers pointed out that the law already calls for most illegal immigrants to be detained when they are apprehended, regardless of criminal records, and the catch-and-release policies of the Biden years are the anomaly.

She also said illegal immigrants retain their right to fight deportation through an asylum claim even if they are detained.

• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.