Biden Spars With Marjorie Taylor Greene About a Murder He Said Was Committed ‘by an Illegal’

President Biden jousted during his speech with Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, a far-right representative with a history of interrupting recent State of the Union addresses, about crimes committed by undocumented migrants, saying that in one recent incident a young woman “was killed by an illegal.”

Mr. Biden’s use of the term triggered immediate backlash from liberal Democrats and immigration advocates, who accused the president of dehumanizing undocumented migrants by highlighting the killing and using the term “illegal.”

Mr. Biden’s remarks to Ms. Greene caused the president to veer from his prepared script. Mr. Biden had originally intended to draw attention to Donald J. Trump — his Republican predecessor and likely opponent in November — and his caustic language about immigrants. He had been expected to say in his speech: “I will not demonize immigrants saying they ‘poison the blood of our country’ as he said in his own words,” referring to the former president, who was sharply criticized late last year for repeating language that resembled that used by leaders like Hitler or Mussolini, as well as white supremacists.

But Ms. Greene, a Republican from Georgia, heckled Mr. Biden before he got to that part of the speech during a segment on immigration policy. Mr. Biden was calling on Republicans to support a bipartisan border deal that had been negotiated in the Senate but abandoned by Republicans who had asked for the legislation.

Wearing a bright red “Make America Great Again” hat and pins on her lapel referring to Laken Riley, a 22-year-old nursing student from Georgia who was killed in February, Ms. Greene shouted at Mr. Biden, who had picked up one of the pins honoring Ms. Riley on his walk to the rostrum to