President Donald Trump signed an executive order Tuesday renaming Texas’ Anahuac National Wildlife Refuge the “Jocelyn Nungaray National Wildlife Refuge” to honor a 12-year-old Houston girl murdered in June 2024, allegedly by two Venezuelan illegal immigrants linked to the Tren de Aragua gang.
The move, announced by the President on Tuesday, ties the tribute to Trump’s broader border security crackdown, casting the killing as a grim fallout of Biden-era immigration failures.
Jocelyn Nungaray’s death—brutal and senseless—sparked national outrage after Johan Jose Martinez Rangel and Franklin Jose Peña Ramos, apprehended near the border in early 2024 and released under Biden’s policies, were charged with her murder.
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Trump’s order, invoking the National Wildlife Refuge System Administration Act, directs Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to update all references within 30 days, cementing a legacy for a girl remembered for her love of animals and knack for finding them homes. “It’s fitting and in the national interest,” the order states, nodding to the refuge’s Gulf Coast habitat near Jocelyn’s hometown.
The renaming doubles as a cudgel against Biden’s “open-border policies,” which Trump blames for a flood of “cartels, criminal gangs, known terrorists, human traffickers, smugglers, and illicit narcotics.” The fact sheet cites a 40% disappearance rate of Biden’s catch-and-release migrants and a 75% illegal alien arrest spike in Midtown Manhattan in 2024, linking these to murders like those of Jocelyn, Laken Riley, and Rachel Morin. “Innocent American lives have been taken due to this migrant invasion,” it declares.
Trump’s Day One border reset—apprehensions down 94% from last year, per CBP—anchors the narrative. The administration touts a 627% surge in ICE arrests, cartel fear, and a laundry list of actions: a national emergency, troop deployments, wall construction, terrorist designations for groups like Tren de Aragua, and the end of catch-and-release, parole programs, and the CBP One app.
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“Would-be illegal border crossers have reportedly ‘given up,’” the White House boasts, spotlighting Guantanamo detentions and a refugee program pause.
The order lands amid Trump’s tariff rollout—25% on Canada and Mexico, plus a 20% China hike—tying border security to economic pressure. Democrats call it a distraction from spending fights, but Trump frames it as justice for Jocelyn and a rebuke to Biden’s legacy. As the refuge’s signs change, her name now stands as both memorial and rallying cry in a polarized immigration debate.
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