The Tudor Dixon Podcast: A Father’s Grief After Illegal Immigrant Kills His Daughter

Summary

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The Tudor Dixon Podcast: A Father’s Grief After Illegal Immigrant Kills His Daughter

Podcast: The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show
Host: Tudor Dixon
Guest: Joe Abraham
Date: April 1, 2026

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Episode Overview

This emotionally charged episode centers on the devastating impact of sanctuary policies and illegal immigration, told through the eyes of a grieving father. Host Tudor Dixon speaks with Joe Abraham, whose 20-year-old daughter, Katie, was killed by a drunk driver—an illegal immigrant—just a year prior. Together, they reflect on the personal cost of policy failures, challenge the rationale behind sanctuary cities, and discuss how politicians and the media handle tragedies involving illegal immigrants. The episode urges policymakers to reconsider the human consequences of their actions and advocates for both compassion and accountability.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Tragic Story of Katie Abraham

• Katie’s Life & Death:

  • Joe Abraham shares the heartbreak of losing his youngest daughter, Katie, who was killed in January 2025 by a drunk, illegal immigrant driver in Urbana, Illinois.
  • Katie was just 20, with her whole life ahead of her.
  • The shock and grief experienced by the family are deeply recounted, highlighting the lasting impact of her loss.

• A Father’s Perspective:

  • Joe recounts the moment he learned of Katie’s death, the agony of telling her siblings, and the haunting dreams that followed.
  • He underscores the irreversible loss—“We got a death sentence. We lost our person forever." (34:47)

2. Sanctuary Policies and Public Safety

• Sanctuary Cities & Statewide Policies:

  • Both host and guest critique Illinois’ sanctuary policies for creating environments that endanger citizens and fail to support either immigrants or victims.
  • Joe laments that even small towns and college communities in Illinois are unsafe due to state policies:
    • “Don't send your kids there. That's all I have to say.” (08:05)
  • Dixon notes the disconnect between the stated goals of welcoming cities and the real-life consequences:
    • “The only thing a sanctuary city means: if you commit a crime, you’re safe here.” (20:14)

• Consequences for Families:

  • Abraham argues that “angel families” like his—who lose loved ones to crimes by illegal immigrants—receive no support, consideration, or media attention:
    • “We have been separated. We have been disappeared. I will never see Katie again. She's in the grave. I'm kind of in the grave with her.” (08:38)
  • He adds that instead, victims’ advocates are often labeled cruel or racist when they speak out.

3. Political and Media Response

• Criticism of Political Leaders:

  • Both speakers criticize Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker, Chicago mayors, and other state leaders for prioritizing ideology over citizen safety.
  • Joe describes the governor as “not a serious person... more importantly, a dangerous person.” (14:09)
  • They discuss how political interests, census apportionment, and secure voting blocs can motivate sanctuary policies, sometimes at the cost of constituents’ well-being.
    • “Katie died on the altar of political power. They don't care about... They love humanity in the abstract. They do not love it in the concrete.” (23:55)

• Media Bias & Selective Coverage:

  • Joe predicts and then observes how the media reframes victims and perpetrators to fit ideological narratives:
    • “...the media has. The media is totally in the bag for Democrats... you warned that the media would protect this guy and then they did.” (26:32)

4. Systemic Issues and Lack of Accountability

• Failures in Immigrant Support & Public Health Risks:

  • Cases are cited where individuals entering the U.S. are neither vetted for criminal backgrounds nor screened and treated for health issues (e.g., HIV, tuberculosis).
    • “He had a valid Illinois driver's license... he also had and is being treated for HIV. What did you do when you welcomed him?” (18:50)

• Justice & Sentencing:

  • Many offenders serve sentences and may be released, while families like the Abrahams are “serving a life sentence.”
    • “Some of them have already gotten out of jail. Some of them have gone on to commit more crimes... we got a death sentence. We lost our person forever.” (33:56)

5. Advocacy and the Need for Change

• Encouraging Policy Reassessment:

  • Joe urges lawmakers to “pause and reassess,” stating that changing course is not weakness—“That’s not losing. That’s not showing weakness. To me, that’s the opposite.” (40:36)

• Call to Action for Listeners:

  • Tudor emphasizes the importance of sharing such stories and being vocal about the impact of policy:
    • “It's so important to speak out... Thank you for making sure people hear the pain of not taking care of Americans.” (39:16)
  • Both express hope that more people—including policymakers and voters—will grasp the reality behind ideological rhetoric.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

On Grief and Loss

• “She was absolutely ripped from us... What are they going to do? I’m in a grave with Katie. What are they going to do? Come physically hurt me? I would love to see them come.” — Joe Abraham (08:38)
• “You took my golden years away, Governor, with your reckless policies... Now I'm just going through life and I want to see my Katie again.” — Joe Abraham (34:47)
• “The only reason why I’m speaking out... is so that other families can be saved. And I want our politicians to start listening... their ideology should not be so rigid that they cannot stop, take a breath and reassess.” — Joe Abraham (40:36)

On Policy & Politics

• “You have people that are losing their loved ones. Are we not being loud enough?” — Tudor Dixon (29:56)
• “They love humanity in the abstract. They do not love it in the concrete... They've never once said her name.” — Joe Abraham (23:55)
• “That's what I mean. These sanctuary cities are not a place to come… The only thing a sanctuary city means: If you commit a crime, you're safe here.” — Tudor Dixon (20:14)

On System Failures

• “He had a valid Illinois driver's license... he also had and is being treated for HIV. What did you do when you welcomed him into your state? You left him aimlessly to roam around our communities with HIV with no sense of how to behave.” — Joe Abraham (18:50)

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Important Timestamps

• 03:23 – Introduction of the episode narrative and background on the murder of Sheridan Gorman and Katie Abraham
• 06:27 – Joe Abraham begins recounting Katie’s story
• 08:05 – Discussion about Urbana, Illinois, and the realities of sanctuary policies
• 14:09 – Critique of political leadership and frustrations with Chicago’s mayors
• 18:50 – Lack of support for immigrants and public health risks highlighted
• 20:14 – Explanation of how sanctuary cities fail both immigrants and citizens
• 23:55 – Congressional apportionment, political power, and feeling disregarded as victims
• 34:47 – Joe Abraham’s deeply personal account of the day he learned of his daughter’s death
• 39:16 – Tudor Dixon expresses sympathy and calls for more public advocacy
• 40:36 – Joe’s plea for policymakers to have humility and reassess their rigid ideologies

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Conclusion

This episode serves as a heartfelt critique of current immigration and sanctuary policies, grounding the political debate in the very real and ongoing pain of families affected by violent crimes committed by those in the country illegally. Through Joe Abraham’s moving testimony, Tudor Dixon challenges elected officials—and the audience—to reconsider who is being protected, who is being ignored, and what true compassion and accountability look like in public policy.

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Transcript

[Tudor Dixon]

This is an iHeart podcast.

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[Tudor Dixon]

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[Joe Abraham]

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[Tudor Dixon]

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[Tudor Dixon]

and after your trip. Because a great trip starts with peace of mind and maybe a good playlist, but we've got the peace of mind part covered. You are listening to the Tudor Dixon Podcast and you probably heard my podcast a few days ago about Sheridan Gorman, who was senselessly murdered in Chicago. A young girl, 18 years old. I think that we can all, all relate to this as parents. Most of the people that are listening, I know you all have children of your own. Her parents sent her to college for her first year, not just any college, to Loyola. And when you send your daughter to Loyola, you are sending your kid to a university that has a great reputation. You have to be smart. You have to be one of the top students in your class. You're going to a big city. You should be safe. They sent their daughter there and probably celebrated sending their daughter there. And then you heard my podcast where I said she decided to go off with friends one night and like any college student would do, to take pictures, just to go out and take pictures. They thought they might catch the northern lights, but she was brutally murdered by an illegal alien that night because she went to the end of a pier and you'll hear that she was shot in the head. And I just want to say that the newspapers at the end of last week just kind of in the, the fine print, they said, oh, turns out it wasn't actually she was shot in the head. She was shot in the back. So we know she ran, we know she saw this guy. We don't know what was, but we know that this girl knew her Life was in danger. This 18 year old child turned and ran and this guy shot her in the back and killed her. This story, you think it's not common? It is way too common. There are way too many. There are thousands of what we call angel families out there that have lost their child or their family member, someone they love, to an illegal alien, someone who came into this country illegally and committed a crime. And we have one of those parents with us today. Just A year ago, January 19, 2025, Joe Abraham's daughter Katie was killed in Urbana, Illinois, in Illinois, again by an illegal immigrant who was a drunk driver slammed into the back of her car. And I have to tell you, this is not an unusual story either because I have told you guys before, I've met with many families in 2019, met with 18 families who had lost someone to an illegal immigrant. And it was shocking the number of people who had been killed because this person was drunk and just recklessly killed them in their car. And Joe, I know that's your story and I am just so grateful that you are here to share. Katie was 20, just 20 years old, her whole life ahead of her. And she was taken from you.

[Joe Abraham]

She was absolutely ripped from us. And it's, it's rather distressing when you hear everyone defending sanctuary policies and trying to tear down ICE and denigrate ICE about how they are separating families. So Katie was, you know, minding her business, living her life. Now, in all honesty, between you, you and I, I didn't really like the fact that she was going to Urbana. That's where the University of Illinois is located, just because we are a sanctuary. And a lot of these, this state puts a lot of people in these smaller towns along with Cook county, but it's a larger county. But, and just a side note, all three of my kids did not go to college in Illinois. I would, I would try to persuade anyone that wants to send their kid to Illinois to, to a university here not to do that. There are other schools they can go to in safer places.

[Tudor Dixon]

I just have to say it is blowing my mind what you're saying right now. Because I grew up in Illinois, my class kind of split between the University of Iowa and the University of Illinois. Most of the kids went to one of those two universities. And you think, to me, you think that Champaign, Urbana, where the University of Illinois is, it's like a farm town. You, you think that's safe? Like, I think, okay, being on the streets of Chicago, that's somewhat dangerous. But being in Urbana, what you just Said about like, I knew it was dangerous because they send people there. We don't know this. We are. That is a shocking statement to me. We don't know this. And yet that is what sanctuary policies create.

[Joe Abraham]

Yeah, I will. You know, I was there the other day, down where Katie. Her birthday was Saturday, so I was down where she took her last breaths in Urbana. Go walk around Urbana and tell me that it's a safe, small, quiet, quaint college town. All I have to say is, don't send your kids there. That's all I have to say. So Katie went down that weekend, just with some friends. They were five of them in the vehicle. And they were at a stoplight, idle, and were smashed in from the rear at almost 80 miles an hour.

[Tudor Dixon]

Wow.

[Joe Abraham]

And Katie, you know, to go back to the whole, you know, oh, families are being separated. They're so evil and cruel. Why does my family and families like mine get zero consideration? What do I mean by that? Katie was ripped from us by someone who should never have been here. This was not an American dui driving. Yes, we have those deaths every day. Those are different. That people cannot seem to make the distinction. If this person was not in our communities, Katie would be alive today. It wasn't the citizens that rammed into them. So my only point there is that we have been separated. We have been disappeared. I will the difference. I will never see Katie again. She's in the grave. I'm kind of in the grave with her. That's how bad it is when you're going through this. But there's no consideration for us. Or we are supposed to shut our mouths. If we talk about it. We're cruel and racists and bigots. And this is what they use their tactic to shut you down and shut you up. But I won't be. What are they going to do? I'm in a grave with Katie. What are they going to do? Come physically hurt me? I would love to see them come. So that's what they don't seem to understand. And we get no consideration, not from the state leaders, not from a large part of the citizens who are very, you know, their North Star is their ideology. And so they look at you and say, why is Katie special? People die every day because of drunk drivers. Katie's not.

[Tudor Dixon]

You know, that drives me crazy. And I hear that argument all the time. We have a lot of criminals that are Americans. And the fact of the matter is that's true. And that is what we need to be policing. That's what our focus needs to Be. When we have police officers, when we have police departments, when we have federal law enforcement, they need to be focused on Americans, Americans that are hurting Americans and making sure our streets are safe. Why would we add more? Why would we just knowingly add more? That's what I just cannot understand. And you've got these no Kings rallies. And. And I will say I just saw a tweet before I came in here that was from a woman who is running for State Senate, or U.S. senate, I should say. She's a state senator in the state of Michigan. Her name is Mallory McMurrow. She's running for U.S. senate right now. And she just did this video where she said, this is outrageous that Republicans are not funding TSA because they're insistent that they fund ice. We cannot fund ice. We have to fund tsa. And I think to myself, why is this? Am I in, like, opposite land? Do people not really look at this and go, how could you possibly say that we should keep our airport safe and our airlines safe, but we shouldn't keep our cities safe? How do you take. How do you make those two separate? Do you decide that one is more important than the other? Because the idea that this guy in Chicago or this guy in Urbana who took the lives of two beautiful young women and. And like I said, it happens across the country every single day. How can you say that? That is not important?

[Joe Abraham]

So I agree with you. It's. It's a complete deflection and really just kind of besides the point. Right? The fact that we have crime or naturalized citizens, number one, I think that's debunked. I don't believe that for a second. They're manipulating some statistics. I know about statistics. You could have them say 12 different things. So they're manipulating that. But let's just for the sake of this argument, say that's true. So is our logical end here. We don't have enough crime, so we'll import crime and we won't filter people out. That will make crime. Is that where we're headed? Or we don't have enough drunk drivers here. Now we need more to come in. Look, in Illinois, we're bleeding citizens. And so you can't even take care of the people you have in this state. You have failed the people in the state. So now what's your solution? To bring in another half a million people you can't handle? You have nothing. As far as. It's so incoherent, I can't explain it.

[Tudor Dixon]

It's nasty. I mean, it's Just nasty. And I thought Lori Lightfoot was like the wor I when she was mayor. I was like, this woman is the worst mayor you could imagine. But you can never say that with leftists now because Brandon Johnson, what he did last week is, is so unforgivable. And the fact that there could even be anybody, even on the left that could say you had a young woman die on your streets at the hands of an illegal immigrant who should have had to leave the country, who came in illegally and was and convicted of crimes have been deported. And if ICE had been allowed in, your city, probably would have. Or even the National Guard when the president offered to help keep Chicago safer. No. This guy rolls out a new snowplow and celebrates the name as abolish ice.

[Joe Abraham]

You know, I was asked a question today on Fox earlier this morning on America's Newsroom, and they wanted me to respond to Mayor Johnson's comments last week. And I said I would not. He is not a serious person. He's s, he's like a silly person. I won't waste my breath.

[Tudor Dixon]

But a silly person that has too much power.

[Joe Abraham]

Exactly. He's a silly person. And more importantly, he's a dangerous person. So I don't want to engage in a dangerous. I hope Chicago smartens up on that, but I suspect they might not. But I hope they do.

[Tudor Dixon]

But how do these people get elected, though? I mean, we really don't understand how this is happening.

[Joe Abraham]

I've, I'm a lifelong Illinoisan and lived in Cook County. There's no way this county's not the most corrupt in the nation. So then you tell me how they do it.

[Tudor Dixon]

Let's take a quick commercial break. We'll continue next on the Tudor Dixon Podcast.

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[Tudor Dixon]

I need to be healthy every day to survive it and go through the next chemo round and the next chemo round. So it's important that work was part of that to keep my mind busy for 8, 9 hours and then I had to go back and face the reality. I had a goal and the goal is to survive.

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place for healing, learn more and sign the [e-mail] early birds always rise to the occasion for summer vacation planning because early gets you closer to the action. So don't be late. Book your next vacation early on VRBO and save over $120. Rise and shine. Average savings $141 select homes only. It reminds me of we had that Crook county podcast guy on one time and he went through exactly what happens it behind the scenes. So you make a great point. There is a lot of corruption, but think of just the corruption of wanting to keep. I think people don't necessarily understand what sanctuary city means and what sanctuary policies are. And I've tried to explain this. In our state we had, in our town, we had people that came in and they said, we're going to make your town a welcoming city. That was the new term for sanctuary city. And we went to the town council and we talked, spoke against it, said you have to understand this sounds so great. They use great words. I mean it sounds so lovely to be well known.

[Joe Abraham]

It's absolutely news. It's so Orwellian. Welcoming town. What does that mean exactly? And by the way, what do you do for the people you're welcomed in? For example, just two examples. If you look at Katie's and Sheridan's, Katie's case, he in court admitted he couldn't, never had a day schooling, couldn't read, couldn't write either English or Spanish. He spoke Kai Chi, a region of mountain, mountainous Mayan language. Right? So. But he had a valid Illinois driver's license. Go figure that out. Okay. Now he also had and is being treated for hiv. What did you do when you welcomed him into your state? You left him aimlessly to roam around our communities with HIV with no sense of how to behave himself and how to be successful in our communities. Now Sheridan's got, he came in, now they're telling us he's got a mind of a child. Okay, what did you do to help him if he needed special attention? What did you do? No, you did nothing. You let the gang members take advantage of him. You let him roam around aimlessly. People have to understand Illinois and governor pritzkers of the world, they don't care about the victims 100%. They never did. But they don't care about the welcoming immigrants. What they care about is Warm bodies that you can tie some ballots to.

[Tudor Dixon]

That's exactly right. They're. They're. They are not. That's what I mean. These sanctuary cities are not a place to come. Like they say, we're giving them healthcare, we're taking care of them. They don't talk to them. This is just a place to keep them, where they keep ice from getting them if they commit a crime. The only thing a sanctuary city means, if you commit a crime. You're safe here. We won't turn you over to the federal authorities, but you make a point. That guy, the Sheridan. The guy that killed Sheridan had tuberculosis, didn't he?

[Joe Abraham]

Yeah, yeah. Oh, that's true. He had tuberculosis. He was supposedly had a mentality of a child. You did nothing for this guy. And he's in the communities. You know how easy you can get.

[Tudor Dixon]

Right, right. That's what I mean. Running around with a horrible illness that he could give to anyone. And if we were running around that way, the government would actually punish us for not getting our health care taken care of. So he's 2020.

[Joe Abraham]

Yeah, exactly.

[Tudor Dixon]

Yes.

[Joe Abraham]

Yeah.

[Tudor Dixon]

Yes. So he's running around with tuberculosis. The man who killed Katie had hiv. Now think about this. What. How is he. He's spreading that. He clearly got it somehow, so he's likely spreading that as well. There's no testing. I mean, you go back to when your parents came to the United States. You had to go through medical tests. You had to actually prove that you are healthy enough to be an American citizen. And even. And if you weren't healthy, then either you went back or you went to the hospital. There's no. There's no vetting. The. The Biden administration and the leftists who are telling. Are good people, and they're vetted. They're. They're not even healthy. So there's no vetting. And I'm not saying that there aren't good people that are coming across because I do believe that we should have an ability to come here for people that want to be Americans, but not for people who want to shoot young girls in the back there.

[Joe Abraham]

There's a distinction, and it's sad that we. We can't call that out. These folks, look, the guy who killed Katie and the guy who killed Sher, they are not here to better their lives. They are not our neighbors. They are ones that created this country, as they like to say, these tired platitudes that they use. It's so. It's like, enough. You clearly did not vet anyone. You didn't give anyone health screening you didn't give them any support from. But, but you're spending $3 billion plus 2, $3 billion on so called immigration. Who's that money going to? How are you helping these people? Or is this just another, I don't know, slush fund that you're washing taxpayer dollars around everywhere?

[Tudor Dixon]

You have to wonder because that guy was living in taxpayer funded housing. The, the guy who killed Sheridan was living in taxpayer funded housing and he'd been here since 23. So for three years the people of the city of Chicago were paying for his lifestyle, for paying for him to live here. And then he killed somebody. So how did, how does the governor, and how does the mayor, I mean the governor is out there every day talking, you know, he's talking about running for president. How do they get away with this? But you make a great point. There is a benefit over and above voting. I mean, even if you were to take voting out of it, I do believe that they use these people to get elected. But even if you were to take that out of it, they put these people into the census and they get more control because they get, I mean, look at California. If you took away the immigrants out of Cal, the illegal immigrants out of California, you wouldn't have nearly the representation in Washington that you do. So they are gaining power by just allowing people to flow into the country.

[Joe Abraham]

That's right. It's congressional apportionment. It's political power. Katie died on the altar of political power. They don't care about. They love humanity in the abstract. They do not love it in the concrete. They don't want to hear, they don't acknowledge Katie. They've never once said her name. Pritzker, Duckworth, Durbin, all these, whoever Durbin endorses, we should reject outright. But that's kind of what I was trying to say to the Gorman family. Look, they're saying it now because they don't want to be beaten over the head. But you have a Governor Pritzker now over there as incoherently saying, well, ICE and Trump didn't do their job when they were here during Midway blitz, which was honoring my daughter Katie Abraham. But, but so, and at the same time, when they, when it was happening, they were on in front of every microphone, degrading and, and just beating down ice. ICE agents, by the way, I've met probably 100, 200 ICE agents and staff. The most diverse, professional, caring, understanding people I ever met. It's, it was amazing how they're beating me on, they, they say they're on train. They don't know what they're doing. They should be a. They. They just. They're using this rhetoric dangerously. And if you think it's only going to stop at ICE law enforcement, they are so wrong. They do not. They are so short term minded. This will flow through to you. See it now actually look at the police officers in New York where people are. There's no respect for law enforcement. So any law enforcement that, you know, get these sheriffs that buy into this, it will filter down to your police department where citizens will have no respect for your police department. So. So I think you just gotta be careful with the demagoguery that these guys do. It's not effective because it's gonna hurt people in the end.

[Tudor Dixon]

You made a point earlier about the media being on their side and you came out early on after Sheridan's death and you said to the family, look, they're gonna try to make this guy into the victim. And that is a problem for the people that just want law enforcement to be able to do their job. And I don't even like to say one side of the aisle. I think there are actually people on the Democrat party that understand the importance of having law enforcement. I don't think everybody, I hope not everybody has lost their minds. But the media has. The media is totally in the bag for Democrats, it is totally ideological. For them it is just about who gets elected. And you warned that the media would protect this guy and then they did.

[Joe Abraham]

They did. And I have no, again, I don't feel any vindication around that. I feel a sense of sadness. I feel a sense of sorry for our nation and our citizens that we have always taken a backseat. We're just supposed to fund their experiment. We're just our little lab rats. We send our money and they do whatever they want. We have no consideration. We are collateral damage. And they also never suffer the consequences of their own ideology. And that's a sad thing. And then you look at, I don't know what you call it. It's got to be Tudor. It's got to be more than just a hypocrisy. Like when someone like Governor Pritzker comes out and he says they didn't do their job. At the same time he was out there saying, don't do this job. He's up in Minnesota honoring Alex Preddy and Renee Goode and no one should ever die. Don't misunderstand. No one knows more than me that I had to bury a child I understand loss all too well. Right. So I get that. But Katie and Sheridan, unlike Alex Preddy and Renee Goode, did not interject themselves in the middle of a law enforcement operation, regardless who was running it. You have. You have people with, you know, they're armed, and you're gonna go take your car or you're gonna start kicking these people. How do you think this is gonna end? And then you're carrying a firearm on top of that and behaving that way. There's a responsibility you must show and some respect you must show to that firearm that you don't go running around with armed people, kicking cars and spitting on people. And so the governor has consideration for those because he can use them for a political reason. He can't use a political reason for the Katies of the world. It's inconvenient for him, and it can't be used for his benefit. Therefore, they need to be ignored and disappeared.

[Tudor Dixon]

Right. It doesn't work for them. But let me ask you this, because you. You bring this up, and we talked about this on the podcast earlier about the fact that J.B. pritzker actually went to Minnesota. But let me compare the two sides for a minute, because, you know, when the. When the left said they didn't like what was happening in Minnesota, they went out there, they protested. They certainly did get violent. They got. They became. They had riots. They pushed back. There were responses to what happened. And the president then said, okay, I'm going to change how we operate here. He made the change, and there's been multiple changes at dhs. Obviously, he changed out. Even the Secretary of dhs, he listened. He made the change. When this happens on our side, I hate to even say it's not a side when it happens. When someone gets murdered in the United States, when someone is murdered like this, like your daughter, like Sheridan, should there be protests in the streets from the people who are calling for us to just have law and order? Should we be louder? I mean, are we just too relaxed about these things? I. I had never even heard Katie's story before I heard Sheridan's. That's the. That's the sad thing about it, is we aren't going out there and saying, enough is enough. JB stop. You have to stop these practices. You have people that are losing their loved ones. Are we not being loud enough?

[Joe Abraham]

Well, I don't think the loudness has anything to do with that. You got to look at someone like J.D. pritzker, who's very, in my opinion, ineffectual. Uncaring, uncompassionate, very robotic. Right. His North Star is ideology, right? He believes he's in it for the game. He wants if. If people think Illinois is his final destination. He doesn't want anything to do with Illinois. He's using this for something else. So therefore, he doesn't care about the. The. The victims or the citizens. He's trying to position himself for something that he. He thinks he's going to run for. I don't know, maybe he might run for Pope, too. I have no idea what he's. He's thinking. It's certainly not Illinois, but. But the thing with this is when your North Star is politics and is ideology, I feel really more sorry for them. But the problem there is they think they're righteous in their ideas and they're the most dangerous, right? Because they feel their righteousness does not allow anyone to question their effectiveness, their policies. It's full speed ahead and they never pause. They don't have the humility in their service to pause and understand what citizens are saying. They just full speed ahead and whatever they think is going to get them where they need to go. So it's a sad life, personally. I mean, I maybe a little bit understand it. He grew up, you know, again, there was this term that, you know, he was born on third base and thought he hit a triple. But so when you have everything given to you and you've never worked for anything and you never had to struggle, things might look a little bit differently. And that empathy is, I think, sort of fades away when you're, when you're going that way. He has none. And I'm example number one of that. There are so many others. To your point, there are thousands of victims, but tens of thousands. But on top of that, that now you got to start talking hundreds of thousands of really victims that are suffering, that are left behind. So it's not just these victims. And that's what upsets me. Last year, when he was saying, when Chairman Comer was asking him, should this guy have been in the state when he killed Katie? And he wouldn't answer that, he said all he could say is, well, look, we're going to adjudicate him. If he's a criminal, he's going to get his time. But sorry, Governor, that's not good enough. You could have vetted him out if you had any minimal standards, right? You could have vetted him out. Katie would be alive. It's not good enough to say, well, he's now going to spend some decades a Couple decades in jail, if even that. And meanwhile, we don't care about the dozens of family members are suffering the rest of their lives sitting with a life sentence. See, this is what he doesn't understand. And the consideration and my goodness. Just stop for a minute. Pause. Can you really handle half a million plus to come in within a few years? Because Joe Biden and Alejandro Mayork created a free for all. You can't handle what you got in your state. You can't take anymore.

[Tudor Dixon]

Just threw the door wide open. Remember when Governor Abbott started sending immigrants to New York and to Chicago and they said, this isn't fair. We can't take this. Well, this is exactly. That's the point. We can't take this. We can't do this.

[Joe Abraham]

But that's a deflection. That, that's a deflection on Governor Pritzker. He blames Governor Abbott with the buses. How many buses really did come to Chicago? A hundred.

[Tudor Dixon]

Right?

[Joe Abraham]

A bus holds what, 70? Okay, let's call it a thousand buses. You let in over half a million. Greg Abbott's buses only was a dent in that.

[Tudor Dixon]

You call it humanitarian mirror.

[Joe Abraham]

Stop blaming others and deflecting. Look in the mirror. Pause yourself. Have the common sense to reassess your policies.

[Tudor Dixon]

Let's take a quick commercial break. We'll continue next on the Tutor Dixon Podcast. So when I talk to families who've experienced the same thing you've experienced, they say, look, the person who did this, they got a sentence, maybe it's not even a life sentence. They. They go to jail. And some of them have already gotten out of jail. Some of them have gone on to commit. Commit more crimes. I mean, that's the crazy part about it. And yet they say to me, but we got a death sentence. We lost our person forever. You were telling me what that weekend was like before. And then what I always think about that, too, is as you're planning, like, you know, the. Everybody has planned, and then they just lose that person. And all those plans just, it's just all melts away. Tell us about what that was for you.

[Joe Abraham]

It's. It's. So we get the phone call on the 19th and to hear that your youngest daughter was killed on the streets of Urbana, Illinois, doing nothing but minding their own business. We couldn't even process it. Why Katie's sister and her are only a year apart. They are so close like you. You couldn't believe people couldn't be closer than those two. So now her sister's texting us right away because from the time they get up to the time they go to bed, they're always together, even though they're in separate universities. She's texting us. Katie's phone's at the police station. She knows the location of the phone. What's happening? I'm worried. I'm freaking. So now we're like. We can't even, like, process this. We have to stop. She's got two siblings. They cannot hear outside of us. We had to get into a car in January, in a snowstorm in Michigan, and get up to the university. Five and a half hours to tell my other daughter that her sister was killed. And what haunts me to this day is when we walked into her apartment and she saw us and she knew. And her reaction is seared in my brain. She knew that her daughter was dead. And, I mean, her sister was dead. And she. I mean, we. I'll never forget that day. I will never. It haunts my dreams. It haunts me that I wasn't with Katie. I would give everything I have and the rest of my days for just one more hour with Katie. So we held her, her sister. We comforted her. We spent time with her. Her mom stayed. I drove back. Because, you know, she's got another sibling down here. A brother. It was the longest day of our lives, all this happening when we couldn't really process what they did to Katie. A violent. They had to pry open that little Honda Civic just to drag her dead body out of the car. I wasn't there for her. It pains me to this day. I know what the Gormans are going through. I know the sleepless nights they're going to have. I went days without sleep because I used to have these vivid, vivid dreams of Katie, her and I, like we were back again. And then I'd wake up. Your mind plays these tricks, like she's alive and she's not really dead. And then you're like, she's dead. And then you don't want to go to sleep because you're scared. You don't want to do that whole thing over again. So now you're not sleeping for days because you got questions in this May of 2025. I can't recall the exact day. I wish I just noted it down, but I didn't. Everything was such a fog back then. She came to my dreams as vivid as I'm talking to you. We're both crying. She hugs me, she kisses me. And she says I'm okay. And I have never seen her since. And it breaks my Heart because she should be here. I would trade places with her in a heartbeat. Be. Now I just have to wait for the day that we're reunited. This is the other thing Governor Pritzker doesn't realize that he. That he. What he took away from me was not just Katie, was my consideration of my longevity. I don't worry about my longevity anymore. I know I have two other children. And my whole thing was watch my kids grow and watch their kids grow. That was why I wanted longevity. So you took my golden years away, Governor, with your reckless policies. And now I'm just going through life and I want to see my Katie again. I want to reunite with it. I know I will. And I'm waiting to hear all the adventures she had with our heavenly Father because she is such a huge personality that the things she's doing, I'm sure, is driving half the people up there crazy. So this is what they don't consider, what they don't care about. This is real. This is just a gut punch every morning, every night, and they don't care. Durbans don't care. Duckworths don't care. Pritzkers don't care. Up and down the chain of this state, no one cares. No consideration for people like us. And the Gorman. The Gormans are going to see the same thing. From Illinois.

[Tudor Dixon]

I'm so, so sorry for your loss. And I'm. I'm so grateful that you are willing to speak out on this because it's hard. It's hard to tell that story. But I think those are the feelings people need to understand. That's the loss. That's what these policies are doing. That is how painful this is. And you are one of so many families who wake up this way every day. I know. I have a friend who lost her son a similar situation. Drunk driver, killed him on a motorcycle. And it was her only child. And she has the same. She wakes up every day and she talks about him every day. And she. She thinks of him and she speaks about him and she has kept his memory alive. But she is never not advocating for families like yours. She's always in D.C. she's always fighting. And it's so important too speak out. I know it's so hard for you. I can see that it's so hard for you. I mean, it's hard for me to even hear the story because my heart breaks for you. But I am so impressed that you are doing this. And I just. I thank you. Thank you for speaking up. Thank you for telling your story. Thank you for making sure people hear the pain of not taking care of Americans.

[Joe Abraham]

Yeah. And that's, you know, that's the main point for me, is. No, I wish I could explain it in better words. Honestly, I wish. I just can't. It is something no one should ever have to experience. It's not right. And that's the only reason why I'm speaking out. And I will continue to speak out, and I will continue to speak out so that other families can be saved. And that I want our politicians to start listening, that their ideology should not be so rigid, that they cannot. Cannot stop, take a breath and reassess. That's not losing. That's not showing weakness. To me, that's the opposite. And the fact that you can't do that is so disheartening to me, is so discouraging that we have policymakers that will continue to go headlong into this. I was at the hearing, listening some of the Democratic senators, after even I told my story as if I wasn't even there. They're going headlong into ISIS terrorists. DHS needs to be defunded. All these immigrants are only here for a better life, and they're our neighbors and they're the backbone. All this is just rhetoric. It's demagoguery, and it should stop. And they need to start taking some consideration for others. It's very difficult to watch any elected

[Tudor Dixon]

official who is a parent who can hear your story and what you just said about feeling as though you've had your golden years ripped away from you, and that. That image of you and the torture of being toggled between your children who are here on earth and your child who's in heaven. And that. That feeling, that pull to be with both sides, the two that are here and Katie, who is celebrating, she's. I. We know she's in a beautiful place. We know that she's enjoying her time with our savior, but she's meant to be with you for long. So I appreciate that. I appreciate you sharing that. I hope that there are elected officials out there that are listening to this, that are understanding that it's not cruel to make sure that we're safe. This is not cruel. This is actually. These are the policies that are so critical to making sure that people can live in this country and have the American dream and enjoy their families. And that should be what we want.

[Joe Abraham]

And I just want to Tudor what's cruel. Cruel is what they did during the Biden, New Yorkist years. That was cruel and that was extreme. And to now deflect today to say we're too extreme. Where were these same voices during the Biden and New Yorkist years when people were being exploited, children were being exploited, people were being killed along the way. You had misery at the border. Where were these voices? This is not about. This was not about. About bettering people. This was not. They were doing something insidious. I don't know why the Department of Justice can't look into some of these people like a mayorkas. I don't understand why they get away with it. But this, you cannot say this is cruel and not turn back and say, well, that was cruel as well. So therefore we need to. You know where I'm sitting, you kind of got to be extreme now because you have to combat the extreme. That was before. You don't get one and not the other. I'm sorry. You created this environment. Someone has to get it figured out.

[Tudor Dixon]

And I'll just say this. It is all set up for that to reoccur. If they get back into power, they have still those systems set up to make sure those doors go wide open that the border reopens. So it is so critical to hear your voice. Joe Abraham, thank you so much for sharing your daughter's beautiful life with us. Thank you. And thank you all for listening to the podcast. As you know, you can get the podcast wherever you get your podcast, iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, Rumble or YouTube. You can watch it there. God bless you and God bless you, Joe. Thank you all for listening. Have a blessed.