The Trump administration has renamed the Anahuac National Wildlife Refuge in Texas after a Houston girl who, prosecutors said, was brutally killed last year by two Venezuelan illegal immigrants.
The park, now known as the Jocelyn Nungaray National Wildlife Refuge, hosted a renaming ceremony on Thursday. The 39,000-acre sanctuary along the Texas Gulf Coast in Anahuac serves as a home for migratory birds and wildlife managed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
“Let this land speak her name. Let its quiet strength echo her spirit. And let it stand as a testament that her life mattered,” Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said during the ceremony attended by Nungaray’s mother. “And that her story, however heartbreakingly brief, needs to be told and retold and never forgotten.”
JOCELYN NUNGARAY’S MOTHER REVEALS HORRIFIC TIMELINE OF DAUGHTER’S MURDER IN HEARING ON OPEN-BORDER CRIME
The Anahuac National Wildlife Refuge became the Jocelyn Nungaray National Wildlife Refuge on Thursday to honor the life of the 12-year-old girl who was brutally murdered last year by two alleged Venezuelan illegal immigrants. (KRIV)
During his joint address to Congress in March, President Donald Trump announced the renaming of the refuge to honor Nungaray, showing his signature on an executive order that changed the name of the park.
“I had no idea that was going to happen. It was a really big shock and surprise,” Alexis Nungaray, Jocelyn’s mother, told FOX 26 at the time. “I was stunned. I didn’t really know how to react. It was very surreal, very bittersweet.”
TRUMP HONORS LIVES OF LAKEN RILEY, JOCELYN NUNGARAY WHILE CELEBRATING STRIDES ON SECURING BORDER
Franklin Jose Peña Ramos, left, and Johan Jose Martinez-Rangel, right, have been charged in the killing of Jocelyn Nungaray in Houston, Texas. (Harris County Jail)
During Thursday’s ceremony, Burgum noted that Nungaray loved animals while offering his condolences to her mother, who did not speak.
“May Jocelyn’s family find peace in…
