However, The Des Moines Register reports that Tibbetts said he encountered Hispanics at Mexican restaurants and elsewhere who were sensitive and kind during the weeks he spent in the central Iowa community of Brooklyn to help search for his daughter.

“The Hispanic community are Iowans. They have the same values as Iowans,” he said. “As far as I’m concerned, they’re Iowans with better food.”

The body of 20-year-old Mollie Tibbetts was found August 21 in a cornfield outside Brooklyn, where she had been staying during her summer break from the University of Iowa. Authorities have said she was abducted while out running July 18, and an autopsy showed that she died from stab wounds.

Cristhian Bahena Rivera, 24, has been charged with first-degree murder in her death and is being held in lieu of a US$5 million cash-only bond. He is a Mexican suspected of being in the United States illegally.

If convicted of murder, he faces life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Within hours of Rivera’s arrest, Trump, Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds and the state’s two US senators said her death demonstrated the need to change immigration laws. Trump called for the election of more Republicans who would support such changes.

In his address at Brooklyn-Guernsey-Malcom High School, Rob Tibbetts asked mourners to remember his daughter by “celebrating something wonderful,” rather than focusing on how she died.

Tibbetts urged the audience to remember his daughter’s passion for life and her desire to help others. To highlight his call to celebrate “wonderful” things, the father recognised a couple who had just married the day before during his eulogy.

“Today, we need to turn the page. We’re at the end of a long ordeal,” he said. “But we need to turn toward life – Mollie’s life – because Mollie is nobody’s victim. Mollie is my hero.”

Davenport Bishop Thomas Zinkula led the funeral Mass in the city of 1,500 where Mollie Tibbetts grew up.