Millions of innocent people worldwide become victims of human trafficking every year. They are usually women or girls, and often are forced against their will, into the sex trade industry. It can happen entirely within a country, but more and more it is international in scope.
A teenage girl is promised a job, or to study abroad. She’s then whisked across the border to another country, away from her family, separated from those who care about her. Her passport is taken away, and she’s threatened, beaten, and forced into prostitution, often by sophisticated multinational criminal syndicates. She may be held in Russia, or China, or India, or even in the United States.
Sometimes it’s not the sex trade. It might be involuntary servitude in a sweat shop. Or it might be forced domestic labor in someone’s home. Or it might be working the fields, in forced agricultural labor. In essence, in many cases, it amounts to virtual slavery.
It’s estimated that there are 20 to 27 million people worldwide who have been forced against their will into the sex trade industry or other involuntary servitude.
Is anything being done to combat this worldwide curse? Yes. The first significant legislation enacted by Congress was the Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act, passed into law in 2000. (I voted for it.) The law has been strengthened and reauthorized several times over the years. In essence, it updated our federal criminal laws dealing with human trafficking, and stiffened the penalties (up to a life sentence) for human trafficking. In addition, it established rehabilitation programs to help victims in their recovery, authorized public education campaigns to increase awareness, and cut off foreign aid to governments who don’t cooperate in combating human trafficking.
I also introduced legislation a few months back called the Girls Count Act. There are about 51 million people, mostly girls, born each year around the world, who, at least on paper, don’t exist. They are not registered in any way; they don’t have birth certificates. This lack of documentation not only keeps them from fully participating in society, but from receiving services such as education and healthcare. Even more importantly, it makes these girls particularly vulnerable to being trafficked, either into the sex trade industry, or into other involuntary servitude.
The Girls Count Act would authorize the U.S. State Department to work with other countries, international groups, and faith-based organizations, to support efforts to issue birth certificates to every person boy or girl, in every country across the globe.
We must ensure that every baby girl born anywhere on earth, is afforded the same basic human rights as every male child. We should wipe human trafficking from the face of the earth.
