Human Trafficking

What Senator Blackburn Is Doing To Combat Human Trafficking

Fighting President Biden's Open Border Agenda

As President Biden’s border crisis continues to embolden cartels and human traffickers, Senator Blackburn has strongly opposed amnesty for all and the spread of sanctuary cities and states that operate as lawless havens for illegal immigrants. Secure countries have secure borders. A wall helps put a stop to the caravans of illegal immigrants trying to cross our border and blocks the flow of drugs, human trafficking, terrorists, and other dangerous criminals. Until we secure our border and ports of entry, every state in our nation will be a border state, and every town will be a border town.

Senator Blackburn has championed legislation aimed at combating human trafficking along the southern border. In April 2023, after learning that the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) lost track of at least 85,000 unaccompanied migrant children, Senator Blackburn pressed HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra and the Biden administration over this gross incompetence and sent a series of letters demanding transparency to protect these innocent children.

Additionally, Senator Blackburn introduced the End Child Trafficking Now Act, which would require a DNA test to determine the familial relationship between illegal immigrants coming across the border and any accompanying children. As many as 30% of children DNA tested were found not to be related to the illegal immigrants posing as family members. Meanwhile, drug cartels and gangs use minors to falsely present themselves as family units and seek asylum at our southern border. This legislation would stop criminals in their tracks and help protect children from exploitation.

Furthermore, 1 in every 3 human trafficking victims is a child, and in 2019, ICE identified 600 children who were “recycled,” with one child being brought across the border as many as eight different times. Despite these statistics, current DHS regulation and federal law prohibit Border Patrol agents from fingerprinting children under the age of 14. To combat this, Senator Blackburn introduced the PRINTS Act, which would prevent child recycling by giving U.S. Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) the authority to fingerprint non-citizens under the age of 14.

Following Senator Blackburn’s visit to the Del Rio Sector of the U.S.-Mexico border in early 2023, she also introduced the Stop Taxpayer Funding of Traffickers Act to ensure human and drug traffickers cannot continue to defraud the American taxpayer while they await prosecution and conviction in the United States.

Securing Justice for the Victims of Sex Trafficking Rings

For years, the American public has known about financier Jeffrey Epstein’s alleged sex trafficking ring. We know the abuse spanned decades and harmed untold numbers of vulnerable young girls, and we also know a large network of high-profile, high-dollar predators participated in this horrific abuse.

That’s why Senator Blackburn has repeatedly requested a subpoena for the complete, unredacted Epstein flight logs and Ghislaine Maxwell’s unredacted “little black book” of contacts and addresses, along with all documents and records from the FBI regarding Epstein and Maxwell. The American people deserve to know who flew on Epstein’s plane, who witnessed these crimes, and who potentially participated in his international sex trafficking ring.

Senator Blackburn has also introduced legislation to curb the smuggling and trafficking of young women and girls. Unfortunately, trafficking disproportionately affects girls and women, and nearly one in every four victims of human trafficking in the United States is reported to be a child. Additionally, more than 90 percent of female trafficking victims are trafficked for sexual exploitation. The bipartisan SAVE Girls Act would provide states, local governments, and nonprofits with vital resources they need to train personnel, conduct rescues, and help save trafficking victims.

Additionally, one in four women will be a victim of domestic violence in her lifetime, and in the United States, three women are killed each day by an intimate partner. Some women, even at their most vulnerable and isolated, will continue going to the salon and building relationships with their cosmetologists. The SALONS Stories Act would incentivize training for cosmetologists and beauticians so that they can spot signs of domestic violence among their clients and get them the help they need. This initiative replicates a program in Tennessee, Shear Haven, that has helped countless girls and women.

Furthermore, Senator Blackburn visited the Scarlet Rope Center in Jackson, Tennessee, to support victims of human trafficking. She discussed with leaders of the project their work that provides healing and restoration to female survivors of human trafficking who are 18 years and older.

Holding Big Tech Accountable for Online Sexual Abuse

It is critical that children are protected from the online harms that platforms like Instagram and TikTok present, and Senator Blackburn is committed to holding abusers and Big Tech accountable. Instagram, owned by Meta, has become a connecting site for pedophiles, promoting illicit content of minors and advertising child sexual abuse material for sale.

In today’s technological age, children have become increasingly vulnerable to online sexual exploitation. There is an urgent need to address loopholes in reporting these crimes, which is why Senator Blackburn has led bipartisan legislation, the REPORT Act, to equip the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children and law enforcement with the resources they need to adequately respond to online sexual exploitation. Additionally, the bill adds sex trafficking of children and enticement crimes to the reporting obligations within 180 days of the bill’s enactment and increases penalties for failure to report exploitative content ($600K-$850K on the first offense; $850K-$1M on the second offense). On May 7, 2024, the REPORT Act was signed into law, making a major step forward in the fight to protect children online.

Senator Blackburn has also introduced legislation to remove the statue of limitations for child sex abuse survivors. The bipartisan Eliminating Limits to Justice for Child Sex Abuse Victims Act of 2021, which passed both the U.S. Senate and House of Represenatvies, ensures that survivors of child sex abuse are able to seek justice under the federal civil remedy statute, 18 U.S.C. § 2255, without being barred by statutes of limitation.