The following letter is part of the larger 2013 Trafficking in Persons Report (TIP). The secretary of state submits this yearly report to Congress as required under the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 (TVPA), the first comprehensive U.S. federal law to protect victims of trafficking and prosecute their traffickers. The TIP report defines various terms concerning human trafficking and defines a framework of prevention, protection and prosecution to combat trafficking in persons and to protect victims.
The following letter is part of the larger 2013 Trafficking in Persons Report (TIP). The secretary of state submits this yearly report to Congress as required under the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 (TVPA), the first comprehensive U.S. federal law to protect victims of trafficking and prosecute their traffickers. The TIP report defines a framework of prevention, protection and prosecution to combat trafficking in persons and to protect victims.
WASHINGTON — The federal government is taking new steps to highlight the horrors of human trafficking and help victims of the often hidden crime.
Blumenthal and Portman last March introduced legislation that seeks to end human trafficking by government contractors.
I ask for your indulgence as I return once again to the issue of human trafficking a topic which, unfortunately, seems to intersect with private military and security contracting more than now and then.
In the United States of America, the land of the free, many people believe that all are, indeed, free. However, this is not true — slavery still exists. Although the abolition of slavery happened over a century ago in America, slavery is still a common occurrence today.
The failure of the White House to enforce threatened sanctions against countries that the State Department has accused of doing little to control human trafficking is “appalling,” with the Obama administration • much like the George W. Bush administration before it — using “every loophole possible” to issue waivers to avoid punishing the offending nations by cutting U.S. aid, according to elected officials, human rights activists and others.
To combat that notion, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service is trying to educate the public, emergency responders, police and others about programs and tools that can protect and help victims who are in the country illegally.
