Last month, Stop Modern Day Slavery hosted Human Trafficking Expert Panel: A Conversation Among Human Trafficking Experts on Prevention, Protection, and Prosecution. The panel featured six highly distinguished individuals who have dedicated much of their lives to ending human trafficking. These experts included Ambassador John Richmond, John Freeman, Nate Knapper, Chiquita Tillman, Jane Bigelsen, and Jerome Elam. Each of the panelists used their unique backgrounds to provide profound insight into this complex issue and how legal professionals, government employees, NGOs, and law enforcement can work together to end human trafficking. Here are our top five takeaways from our Human Trafficking Expert Panel, which can be watched here:
1. Human Smuggling vs. Human Trafficking
Despite the media often conflating the two, there is a large difference between human smuggling and human trafficking, as pointed out by Ambassador John Richmond, the United States Ambassador for Trafficking in Persons from 2018 to 2021 and a founding director of the Human Trafficking Institute. As a result of the conflation between smuggling and trafficking, people tend to think of human trafficking as requiring movement from one place to another. Despite this misconception, he shared that 71% of trafficking victims are trafficked in their country of origin.
Nate Knapper, founder and CEO of The Joseph Project and FBI agent, expressed agreement with Ambassador Richmond’s statements on human smuggling versus human trafficking, explaining, “When you have a person who is moved across an international border… you don’t necessarily have a case of human trafficking yet. What you would need to identify is whether the person who was moved has been commercially exploited for sex or labor services through force, fraud, or coercion.
It is important to note that, unlike human trafficking, human smuggling is voluntary.
2. Human Trafficking as a Threat to National Security
According to Ambassador Richmond, “There are national security implications to human trafficking… We have non-state armed groups like ISIS, West Africa Boko Haram, who are forcing people to labor or forcing people into sex slavery. We also have children in armed conflict as a form of human trafficking, and there are so many different ways that we see expressions of human trafficking that come alongside and cause us to be concerned about our own national security.”
Jerome Elam, President and CEO of the Trafficking in America Task Force and a survivor of human trafficking, discussed how “gangs that used to sell drugs a few times a day,” for example, are “now turning to human trafficking and selling humans about 12 to 15 times a day.” He added that, thanks to cryptocurrency, this number is increasing. Profiting from human trafficking strengthens dangerous gangs and threatens our national security. Additionally, Jerome stated that trafficking by gangs and international organizations ultimately “eats away at the fabric of society,” since profit should not be gained at the expense of someone’s body.
3. Pathways to Citizenship for People Trafficked into the United States
Nate Knapper explained that while different presidential administrations may change policies on immigration, every human trafficking survivor or victim who is technically in the United States illegally has a right to apply for a T visa or U visa. These visas allow them to stay and work in this country legally. Without legal counsel or a pro bono lawyer, however, it is difficult for victims to take advantage of these pathways to legal residence and citizenship. This is often due to survivors not having the “financial means or legal background” to understand what their options are for staying in the United States. Many undocumented survivors may not speak English, creating another barrier to obtaining a T or U visa.
John Freeman, Director of Law Enforcement Operations for the Human Trafficking Institute, added that traffickers are aware of how efficient and successful legal teams can be: they bring a case to a prosecutor, see that it gets closed, that the victim (ideally) receives restitution, and that the trafficker is taken off the streets and put in jail. As a result, many traffickers use psychological and emotional manipulation to prevent victims for reaching out for help or leaving. John Freeman also explained that for undocumented immigrants specifically, traffickers take advantage of the victims’ immigration status and threaten to get them deported or even killed if they leave, “making the level of coercion or exploitation near-crippling.”
4. COVID-19’s Effects on Human Trafficking
The coronavirus, unfortunately, did not put a damper on human trafficking; we actually saw it increase by 40% nationwide. Jayne Bigelsen, the Vice President of Advocacy at Covenant House New York (CHNY), explained that while stay-at-home orders lessened the spread of COVID, many victims were forced to stay home with their traffickers.
Chiquita Tillman, author of I am a Ruby, Not a Sapphire and a survivor of human trafficking, expressed that “fundraisers and donations [to help survivors and victims] have declined” due to the virus and have “limited access to resources” as a result. This has ultimately hurt those experiencing or recovering from commercial exploitation.
Ambassador Richmond added that government stay-at-home orders that required the closing of courts meant that cases were not being processed, meaning that traffickers were not being incarcerated or punished for their actions. This made some survivors worry for their safety and if they would be re-exploited since their traffickers had been “released pre-trial from jail.”
And, just as we used Zoom to get back into the classroom and attend work meetings, traffickers also adapted to find new ways to manipulate people by using various online platforms. Online sex trafficking, as well as online child sex abuse, have been met with an increase during the pandemic due to underground traffickers “targeting children who are home from school,” according to Chiquita.
5. Decriminalization of Prostitution/Sex Work
The full decriminalization of prostitution/sex work isn’t as progressive as one might think, according to Jayne, when asked about the effects of legalization and decriminalization. Instead, she recommends the Equality Model, a model of partial decriminalization where buyers and promoters are jailed, but not the sex workers or victims of sex trafficking.
Speaking to the financial motives of those recruiting others to sell sex, Jayne explained, “If you fully legalize it, that adds more people who are willing to purchase sex and will add more money into the system… That’s more money for pimps and traffickers to make. There’s not enough people out there who are willing to consensually sell sex… so for all that extra money to be made, that’s more of a reason for pimps and traffickers to lure in vulnerable people.”
Jayne also claimed that, with full decriminalization, buyers of sex work and pimps would not be held accountable. For example, one would not be able to call the police if they see young adults (18-20) being recruited for sex work since it (and, by association, recruitment into trafficking rings) would be considered permissible under the law. This would ultimately end up further hurting those who are targeted and bought for sex, especially poor cisgender and transgender women of color.
She added that there is not a clear line between consent and a lack of consent since the young people who do sex work have brains that are not fully developed and may even enter the field due to pressure from family. As a result, many young sex workers share a common thread with victims of trafficking: that they are more susceptible to sexual assault, as well as the anxiety and PTSD that it often causes.
John Freeman also expressed concern for full decriminalization, citing a case in 2005 that he worked on with several agencies and multi-jurisdictional taskforces in San Francisco. He stated that, among the 10 brothels that law enforcement had warrants to search for human traffickers and pimps, not one of the 150 “sex workers” was there willingly. With full decriminalization, law enforcement would not have been able to identify and help the victims of sex trafficking at the brothels.
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Afia, originally from New Jersey, is a rising second-year student at Bowdoin College in Maine. She is currently undeclared, but interested in pursuing an Asian Studies and Government and Legal Studies double major. As a Japanese language student and a budding writer, Afia is no stranger to the power of words, so she is interested in using them to communicate and educate people on important issues. Some of Afia’s favorite hobbies include cooking (especially oatmeal), watching anime, listening to music, and watching random shows on Youtube.
